How does social media content go viral across platforms? Modelling the spread of Kamala is brat across X, TikTok, and Instagram

Abstract

The article addresses cross-platform movement of viral social media content in the context of high-profile election campaigns. Social media is influential in election outcomes but understanding the scope, reach, and spread of viral content is challenging as it increasingly travels across platforms. Applying an innovative form of social network analysis (SNA) to datasets collected from X, Instagram, and TikTok (N = 396), the paper maps the spread of the kamala is brat meme in the run-up to the 2024 US presidential election. It demonstrates a five-stage process of cross-platform spread, showing how content emerges on X, is adapted on TikTok and Instagram, and molds to the contours of individual platforms, before resurging on X. A viral contagion model is proposed that can be used to leverage the soft-power of social media for political success, putting forward recommendations for doing so. The paper’s methodologically innovative approach – mapping viral spread on small datasets – looks to the future of a rapidly evolving technological landscape, and is well-suited for continued change.

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