The Effect of Streaming Chat on Perceptions of Political Debates

Abstract

Broadcast media consumption is becoming more social. Many online video “livestreams” come with embedded livestreaming chatboxes, uniting the on-screen and social components. We investigate how streaming chat shapes perceptions of political events. We conducted a field experiment during the September 2019 Democratic Primary Debate where subjects were assigned to view the debate with or without streaming chat. We use text analyses to characterize the frequency, toxicity, and tone of comments in the chat. Our experimental findings indicate that Democratic subjects assigned to the Facebook (social) chat condition reported lower affect toward Democrats and a worse viewing experience, aligned with the toxic and overwhelming nature of the chat. The polarity of candidate-directed comments also influenced candidate evaluations and perceived performance in the polls. This suggests that consumers of mass media will be both more immediately affected by social feedback and likely to make inferences about the experiences of their fellow consumers.

The Democratic Value of Strategic Game Reporting and Uncivil Talk: A Computational Analysis of Facebook Conversations During U.S. Primary Debates

“…The results of our study should be informative to news organizations involved in moderating political debates. While unmoderated real-time commentary in debate streaming chat can be toxic and provide negative experiences for debate watchers (Asbury-Kimmel et al, 2021), our study suggests that post-debate coverage and commentary associated with slow-paced online commenting can produce discussions that, although contain uncivil language, provide reasoned conversations that might contribute to voter learning, engagement, and overall better user experiences. In this context, news organizations can adjust their reporting style to help create an online environment that channels relevant and reasoned discussions by putting an emphasis on issues rather than on strategy and attacks.…”

“…In addition to the elite influences, recent scholarship argues that debate audiences' online expressions are likely to also exert significant influence on debate viewers (Camaj & Northup, 2019), suggesting that the rise of multiscreening and online streaming chats enable audiences to prime their peers who engage in online conversations or those who consume it while watching televised debates. Relevant to this study, a recent study found that debate audiences who were exposed to a real-time streaming chat containing high levels of toxicity during debate watching reported lower affect toward Democrats and a worse viewing experience (Asbury-Kimmel et al, 2021). The question remains, to what degree do uncivil user comments impact the general quality of user discussions in asynchronous conversations in digital news spaces.…”

“…Previous research (Asbury-Kimmel et al, 2021; Ventura et al, 2021) shows that the overly toxic nature of online comments can create a negative experience for users during political events. We provide more nuance to these findings.…”

Winning! Election returns and engagement in social media

“…Toxicity is defined as "a rude, disrespectful, or unreasonable comment that is likely to make one leave a discussion.". Google's Perspective is widely used both in industry and by scholars in social media studies, including research that identifies toxic comments on streaming Facebook chats during political debates [34,35], to classify YouTube comments made by politically engaged users [36], to classify Twitter's uncivil political discussion [37], and to understand toxicity in Facebook and Reddit pages [38].…”