Reporting Hate Comments: Investigating the Effects of Deviance Characteristics, Neutralization Strategies, and Users’ Moral Orientation

Norm violations in comments on social networking sites have raised concerns about the climate of political discourse. In this article, we analyze how comment characteristics and neutralization techniques in potential hate speech comments influence users’ ascription of deviance by reporting negative comments about refugees. We focus on the type of norm violation, subtlety, type of victim, and justifications as comment characteristics. Moreover, we examine the influence of descriptive and injunctive norms on reporting behavior of potential hate comments. Here, we focus on individual’s moral orientation and the perceived level of peer deviance. Results of an online survey ( n = 457) that included a choice-based conjoint design suggest that incitements for violence and direct offenses are more likely to be reported than other types of norm violation and indirect offenses. Moral foundations, indicative of liberal political orientations, fostered reporting behavior, but conservative orientations reduced reporting behavior.

Download Full-text

Confronting Online Extremism

Social Science Computer Review ◽

10.1177/0894439316666272 ◽

2016 ◽

Vol 35 (5) ◽

pp. 587-605 ◽

Cited By ~ 18

Author(s):

Matthew Costello ◽

James Hawdon ◽

Thomas N. Ratliff

Keyword(s):

Social Control ◽

Collective Efficacy ◽

Social Networking Sites ◽

Online Survey ◽

Hate Speech ◽

Strong Relationship ◽

Routine Activity Theory ◽

Routine Activity ◽

Self Help ◽

Youth And Young Adults

Who is likely to be a target of online hate and extremism? To answer this question, we use an online survey ( N = 963) of youth and young adults recruited from a demographically balanced sample of Americans. Adapting routine activity theory, we distinguish between actor-initiated social control (i.e., self-help), other-initiated social control (i.e., collective efficacy), and guardianship and show how self-help is positively related to the likelihood of being targeted by hate. Our findings highlight how online exposure to hate materials, target suitability, and enacting social control online all influence being the target of hate. Using social networking sites and encountering hate material online have a particularly strong relationship with being targeted with victim suitability (e.g., discussing private matters online, participating in hate online) and confronting hate also influencing the likelihood of being the target of hate speech.

Download Full-text

Perceptions of the appropriate response to norm violation in 57 societies

Nature Communications ◽

10.1038/s41467-021-21602-9 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 12 (1) ◽

Author(s):

Kimmo Eriksson ◽

Pontus Strimling ◽

Michele Gelfand ◽

Junhui Wu ◽

Jered Abernathy ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Social Behaviors ◽

Cultural Variation ◽

Negative Relation ◽

Norm Violations ◽

Norm Enforcement ◽

Norm Violation ◽

Social Ostracism

AbstractNorm enforcement may be important for resolving conflicts and promoting cooperation. However, little is known about how preferred responses to norm violations vary across cultures and across domains. In a preregistered study of 57 countries (using convenience samples of 22,863 students and non-students), we measured perceptions of the appropriateness of various responses to a violation of a cooperative norm and to atypical social behaviors. Our findings highlight both cultural universals and cultural variation. We find a universal negative relation between appropriateness ratings of norm violations and appropriateness ratings of responses in the form of confrontation, social ostracism and gossip. Moreover, we find the country variation in the appropriateness of sanctions to be consistent across different norm violations but not across different sanctions. Specifically, in those countries where use of physical confrontation and social ostracism is rated as less appropriate, gossip is rated as more appropriate.

Download Full-text

The Interplay of Online Network Homogeneity, Populist Attitudes, and Conspiratorial Beliefs: Empirical Evidence From a Survey on German Facebook Users

International Journal of Public Opinion Research ◽

10.1093/ijpor/edaa036 ◽

2020 ◽

Author(s):

Manuel Cargnino

Keyword(s):

Social Networking ◽

Empirical Evidence ◽

Social Networking Sites ◽

Online Survey ◽

Process Information ◽

Negatively Associated

Abstract Social networking sites are suspected to impede the communication between members of different political camps and thereby increase network homogeneity. This homogeneity can be a result of humans’ tendency to process information in confirmatory ways—a characteristic which is also ascribed to populist citizens and those who hold conspiratorial beliefs. It is hypothesized that populist views and conspiratorial beliefs are associated with higher exposure to like-minded information within Facebook. An online survey with German Facebook users (N = 469) revealed that populist attitudes are positively associated with conspiratorial beliefs but negatively associated with homogeneity. Conspiratorial beliefs are unrelated to homogeneity. Findings are discussed in the light of extant research.

Download Full-text

How Downward and Upward Comparisons on Facebook Influence Grandiose and Vulnerable Narcissists’ Self-Esteem—A Priming Study

Behavioral Sciences ◽

10.3390/bs11030039 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 11 (3) ◽

pp. 39

Author(s):

Phillip Ozimek ◽

Hans-Werner Bierhoff ◽

Elke Rohmann

Keyword(s):

Social Networking Sites ◽

Online Survey ◽

Social Comparisons ◽

Past Research ◽

Self Esteem ◽

Self Report ◽

Control Group ◽

Experimental Conditions ◽

Vulnerable Narcissism ◽

And Control

Past research showed that social networking sites represent perfect platforms to satisfy narcissistic needs. The present study aimed to investigate how grandiose (GN) and vulnerable narcissism (VN) as well as social comparisons are associated with Facebook activity, which was measured with a self-report on three activity dimensions: Acting, Impressing, and Watching. In addition, the state self-esteem (SSE) was measured with respect to performance, social behavior, and appearance. One hundred and ten participants completed an online survey containing measures of SSE and Facebook activity and a priming procedure with three experimental conditions embedded in a social media context (upward comparison, downward comparison, and control group). Results indicated, as expected, that high VN was negatively associated with SSE on each subscale and the overall score. In addition, it was found that VN, but not GN, displayed positive associations with frequency of Facebook activities. Finally, it was proposed and confirmed that VN in interaction with the priming of downward comparisons negatively affected SSE. The conclusion drawn is that VN represents a key variable for the prediction of self-esteem as well as for the frequency of Facebook activity.

Download Full-text

Analyzing the Perceived Utility of Covid-19 Countermeasures: The Role of Pronominalization, Moral Foundations, Moral Disengagement, Fake News Embracing, and Health Anxiety

Psychological Reports ◽

10.1177/00332941211027829 ◽

2021 ◽

pp. 003329412110278

Author(s):

Alessandro Ansani ◽

Marco Marini ◽

Christian Cecconi ◽

Daniele Dragoni ◽

Elena Rinallo ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Structural Equation ◽

Moral Disengagement ◽

Online Survey ◽

Health Anxiety ◽

Personal Characteristics ◽

Moral Values ◽

Equation Model ◽

Moral Foundations ◽

Fake News ◽

Perceived Utility

An online survey (N = 210) is presented on how the perceived utility of correct and exaggerated countermeasures against Covid-19 is affected by different pronominalization strategies (impersonal form, you, we). In evaluating the pronominalization effect, we have statistically controlled for the roles of several personal characteristics: Moral Disengagement, Moral Foundations, Health Anxiety, and Embracing of Fake News. Results indicate that, net of personal proclivities, the you form decreases the perceived utility of exaggerated countermeasures, possibly due to simulation processes. As a second point, through a Structural Equation Model, we show that binding moral values (Authority, Ingroup, and Purity) positively predict both fake news embracing and perceived utility of exaggerated countermeasures, while individualizing moral values (Harm and Fairness) negatively predict fake news embracing and positively predict the perceived utility of correct countermeasures. Lastly, fake news embracing showed a doubly bad effect: not only does it lead people to judge exaggerated countermeasures as more useful; but, more dangerously, it brings them to consider correct countermeasures as less useful in the struggle against the pandemic.

Download Full-text

#SocialMedia: Exploring the Relationship of Social Networking Sites on Body Image, Self-Esteem, and Eating Disorders

Social Media + Society ◽

10.1177/2056305117704407 ◽

2017 ◽

Vol 3 (2) ◽

pp. 205630511770440 ◽

Cited By ~ 8

Author(s):

Sara Santarossa ◽

Sarah J. Woodruff

Keyword(s):

Body Image ◽

Eating Disorder ◽

Social Networking ◽

Social Networking Sites ◽

Online Survey ◽

Self Esteem ◽

Social Networking Site ◽

Dependent Relationship ◽

Relationship Of ◽

The Relationship

The aim of this study was to investigate whether problematic social networking site (SNS) use (i.e., degree of dependent relationship with SNSs), total SNS time/day, total SNS friends, and specific SNS activities were related to body image (BI), self-esteem (SE), and eating disorder (ED) symptoms/concerns. A sample of young adults ( N = 147) completed an online survey which measured SNS usage, problematic SNS use, BI, SE, and ED symptom/concerns. The findings revealed that females and males spent 4.1 ± 3.9 and 2.9 ± 2.8 hr on SNS, respectively, with the majority of time spent lurking (i.e., looking at another users’ profile but not actually communicating with them). Furthermore, problematic SNS use was found to be related to BI, SE, and ED symptoms/concerns. Moreover, SNS activities, such as lurking and posting comments on others’ profiles, were found to be related to BI, whereas SNS total time was found to be related to ED symptoms/concerns. Overall, this study demonstrates the possible correlational influence of SNSs on BI, SE, and ED symptoms/concerns.

Download Full-text

YouTube based religious hate speech and extremism detection dataset with machine learning baselines

Journal of Intelligent & Fuzzy Systems ◽

10.3233/jifs-219264 ◽

2021 ◽

pp. 1-9

Author(s):

Noman Ashraf ◽

Abid Rafiq ◽

Sabur Butt ◽

Hafiz Muhammad Faisal Shehzad ◽

Grigori Sidorov ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Machine Learning ◽

Social Networking ◽

Social Networking Sites ◽

Nearest Neighbor ◽

Hate Speech ◽

Support Vector ◽

K Nearest Neighbor ◽

Speech Detection ◽

Supervised Learning Algorithms ◽

Youtube Videos

On YouTube, billions of videos are watched online and millions of short messages are posted each day. YouTube along with other social networking sites are used by individuals and extremist groups for spreading hatred among users. In this paper, we consider religion as the most targeted domain for spreading hate speech among people of different religions. We present a methodology for the detection of religion-based hate videos on YouTube. Messages posted on YouTube videos generally express the opinions of users’ related to that video. We provide a novel dataset for religious hate speech detection on Youtube comments. The proposed methodology applies data mining techniques on extracted comments from religious videos in order to filter religion-oriented messages and detect those videos which are used for spreading hate. The supervised learning algorithms: Support Vector Machine (SVM), Logistic Regression (LR), and k-Nearest Neighbor (k-NN) are used for baseline results.

Download Full-text

Connecting and being connected: investigating friending practices across multiple social networking sites

Information Technology and People ◽

10.1108/itp-07-2020-0486 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol ahead-of-print (ahead-of-print) ◽

Author(s):

Chien Wen Yuan ◽

Yu-Hao Lee

Keyword(s):

Social Capital ◽

Social Networking ◽

Social Networking Sites ◽

Online Survey ◽

Social Ties ◽

Relationship Maintenance ◽

Strong Ties ◽

Content Type ◽

Bonding Social Capital ◽

Amazon's Mechanical Turk

PurposeSocial networking sites (SNSs) offer people the possibility of maintaining larger networks of social ties, which also entails more complex relationship maintenance across multiple platforms. Whom to “friend” and via which platform can involve complex deliberations. This study investigates the relationships between users' perceived friending affordances of five popular SNSs (Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Snapchat and LinkedIn) and their friending behaviors concerning strong ties, weak ties (existing and latent ties) and parasocial ties.Design/methodology/approachAn online survey using Qualtrics was provided to participants (N = 626) through Amazon's Mechanical Turk (MTurk). The survey asked their SNS use and their friending behaviors with different ties on each of the sites.FindingsUsers' friending decisions are dependent on an interplay of socio-technical affordances of each SNS and specific needs for the ties. The authors found that the affordances of bridging social capital and enjoyment are aligned with friending weak and parasocial ties, respectively. The affordances of bonding social capital were not valued to friend strong ties.Originality/valueThe study extends the affordance and social capital literature by assessing users' perceived, contextualized SNS affordances in relation to actual communication behaviors in friending different social ties. This approach provides contextualized insights to friending decisions and practices on SNSs.

Download Full-text

Association of the Individualizing and Binding Moral Foundations with Conceptions of Motherland in Russia

Sibirskiy psikhologicheskiy zhurnal ◽

10.17223/17267080/80/6 ◽

2021 ◽

pp. 107-127

Author(s):

O.A. Sychev ◽

◽

K.I. Belousov ◽

Keyword(s):

Content Analysis ◽

Online Survey ◽

Necessary Condition ◽

Moral Foundations ◽

Moral Norms ◽

Positive Image ◽

Russian Version ◽

Moral Content ◽

Frequent Use ◽

High Level

Patriotism and attitude to the motherland attract much interest of researchers in the field of social sciences, although psychological foundations of these phenomena have not been sufficiently studied. On the basis of Moral Foundations Theory (by J. Haidt) we hypothesized that the characteristics of the moral sphere may be associated with some ideas about the motherland. In particular, binding moral foundations (including loyalty, authority and purity) which are more typical for conservatives should support positive patriotic ideas about the homeland. The low level of binding moral foundations can be related with a critical attitude towards the motherland, the presence of negative assessments of their country. This assump-tion is supported by the results of past studies of patriotism among individuals with different ideological views. The individualizing moral foundations dominating among liberals can be associated with a less global and narrower view of the motherland, which is linked with con-cepts of “family” and “home” rather than “society” or “country”. The aim of this study was to analyze the association between the individualizing and binding moral foundations with the content of ideas about the motherland. The important task of the study was to develop the Russian version of the moral foundations dictionary, which is necessary for analyzing the moral content of ideas about the motherland. To test the hypotheses we conducted a paper-pencil and online survey, obtained data included the answers on Moral Foundations Question-naire and textual answers characterizing the image of the motherland. The sample comprised 831 people (72% women) from 11 regions of Russia. Text responses were processed via com-puter content analysis in the LIWC program (by J. Pennebaker) using the moral foundations dictionary (all categories) and the general dictionary (10 categories most relevant to the prob-lem). To analyze the relations between the results of content analysis and MFQ questionnaire we calculated correlations of the individualizing and binding moral foundations with the presence or absence of each category in the participants’ responses. The results of the correlation analysis indicate that the individualizing moral foundations supports relatively narrow ideas about the motherland, associated with family and home, while people with a high level of binding moral foundations associate the motherland mostly with society and religion. Binding moral founda-tions support a positive image of the motherland, which is manifested in the more frequent use of positive assessments and avoidance of negative evaluations. Persons with a high level of binding moral foundations tend to ignore negative phenomena in the country, reflecting a violation of the individualizing moral norms (care and fairness). In particular, they less often mention violations of human rights and the poverty of the country's inhabitants. The necessary condition analysis revealed the effect of binding moral foundations as a necessary but insuffi-cient condition for maintaining a positive image of the motherland and the absence of negative ideas about it.

Download Full-text

Realizing a Global Survey of Emigrants through Facebook and Instagram

10.31219/osf.io/y36vr ◽

2021 ◽

Author(s):

Steffen Pötzschke ◽

Bernd Weiß

Keyword(s):

Social Networking Sites ◽

Cost Efficiency ◽

Online Survey ◽

Target Population ◽

Global Scale ◽

German Population ◽

Asian Countries ◽

Sampling Frame ◽

German Citizenship ◽

Cross National

Research on international migrants has seen a sharp increase during the last decades, yet sampling them remains a major challenge, especially in a cross-national setting and on a global scale. While various sampling methods are established in the field, most of them cannot easily be implemented globally due to their dependence on specific administrative or infrastructure elements or simply their costs. Since Social Networking Sites (SNS) operate on a global scale, they provide a sampling frame that can be utilized for the targeted recruitment of migrants worldwide. Increasingly used for research purposes and among the largest and most popular SNSs are Facebook and Instagram. In our project GEOOS (German Emigrants Overseas Online Survey), we utilize paid advertisements on these networks to target German emigrants, particularly Germans living outside of Europe. Our research aims to ascertain whether such ads could be used to recruit a nonprobability (migrant) sample on a global scale. More specifically, we are interested in the success of this approach concerning three performance indicators: Cost efficiency, coverage, and sample size. Our advertisement campaign ran for 18 days and resulted in total costs of about 2,223 Euro. This investment led a total of 3,895 individuals to complete the survey; of those, 98 percent belonged to the target population, meaning they were (a) either born in Germany or held German citizenship and (b) did not live in Germany. GEOOS participants lived in a total of 148 countries and territories around the globe. Similar to findings reported in previous studies on this target population, the largest sub-groups resided in predominantly Anglo-phone countries; however, taken together, participants in these countries only constitute 38 percent of our overall sample, with nearly a quarter of GEOOS participants (n = 867) living in Middle and South America, 862 residing in Asian countries, and 476 in Africa. Furthermore, a considerable share of our sample is constituted by individuals who would either not have been included in a sampling frame based on German population registers or who would have been unlikely to be reached through this method due to incomplete or outdated information.

Download Full-text