“I Just Want to Feel Safe”: A Diary Study of Safety Perceptions on Social Media

Social media can increase social capital, provide entertainment, and enable meaningful discourse. However, threats to safety experienced on social media platforms can inhibt users’ ability to gain these benefits. Threats to safety—whether real or perceived—detract from the pleasure people get out of their online interactions and damage the quality of online social spaces. While prior work has individually explored specific threats to safety – privacy, security, harassment – in this work we more broadly capture and characterize the full breadth of day-to-day experiences that influence users’ overall perceptions of safety on social media. We explore these perceptions through a three-week diary study (n=39). We contribute a novel, multidimensional taxonomy of how social media users define ’safety’, centered around security, privacy, and community. We conclude with a discussion of how safety perceptions can be used as a metric for social media quality, and detail the potential for enhancing safety perception through communityenhancing affordances and algorithmic transparency

Trans Time: Safety, Privacy, and Content Warnings on a Transgender-Specific Social Media Site

Trans people often use social media to connect with others, find and share resources, and post transition-related content. However, because most social media platforms are not built with trans people in mind and because online networks include people who may not accept one’s trans identity, sharing trans content can be difficult. We studied Trans Time, a social media site developed particularly for trans people to document transition and build community. We interviewed early Trans Time users (n = 6) and conducted focus groups with potential users (n = 21) to understand how a trans-specific site uniquely supports its users. We found that Trans Time has the potential to be a safe space, encourages privacy, and effectively enables its users to selectively view content using content warnings. Together, safety, privacy, and content warnings create an online space where trans people can simultaneously build community, find support, and express both the mundanity and excitement of trans life. Yet in each of these areas, we also learned ways that the site can improve. We provide implications for how social media sites may better support trans users, as well as insular communities of people from other marginalized groups.Institute for Research on Women and Gender (IRWG)Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/162569/1/HaimsonTransTime.pdfDescription of HaimsonTransTime.pdf : Main articleSEL

Toward A Multi-stakeholder Perspective For Improving Online Content Moderation

Online communities have struggled with malicious behavior, and a major way to combat such abuse is content moderation. While content moderation has been effective in addressing problems in online communities, it also faces various challenges, on the levels of both larger platforms and smaller communities, and these challenges often arise from the varying needs of different stakeholders. For example, global platforms need to consider different values and cultures while dealing with the massive amount of content waiting to be reviewed, and communities with different technological infrastructures also have needs for different rules, moderation strategies, and tools. My dissertation provides a multi-stakeholder perspective of the challenges of online content moderation, provides actionable guidelines to address problems for both volunteer and commercial moderation, and argues that different stakeholders and their associated trade-offs should be a central consideration in online content moderation. In my dissertation, I first describe challenges brought by moderating different technologies by examining the challenges that new platform technology brings to community moderation through a case study of moderating real-time voice on Discord, and argue that community moderators and technology designers should cater to the unique technological infrastructures of individual platforms and communities. My work then investigates the multi-stakeholder tensions in commercial moderation, and reveals varied perceptions of abusive behavior from global social media users, demonstrating the limitations of using a single set of rules to govern global users. Building on my empirical work about the pervasive multi-stakeholder challenges, using a systematic literature review, I propose a framework that centers trade-offs in online content moderation, and show how trade-offs are core to the very definition of content moderation. This dissertation provides deep, empirical understandings of how multiple stakeholders are involved in content moderation, and how ignoring stakeholders&rsquo; needs can lead to serious problems and consequences. By contributing a new way to conceptualize content moderation, my work argues for a future where we start to see different stakeholders, acknowledge their needs, and consciously address the trade-offs between their needs.</p

"My presence is there to be seen for people who judge". Instagram on well-being, body image and body dysmorphic disorder

As social networking site (SNS) use has become increasingly integrated within our daily lives, there is growing concern around the potential impacts SNS use may have on our well-being and body image. However, the interplay between SNS and well-being is complex, and much research continues to rely on self-report measures to capture experiences with SNS. Moreover, previous associations between SNS and body image dissatisfaction point to SNS as playing a role within Body Dysmorphic Disorder (BDD). Therefore, the present project aimed i) to investigate the role of SNS usage patterns on psychological well-being outcomes and ii) to identify and understand the features of SNS use that may influence well-being outcomes from the perspectives of Instagram users, individuals experiencing BDD and clinicians working in the field of BDD, taking a focus on the SNS platform Instagram. A multistage mixed methods approach was employed, implementing psychometric assessment, focus groups and interviews, in addition to ecological momentary assessment (EMA) with objective monitoring. The results of the empirical studies found: i) SNS as combining aspects of both offline and online peer and media influences, whereby appearance is endorsed through interactive features and influential figures on Instagram, ii) appearance anxiety as significant mediator for Instagram use and well-being outcomes, iii) Instagram usage time, number of notifications and number of Instagram launches are not associated with well-being outcomes, iv) Instagram is a platform wherein BDD behaviours are reinforced, but also a place for finding support and connections, and v) Instagram use may contribute towards maintaining BDD symptoms, but may also be a useful tool in therapeutic treatment. Overall, findings of the present project address the features of Instagram that can contribute towards well-being, body image and SNS behavioural patterns, whilst also contributing to knowledge and understanding around SNS use in BDD