Restrictive and Corrective Responses to Uncivil User Comments on News Websites: The Influence of Presumed Influence

ABSTRACT

An online experiment was conducted to examine how the presumed effects of uncivil news comments on other users would influence perceivers’ intention to engage in restrictive or corrective counteractive measures. The results showed that exposure to uncivil comments reduced social desirability and heightened the presumed impact of the comments on others, which, in turn, promoted individuals’ willingness to support comment censorship (restrictive actions) and engage in comment moderation (corrective actions). The study findings provided empirical evidence for an explanation of the relationship between the presumed media influence on others and behavioral responses.     

The Role of Civility and Metacommunication in Facebook Discussions

Social media’s potential for political and social discussion provides great promise since deliberation is key for democracy. Unfortunately, there is a problematic presence of incivility in conversations on digital platforms. We conducted an experiment to examine the effects of this phenomenon, driven by the elaboration likelihood model. Each of our four conditions showed a media outlet’s Facebook post with a story about genetically modified organisms and a comment section beneath with one of the following: a civil discussion, an uncivil discussion, an uncivil conversation with metacommunication encouraging civility, and a control group. Results revealed a mediated relationship of exposure to civil and metacommunicative comments on willingness to engage in a discussion through mental elaboration. We also found evidence of modeling behavior for civility and metacommunication.     

Crowdsourcing civility: A natural experiment examining the effects of distributed moderation in online forums

Participation in discussions about the public interest can be enhanced by technology, but can also create an environment in which participants are overwhelmed by the quantity, quality, and diversity of information and arguments. Political participation is at a greater disadvantage than non-political activities in that participants from different parties already start out with established differences, which requires them to reach some form of common ground before progress can be made. Those seeking authentic deliberation are discouraged to participate when confronted with uncivil and inflammatory rhetoric. These issues are often exacerbated in online discussions, where lack of identity cues and low barriers to entry can lead to heightened incivility between participants, often labeled as “flaming” and “trolling”. This paper explores the extent to which moderator systems, tools online discussion forums use to manage contributions, can reduce information overload and encourage civil conversations in virtual discussion spaces. Using the popular website Slashdot as an example of sound moderation in a public discourse setting, we found that users move toward consensus about which and how comments deserve to be moderated. Using these findings, we explore how transferable these systems are for participation in public matters specifically to the unique attributes of political discussion. Slashdot's political forum provides a comparison group that allowed us to find quantitative and qualitative differences in political posting, comments, and moderation. Our results show that large scale, civil participation is possible with a distributed moderation system that enables regularly lively debates to be conducted positively because the system provides tools for people to enforce norms of civility.     

Out of Sight, (Not Yet) Out of Mind: The Impact of Tie Strength on Direct Interaction and Social Surveillance Among Geographically Close and Long-Distance Facebook Friends

Social networking sites are considered a valuable resource to maintain existing friendships even over considerable distances. The present study emphasizes tie strength as a crucial determinant for the use of interactive and passive features among 302 active Facebook users and friends of different relational closeness (close friends vs. casual friends vs. acquaintances) as well as a moderator for the impact of physical distance. As expected, tie strength affected direct interaction linearly, whereas social surveillance followed a quadratic trend. Furthermore, moderation analyses revealed less frequent direct interaction between close friends and stronger surveillance of casual friends’ profiles as physical distance increases. These results indicate different functions in relationship maintenance for both behaviors as direct interaction aims at nurturing current relationships, while surveillance serves as a catalyst for promising future communications. As a consequence, physical distance influences direct interaction adversely due to emerging constraints but also contains informational value encouraging information-seeking behaviors.     

Civil Interactivity: How News Organizations' Commenting Policies Explain Civility and Hostility in User Comments

The digital transformation of journalism enables new modes of interactivity with the news. While user comments are nearly ubiquitous across news Web sites, there is little understanding about how to improve the quality of discussion spaces that many characterize as hostile and vitriolic. This study uses a keyword content analysis of user comments across 20 news Web sites to understand the organizational policies that encourage more productive dialogue. The findings show that specific policies regarding user registration, moderation of comments, and reputation management systems are effective facilitators of civil discussion.     

Online rulemaking: a step toward E-governance

The adoption of electronic rulemaking by many federal agencies provides an opportunity for a greatly enhanced public role—both in terms of the numbers of people who might participate and the depth of their possible participation. This step towards E-governance poses several challenges for agencies: how they should structure their proceedings, how they can process the comments received and how they can foster and take part in the online communities of interest that will result from this activity. The online tools that may be applied to rulemaking and its ancillary activities—advisory committees, advanced notices of proposed rulemaking and enforcement—can also be used at earlier stages of the legislative process to increase public interest, involvement and commitment. This approach is relevant for all levels of government and for any issue on which public hearings are held or public comment solicited. It can provide an efficient and effective nonadversarial process in which officials and members of the public can mutually define problems and explore alternative solutions.     

Pre‐deliberation moderation on choice dilemmas: proposing a moderation–elasticity theory of choice shift

A moderation–elasticity theory to explain the choice shift is proposed and tested. The theory predicts that group members engage in moderation of initial decision choices in anticipation of future interaction. These moderate choices are strategic in nature, and thus are posited to disappear when anticipated interaction is eliminated. Moderation–elasticity is proposed as a form of predeliberation normative influence. A test of the theory finds support for both moderation and elasticity processes on choice dilemma item decisions.     

Library Social Media Needs to be Evaluated Ethically

Library literature about engagement has drawn from business marketing practices for years which has unsurprisingly influenced our approach towards social media communication. This article will evaluate how continuing this practice without a critical evaluation of the ethics behind marketing practices is contradictory to our institutional values. The principles discussed in this article may be useful for current library workers and administrators looking to engage in reflective practice in their outreach efforts. In response to the pervasiveness of marketing culture in library outreach our field has an obligation to support and encourage authentic interactions with our patrons without jeopardizing what makes us different from businesses. I will explain why a marketing perspective limits our efforts, initiate a discussion about this issue, and highlight some examples of effective engagement.     

The Role of Civility and Anonymity on Perceptions of Online Comments

An experiment was conducted (N = 170) to determine the role of civility and anonymity in online comments received for a news story. Dependent variables were (a) interest in the discussion, (b) favorability toward the comments, (c) favorability toward the commenter, and (d) trust in the information. Participants exposed to uncivil comments viewed the commenter less favorably and reported less trust in the information in the comment. Anonymity had no effect on the dependent variables, in contrast to expectations derived from social presence theory. Findings revealed that politeness of comments affected participants’ overall perceptions of the content of the online discussion.     

A Tutorial on Testing,Visualizing, and Probing an Interaction Involving a Multicategorical Variable in Linear Regression Analysis

Empirical communication scholars and scientists in other fields regularly use regression models to test moderation hypotheses. When the independent variable X and moderator M are dichotomous or continuous, the practice of testing a linear moderation hypothesis using regression analysis by including the product of X and M in a model of dependent variable Y is widespread. However, many research designs include multicategorical independent variables or moderators, such as in an experiment with three or more versions of a stimulus where participants are randomly assigned to one of them. Researchers are less likely to receive training about how to properly test a moderation hypothesis using regression analysis in such a situation. In this tutorial, we explain how to test, visualize, and probe interactions involving a multicategorical variable using linear regression analysis. While presenting and discussing the fundamentals—fundamentals that are not software specific—we emphasize the use of the PROCESS macro for SPSS and SAS, as it greatly simplifies the computations and potential for error that exists when doing computations by hand or using spreadsheets based on formulas in existing books on this topic. We also introduce an iterative computational implementation of the Johnson-Neyman technique for finding regions of significance of the effect of a multicategorical independent variable when the moderator is continuous.     

On arXiv moderation system

The advent of arXiv has revolutionized scientific communication. However, its cultural significance goes far beyond simply accelerating scholarly communication. The arXiv gave a powerful impetus to the democratization of science, freeing young scientists and not only, especially from totalitarian countries, from authoritarian oppression. Many of arXiv's innovative features have been blurred by the introduction of a moderation system. Without a doubt, a moderation system is essential to maintain the quality of arXiv content. However, I believe that it can be improved in line with arXiv's original intentions, using the very successful experience of the MathOverflow moderation system.     

The role of emotions for citizen engagement via social media – A study of police departments using twitter

Police departments increasingly use social media for enhancing their relationships with citizens. However, little is known about how specific characteristics of police-initiated messages affect whether and to what extent citizens engage with the former. This study looks at 11 large police departments using Twitter in Germany. Based on a multimethod approach, it explores the effect of content type and two emotional elements (i.e. arousal and valence) of tweets on different dimensions of citizen engagement. The latter is measured as observable online behavioral responses to police tweets in form of likes, comments, and retweets. The results suggest that emotional arousal (i.e. the emotional intensity of a tweet) plays a key role in triggering all forms of citizen engagement, while emotional valence (more specifically, the negativity of a tweet) largely shows no effect. Moreover, the impact of content type (informative versus interactive) varies across the different engagement dimensions.     

Characterizing University Library Use of Social Media: A Case Study of Twitter and Facebook from Australia

The work presented here characterise the engagement of one university library with two social media platforms popular with academic libraries. The collected data are analysed to identify the forms of Twitter and Facebook activity that engage library stakeholders in social media conversations. Associations were observed between: i) directed tweets from the library and mentions of the library by others on Twitter; and ii) comments from the library and comments from others on Facebook. Three broad classes of Twitter user interacting with the library were revealed: i) accounts strongly linked to the library with multiple to/from tweets; ii) those weakly linked to the library with, typically, a single tweet; and iii) those indirectly linked to the library through tweets mentioning the library and sent by other users. Two divergent forms of Facebook interaction with the library were highlighted: i) a library post generating a large sequence of comments, typically in response to a competition/challenge; and ii) a library post with no comments, typically a photo post or a post inviting readers to click a link to find out more about an event/service. The work presented here is an initial investigation that provides useful insights, and offers a methodology for future research.     

Maintaining neutrality: A sentiment analysis of police agency Facebook pages before and after a fatal officer-involved shooting of a citizen

Increased attention to and scrutiny of fatal police shootings across the U.S. is often credited to the rise of social media sites such as Facebook and Twitter, which provide a platform for citizens to publicly engage with police agencies. On its face, this type of citizen engagement appears to realize the promise of social media in the public sector to increase agency accountability, transparency, and legitimacy. However, research suggests that police agencies primarily use social media as a way to manage their public image, rather than for citizen engagement. In addition, the degree to which citizens use social media to hold police agencies accountable is unclear. We examined both sides by analyzing the emotional tone (sentiment) of over 350,000 police agency Facebook posts and user comments after a fatal officer-involved shooting of a citizen in 2016. On average, police agency posts were decidedly neutral in tone and did not change in the post-shooting time period, suggesting they did not post more positive content after the shooting in an attempt to bolster their public image. While user comments were more negative compared to pre-shooting levels, on average, the magnitude of the change was small, essentially neutral, and increased almost to pre-shooting levels very quickly. We also found small differences in user comment sentiment based on the race and armed status of the victim, but not in the expected direction. The findings provide evidence about how police agencies and users react to a police shooting on Facebook and raises critical questions about the ability of social media to serve as a meaningful tool for citizen engagement and accountability.     

Shared Entertainment,Shared Opinions: The Influence of Social TV Comments on the Evaluation of Talent Shows

The present research investigated whether co-viewer comments in social TV interactions are able to enhance or weaken media effects. With the example of talent shows, the valence of co-viewer comments (pro/contra/none) as well as the type of content (antisocial behavior vs. conventional performance) were varied in an experiment (N = 117). Results showed that participants’ own comments and their private attitudes about the judges varied in line with comment valence. Findings suggest that social TV viewers are prone to social influence of their co-viewers, which might amplify problems regarding the portrayal of antisocial behavior in reality TV.     

Deliberation 2.0: Comparing the Deliberative Quality of Online News User Comments Across Platforms

As news organizations look toward social networking sites as a way to expand their audience, the present article explores how this trend might impact discussion among users of political news content. A content analysis of user comments left by readers of the Washington Post suggests that when it comes to discussing political news, there are significant differences in the deliberative quality of those who access the news directly through the news organization's Web site and those who access the same news via Facebook. In short, comments left by Web site users exhibited greater deliberative quality than those left by Facebook users.     

Examining public acquisition of science knowledge from social media in Singapore: an extension of the cognitive mediation model

This study extends the cognitive mediation model (CMM) by examining the role of social media in cultivating public science knowledge. A sample of 901 Singaporeans was collected through an online survey panel. The results showed that the CMM could be applied to a social media context with a focus on science literacy. Specifically, the findings indicated that people with higher levels of surveillance gratification and social utility motivations tended to pay more attention and to elaborate more about science news that they encounter on social media. Likewise, people with greater social utility motivation tended to engage in greater interpersonal discussions on social media. Notably, attention to news on social media had an indirect association with science knowledge through news elaboration and interpersonal discussion on social media. Implications for theory and practice for science communication were discussed.     

The Partisan Child: Developmental Provocation as a Model of Political Socialization

While recent research highlights the child’s active rolein her own political socialization, this study represents thefirst test of the premise that political identification proceedsas adolescents prompt feedback from parents. I propose a modelof developmental provocation in which adolescents’ interestin an election campaign, once stimulated by news media use,motivates them to engage parents in political conversations.By initiating discussion, adolescents can generate informationfrom parents as a basis for comparison, contrast, reflection,and debate—all of these activities might foster partyand ideological identity. Results from survey panel data supportthe model. The field setting is Lubbock, Texas, during the finalweeks of the 2000 presidential campaign. The stunning aftermathof the election, including the dispute over ballot recountsin Florida, provided a unique opportunity to examine politicalsocialization. Child-initiated discussion generated both parentalencouragement and defensive admonitions, reflecting structuralchanges in family communication patterns. Despite controls fordemographics and parent-initiated discussion, child-initiatedconversation and the resulting feedback predicted an increasein the likelihood that an adolescent would adopt a politicalidentity.     

War on women: interlocking conflicts within The Vagina Monologues in China

Chinese university students’ promotion and performance of the feminist play The Vagina Monologues in 2013 triggered a heated debate and a strain of misogyny in social media, which demonstrate how people perceive feminism in China. Through quantitative content analysis and qualitative text analysis of 533 online comments on this feminist activity, this paper investigates the conflicts and contradictions within feminism in China and four frames (meaning packages) are identified. Three of them, namely the ‘public–private conflict’ frame, the ‘Western-Chinese conflict’ frame, the ‘class conflict’ frame, were employed to express opposition, whereas only one feminist frame held a supportive stance. Feminism in China is found to be perceived as morally deviant, foreign-rooted, and intertwined with issues like nationalism, social polarization, and a modernization-tradition contradiction. In this event, social media facilitated the diffusion of misogyny as well as served as public sphere wherein diverse and deliberative discussion was allowed.     

Gender and Leadership in Academic Libraries

This study considers academic library personnel perceptions of gender and leadership associated with three obstacles – family, “double binds”, social capital – identified by Alice Eagly and Linda Carli in 2007. A survey was created that provides prompts to measure perception of these obstacles as they apply to both genders. Ninety-two library personnel from a random sample completed the survey. Findings from a t-test that describe and interpret the results are presented, along with themes coded from survey comments. Suggestions Eagly and Carli offer to improve leadership equity are adapted specifically to academic libraries.