Online Social Regulation: When Everyday Diplomatic Skills for Harmonious Disagreement Break Down

Roos, Carla Anne; Koudenburg, Namkje; Postmes, Tom

doi:10.1093/jcmc/zmaa011

Cited by 11 publications

(32 citation statements)

References 36 publications

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“…Second, people also tend to feel less heard online. In line with previous research (Roos et al, 2020a), Study 3 showed that interaction partners felt less heard when they communicated via text-based chats than via audio-channels. In the typing condition of Study 3, one of the interaction partners spoke via a headset (audio) while the other reacted via text messages rather than audio.…”

Section: Feeling Heard Matters Across Contextssupporting

confidence: 87%

“…We further find that, in most online interactions, people do feel heard. It is likely that this holds for interactions in general, since there are indications that people feel more heard in face-to-face interactions than in online chats (e.g., Roos et al, 2020a). The context of Study 2 was therefore not limited to online interactions but concerned conversation in general.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Having developed and validated the scale, Study 3 tests whether the experience of feeling heard can be experimentally manipulated. Research suggests that text-based online communication can lead people to feel ignored (Roos et al, 2020a), these people might also end up feeling not heard. We therefore tried to manipulate feeling heard by asking people to engage in two forms of mediated communication: through text and through audio channels.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…But is all this self-expression on social media effective in making people feel heard? Recent research suggests the opposite might be the case: a lack of instant feedback online can be misinterpreted as a signal of disinterest leading people to feel less heard online compared to face-to-face conversation (Roos, et al, 2020a;. Especially in the context of increasing political polarization and concerns about loneliness and isolation (e.g., Hertz, 2020;McPherson et al, 2006), it would be important to know for sure.…”

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confidence: 99%

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Feeling heard: Operationalizing a key concept for social relations

Roos¹,

Postmes²,

Koudenburg³

2021

Preprint

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Feeling heard is seen as a cornerstone of intimate relationships and healthy self-development. In public life, feeling heard may play an important role in a well-functioning representative democracy. The current paper aimed to define and measure feeling heard in the context of everyday interpersonal interactions. Based on an integrative literature review, feeling heard is conceptualized as consisting of five components at two levels. At the interpersonal level people feel heard when they have 1) voice, and they receive (2) attention, (3) empathy, and (4) respect. At the collective level people should experience (5) common ground. In two population surveys (N = 194, N = 1000) and a lab study (N = 74), we develop and validate the feeling heard scale (FHS); a concise eight-item scale with good psychometric properties. Results show that the FHS is a distinct and powerful predictor of conversation intentions in many different contexts and relationships. In fact, the FHS is the strongest predictor of intentions for conflict behavior among a set of 15 related variables (e.g., acquaintance, intimacy). Moreover, the FHS explains variance in conversational experiences that other variables do not. We conclude by reflecting on the potential applications of this scale. In interpersonal relations and professional contacts, the FHS enables the assessment of one crucial dimension of social interaction.

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Section: Feeling Heard Matters Across Contextssupporting

confidence: 87%

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

mentioning

confidence: 99%

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Feeling heard: Operationalizing a key concept for social relations

Roos¹,

Postmes²,

Koudenburg³

2021

Preprint

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“…In essence, ambiguity can be used as a diplomatic tool. Roos et al (2020aRoos et al ( , 2020b reasoned that text-based chats might limit the scope for this kind of diplomatic behavior: typing being slower, people are more likely to be economical and precise and less likely to type things like "ehmm" in their chats. The resulting brevity and explicitness of online chat messages might make it more difficult to harmoniously navigate disagreements.…”

Section: The Diplomacy Of Ambiguitymentioning

confidence: 99%

Diplomacy Online: A Case of Mistaking Broadcasting for Dialogue

Roos¹,

Utz²,

Koudenburg³

et al. 2022

Preprint

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Discussions on social media have been considered a contributing factor to the increasing polarization the Western world is witnessing. In this study, we use automated and manual coding to analyze diplomatic behavior in online discussions and its consequences for polarization dynamics. We analyze Reddit forums with differing norms: reddits known for civil debate (N = 4594), reddits considered incivil discussion spaces (N = 2126), and reddits dedicated to social support (N = 1401). The automated content analysis shows diplomatic behavior in all forums, but diplomacy does not affect the subsequent discussion. The manual discourse analysis reveals why: discussions consist of disjointed statements rather than dialogic exchange, which makes diplomacy inconsequential. These results have consequences for the field. First, evidence of online polarization needs to be studied very closely, because what appears to be polarized dialogue might actually be a string of personal viewpoints broadcasted in a shared space. Second, the usefulness of automated content analysis in studying interaction dynamics is limited because of difficulties distinguishing broadcasting from dialogue.

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The experience and emergence of attitudinal consensus in conversations

Koudenburg,

Kutlaca,

Kuppens

2023

Euro J Social Psych

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Reaching consensus is important for human individual, social and societal functioning. The reverse process of polarization has been associated with individual uncertainty, social conflict and societal distrust, tension, or even schisms. In conversations, the experience of consensus is shaped by both content and aspects of the form of conversation, which indicate whether people are on the same wavelength. In two conversation studies (N = 268) we aimed (1) to examine where the conversational experience of consensus originates and (2) to test which conversational behaviours enhance attitude convergence between conversation partners. The results show that, although actual attitudinal differences were only predictive in Study 2, both conversational content (e.g., disagreement) and form (e.g., experience of flow) consistently predicted the experience of consensus. Convergence of attitudes was harder to predict: most conversational factors were unrelated to attitudinal convergence and conversational flow either increased or decreased attitudinal convergence depending on the particular context.

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Online Social Regulation: When Everyday Diplomatic Skills for Harmonious Disagreement Break Down

Cited by 11 publications

References 36 publications

Feeling heard: Operationalizing a key concept for social relations

Feeling heard: Operationalizing a key concept for social relations

Diplomacy Online: A Case of Mistaking Broadcasting for Dialogue

The experience and emergence of attitudinal consensus in conversations

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