The Role of Civility and Anonymity of Perceptions of Online Comments
Issue Date
2017Author
Graf, Joseph
Erba, Joseph
Harn, Ren-Whei
Publisher
Taylor & Francis
Type
Article
Article Version
Scholarly/refereed, author accepted manuscript
Metadata
Show full item recordAbstract
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.
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Citation
Graf, J., Erba, J., & Harn, R. W. (2017). The role of civility and anonymity on perceptions of online comments. Mass Communication and Society, 20(4), 526-549.
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