Supporting digital discourse? The deliberative function of links on Twitter

Abstract

Digital discussion spaces have changed the shape of discursive argumentation considerably. While there is not much explicit reasoning on Twitter, many users link to external resources in their tweets. This study zooms in on the justificatory capacity of those links and investigates their deliberative function on the platform. A qualitative exploration of material from four countries shows that links to external resources support Twitter discourse by regularly substantiating user statements in the context of both information and argumentation. Links with a truth-based informative function are posted to support deliberative truth claims with empirical evidence, thus adding primarily to theoretical discourses. Links with a norm-based argumentative function are shared to legitimate positions against social standards. They contribute to practical discourses about courses of action by sustaining deliberative claims for normative rightness. The country comparison suggests that societal divisions foster a norm-based argumentative rather than truth-based informative use of links on Twitter.

Comparing and mapping difference indices of debate quality on Twitter

“…However, we introduced a change for measuring respect by allowing a negative value (non-respect) to be coded. In line with Jakob (2022), we further introduced two more specifications. First, we added a measure of informativeness to account for whether a tweet contains any reference to the topic of discussion (e.g.…”

“…Also focusing on YouTube, Edgerly et al (2009) investigated the ability of the platform to contribute to an online public sphere through fostering quality political exchanges by focusing on argumentative content and on the level of incivility . Furthermore, Jakob (2022) investigated the extent to which the limited space for explicit reasoning on Twitter can be counterbalanced by sharing links (or URLs) and analysed the deliberative potential of those links. Results showed that links are used for substantiating user statements in the context of both information-sharing and argumentation (e.g.…”

Political discourses, ideologies, and online coalitions in the Brazilian Congress on Twitter during 2019

“…As such, political communication on Twitter discloses ideologies through the content and tone of the messages, spreading ideas that are not openly shared, such as authoritarianism, racism, xenophobia, and so on. Therefore, political communication on Twitter has been used to make normative claims that justify politicians' ideological positions (Jakob, 2020); and to undermine institutional trust through the use of derogatory language toward the media and political opponents in Trump's political campaign (Ross and Rivers, 2018). Similarly, authoritarian regimes use social media to discredit the opposition in Azerbaijan (Pearce, 2015), for glorifying politicians in power and denigrating their adversaries in Pakistan (Masroor et al, 2019), and for delegitimizing political adversaries and gaining support of military interventions in Colombia (Barreto-Galeano et al, 2019).…”

The Integrative Complexity of Online User Comments Across Different Types of Democracy and Discussion Arenas

“…For data cleaning, comments that could not be assessed reasonably for complexity were identified in the coding process and excluded from further analysis (Baker-Brown et al 1992). This included posts in languages other than English or German (e.g., Arabic, but also English in Germany and English, French, and Italian in Switzerland), topically unrelated spam, and contributions that only linked other users or external websites (see Jakob (2020) for an examination of the function of links to external resources in digital discourse). This resulted in a total of 4,563 user comments used for statistical analysis.…”