nationalism and social media-driven political communication have fundamentally reshaped the formation of youth political identity in the contemporary post-truth era. This research examines how algorithmic infrastructures, platform-specific content distribution systems, and misinformation ecosystems influence political perception, ideological alignment, and identity construction among young users. The study synthesizes interdisciplinary literature from political communication, computational social science, and digital media studies to develop a comprehensive analytical framework of digitally mediated nationalism.

Findings indicate that youth political identity is increasingly shaped by algorithmic personalization and participatory media environments rather than traditional institutions such as education systems or legacy news media. Social media platforms amplify emotionally charged narratives, enabling rapid diffusion of nationalist discourse while simultaneously embedding users within echo chambers and fragmented information ecosystems (Hong and Nadler, 2012; Meraz and Papacharissi, 2013). Furthermore, the post-truth condition intensifies epistemic uncertainty, where subjective belief systems often outweigh objective factual verification in political reasoning (Kluknavska and Eisele, 2023).

The research highlights that digital nationalism is not a uniform ideology but a dynamic, platform-dependent construct shaped by algorithmic curation, peer-to-peer engagement, and influencer-driven communication structures. Youth engagement is particularly significant due to their high digital literacy and dependence on social networking platforms for political information consumption (Lee and Xenos, 2022). However, this engagement is also associated with increased vulnerability to misinformation, ideological polarization, and fragmented civic participation.

By integrating agenda-setting theory, networked gatekeeping models, and computational content analysis frameworks, this study proposes a multi-layered model of digital political identity formation. The research concludes that digital nationalism represents both an opportunity for civic mobilization and a challenge to democratic deliberation in the post-truth information ecosystem.

Digital nationalism, social media politics, youth political identity, post-truth era, algorithmic influence, misinformation, echo chambers, political communication, computational social science, agenda-setting theory

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