Why Do People Share Ideologically Extreme, False, and Misleading Content on Social Media? A Self–Report and Trace Data–Based Analysis of Countermedia Content Dissemination on Facebook and Twitter
Publication: Human Communication Research, 46(4):357-384, 2020
Abstract
This study correlated self-report and trace data measures of political incivility. Specifically, we asked respondents to provide estimates of the degree to which they engage in uncivil political communication online. These estimates were then compared to computational measures of uncivil social media discussion behavior. The results indicated that those that self- disclose uncivil online behavior also tend to generate content on social media that is uncivil as identified by Google’s Perspective Application Programming Interface. Taken as a whole, this work suggests that combining self-report and behavioral trace data may be a fruitful means of developing multi-method measures of complex communication behaviors.
Keywords
incivility; political discussion; toxicity; survey; computational social sciences Manuscript word count (including body; citations; endnotes; tables and figures): 7
How to Cite
Hopp, T., Ferrucci, P., & Vargo, C. (2020). Why Do People Share Ideologically Extreme, False, and Misleading Content on Social Media? A Self–Report and Trace Data–Based Analysis of Countermedia Content Dissemination on Facebook and Twitter. Human Communication Research, 46(4), 357–384. https://doi.org/10.1093/hcr/hqz022
Version and Rights
This is the author preprint. For the final published version, see the DOI above.