Sub-Standards and Mal-Practices: Misinformation's Role in Insular,
Polarized, and Toxic Interactions
- URL: http://arxiv.org/abs/2301.11486v2
- Date: Wed, 19 Jul 2023 16:27:02 GMT
- Title: Sub-Standards and Mal-Practices: Misinformation's Role in Insular,
Polarized, and Toxic Interactions
- Authors: Hans W. A. Hanley, Zakir Durumeric
- Abstract summary: We examine the role of misinformation in sparking political incivility and toxicity on Reddit.
We find that Reddit comments in response to articles on websites known to spread misinformation are 71.4% more likely to be toxic than comments responding to authentic news articles.
- Score: 4.357949911556638
- License: http://arxiv.org/licenses/nonexclusive-distrib/1.0/
- Abstract: How do users and communities respond to news from unreliable sources? How
does news from these sources change online conversations? In this work, we
examine the role of misinformation in sparking political incivility and
toxicity on the social media platform Reddit. Utilizing the Google Jigsaw
Perspective API to identify toxicity, hate speech, and other forms of
incivility, we find that Reddit comments posted in response to articles on
websites known to spread misinformation are 71.4% more likely to be toxic than
comments responding to authentic news articles. Identifying specific instances
of incivility and utilizing an exponential random graph model, we then show
that when reacting to a misinformation story, Reddit users are more likely to
be toxic to users of different political beliefs. Finally, utilizing a
zero-inflated negative binomial regression, we identify that as the toxicity of
subreddits increases, users are more likely to comment on
misinformation-related submissions.
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