The Spreading of Hostility: Unraveling of Social Norms in Communication

This work investigates the relationship between social norms, the shared rules that provide the standard of behavior, and online hate speech. We test our hypotheses empirically with three different online field experiments. Each chapter thus addresses a particular perspective of the relation between social norms and hate speech. In the first study, we compare informal verbal sanctions and censoring hateful content as interventions to tackle online hate. The interventions are based on two conceptualizations of social norms commonly found in the literature: i) the observed pattern of behavior or descriptive norm, and ii) informal social sanctions or the injunctive norm. The results suggest that adherence to the social norm in online conversations might be motivated by the observed pattern of behavior. In the second study, we test the assumption that observing an increasing number of norm violations in the local context will result in a decreased willingness to follow the norm, which will eventually result in the breakdown of the norm. In the last study, we explain the rise in online hate speech after terrorist attacks by the terrorist attacks creating a situation of normative uncertainty in which the previous consensus on the social norm against the public expression of hate erodes. Taken as a whole, the chapters represent an up-to-date general picture of the determinants of how social norms affect hate speech. All the conclusions come from original empirical work. Our data show that highlighting the anti-hate norm results in reduced levels of online hate speech. We also show that the presentation of the norm matters and the observed pattern of behavior is often a powerful normative cue. The descriptive norm seems of key importance for the regulation and they might help to design effective social norm interventions against online hate speech. Different individual characteristics, such as gender, might also affect the way people respond to normative cues. Finally, not only the behavior of others produce normative changes, but events that affect the normative certainty can also impact the anti-hate norm. Particularly events that increase normative uncertainty can amplify influence processes because people resolve the uncertainty by looking at existing patterns of behavior in the context

Norms of prejudice: political identity and polarization

The USA is fast becoming a ‘majority–minority’ country in which Whites will no longer comprise the numerically dominant racial group. Prior studies have linked Whites’ status decline to heightened in-group solidarity and the feeling that Whites, as a group, face growing discrimination. In the light of these findings, we examine the extent to which a social norm controlling anti-White prejudice is now discernible in the USA. Drawing from an original survey measuring Americans’ reactions to racially-offensive speech, we examine second-order beliefs about the social inappropriateness of offensive statements targeting White Americans. We find that White Americans (in comparison to non-Whites) are indeed more likely to profess a social norm governing anti-white prejudice. The pattern is most discernible among white Republicans whom we expect to be most fearful of demographic change. This article is part of the theme issue ‘Social norm change: drivers and consequences’

Observing many researchers using the same data and hypothesis reveals a hidden universe of uncertainty

This study explores how researchers’ analytical choices affect the reliability of scientific findings. Most discussions of reliability problems in science focus on systematic biases. We broaden the lens to emphasize the idiosyncrasy of conscious and unconscious decisions that researchers make during data analysis. We coordinated 161 researchers in 73 research teams and observed their research decisions as they used the same data to independently test the same prominent social science hypothesis: that greater immigration reduces support for social policies among the public. In this typical case of social science research, research teams reported both widely diverging numerical findings and substantive conclusions despite identical start conditions. Researchers’ expertise, prior beliefs, and expectations barely predict the wide variation in research outcomes. More than 95% of the total variance in numerical results remains unexplained even after qualitative coding of all identifiable decisions in each team’s workflow. This reveals a universe of uncertainty that remains hidden when considering a single study in isolation. The idiosyncratic nature of how researchers’ results and conclusions varied is a previously underappreciated explanation for why many scientific hypotheses remain contested. These results call for greater epistemic humility and clarity in reporting scientific findings

Observing many researchers using the same data and hypothesis reveals a hidden universe of uncertainty

Significance Will different researchers converge on similar findings when analyzing the same data? Seventy-three independent research teams used identical cross-country survey data to test a prominent social science hypothesis: that more immigration will reduce public support for government provision of social policies. Instead of convergence, teams’ results varied greatly, ranging from large negative to large positive effects of immigration on social policy support. The choices made by the research teams in designing their statistical tests explain very little of this variation; a hidden universe of uncertainty remains. Considering this variation, scientists, especially those working with the complexities of human societies and behavior, should exercise humility and strive to better account for the uncertainty in their work. Abstract This study explores how researchers’ analytical choices affect the reliability of scientific findings. Most discussions of reliability problems in science focus on systematic biases. We broaden the lens to emphasize the idiosyncrasy of conscious and unconscious decisions that researchers make during data analysis. We coordinated 161 researchers in 73 research teams and observed their research decisions as they used the same data to independently test the same prominent social science hypothesis: that greater immigration reduces support for social policies among the public. In this typical case of social science research, research teams reported both widely diverging numerical findings and substantive conclusions despite identical start conditions. Researchers’ expertise, prior beliefs, and expectations barely predict the wide variation in research outcomes. More than 95% of the total variance in numerical results remains unexplained even after qualitative coding of all identifiable decisions in each team’s workflow. This reveals a universe of uncertainty that remains hidden when considering a single study in isolation. The idiosyncratic nature of how researchers’ results and conclusions varied is a previously underappreciated explanation for why many scientific hypotheses remain contested. These results call for greater epistemic humility and clarity in reporting scientific findings

The Crowdsourced Replication Initiative: Investigating Immigration and Social Policy Preferences. Executive Report.

In an era of mass migration, social scientists, populist parties and social movements raise concerns over the future of immigration-destination societies. What impacts does this have on policy and social solidarity? Comparative cross-national research, relying mostly on secondary data, has findings in different directions. There is a threat of selective model reporting and lack of replicability. The heterogeneity of countries obscures attempts to clearly define data-generating models. P-hacking and HARKing lurk among standard research practices in this area.This project employs crowdsourcing to address these issues. It draws on replication, deliberation, meta-analysis and harnessing the power of many minds at once. The Crowdsourced Replication Initiative carries two main goals, (a) to better investigate the linkage between immigration and social policy preferences across countries, and (b) to develop crowdsourcing as a social science method. The Executive Report provides short reviews of the area of social policy preferences and immigration, and the methods and impetus behind crowdsourcing plus a description of the entire project. Three main areas of findings will appear in three papers, that are registered as PAPs or in process

Supplementary materials for Exposition to xenophobic content and support for right-wing populism: The asymmetric role of gender

This paper studies whether exposure to anti-immigrant sentiment in the online context affects the willingness to support an openly anti-immigration party, and shows how gender moderates the effect. We designed an online experiment in which participants were invited to an online forum to discuss immigration issues. We manipulate the social acceptability of xenophobic views by exposing participants to an increasing proportion of comments with anti-immigrant content. As a proxy for open support for anti-immigrant policies, we ask participants to donate to a well-known German party with a strong anti-immigration discourse: Alternative für Deutschland (Alternative for Germany). We find no evidence that exposure to increasing social acceptability of xenophobic content affected the willingness to donate. In an exploratory analysis, we find that women are particularly reluctant to donate after the anti-immigrant comments raised normative concerns. The results can shed light on the heterogeneous effect of counter-normative discourses on support for anti-immigrant parties

Uncovering Hidden Opinions: Social Norms and the Expression of Xenophobic Attitudes

Data and code for replication of the results, plots and tables of the articl

Homophily and Ethnic Background in the Classroom

The research presents a study of ethnic homophily, i.e. the tendency of agents to be connected to similar others, in the school context. It uses two observations of the complete social network of a cohort of Swedish students (n=115) in a secondary school. The study analyses the scope of the selective attachment and the student’s possible motivations to seek similarity, as well as its interrelation to homophily induced by structural organization or foci. It focuses in the interrelation between the individual motivation to seek similarity and how the context of opportunity is organized. Sociometric data was collected during a school year and the model is based in crosscuts of the friendship network. Homophily in respect to ethnic origin was found in the first time point, with students making connections within the in-group. The effect of ethnic homophily seems to decrease between the time points, with evidence of an effect of structural constraints that gained importance over time. Results suggest that organisational divisions in classrooms play a decisive role in the pattern of friendship connections in the schoo

Supplementary Materials The Breakdown of Anti-Racist Norms: A Natural Experiment on Hate Speech after Terrorist Attacks

Terrorist attacks often fuel online hate and increase the expression of xenophobic and anti-minority messages. Previous research has focused on the impact of terrorist attacks on prejudiced attitudes towards groups linked to the perpetrators as the cause of this increase. We argue that social norms can contain the expression of prejudice after the attacks. We report the results of a combination of a natural and a lab-in-the-field experiment in which we exploit data collected about the occurrence of two consecutive Islamist terrorist attacks in Germany, the Würzburg and Ansbach attacks, in July 2016. The experiment compares the effect of the terrorist attacks in hate speech towards refugees in contexts where a descriptive norm against the use of hate speech is evidently in place to contexts in which the norm is ambiguous because participants observe anti-minority comments. Hate towards refugees, but not towards other minority groups, increased as a result of the attacks only in the absence of a strong norm. These results imply that attitudinal changes due to terrorist attacks are more likely to be voiced if norms erode

Normative Change and Culture of Hate: An Experiment in Online Environments

We present an online experiment in which we investigate the impact of perceived social acceptability on online hate speech, and measure the causal effect of specific interventions. We compare two types of interventions: counter-speaking (informal verbal sanctions) and censoring (deleting hateful content). The interventions are based on the belief that individuals infer acceptability from the context, using previous actions as a source of normative information. The interventions are based on the two conceptualizations found in the literature: (i) what do others normally do, i.e. descriptive norms; and (ii) what happened to those who violated the norm, i.e. injunctive norms. Participants were significantly less likely to engage in hate speech when prior hate content had been moderately censored. Our results suggest that norm adherence in online conversations might, in fact, be motivated by descriptive norms rather than injunctive norms. With this work we present some of the first experimental evidence investigating the social determinants of hate speech in online communities. The results could advance the understanding of the micro-mechanisms that regulate hate speech. Also, such findings can guide future interventions in online communities that help prevent the spread of hate