TY - JOUR
T1 - Political and personality predispositions and topical contexts matter
T2 - Effects of uncivil comments on science news engagement intentions
AU - Su, Leona Yi Fan
AU - Scheufele, Dietram A.
AU - Brossard, Dominique
AU - Xenos, Michael A.
N1 - Funding Information:
The author(s) disclosed receipt of the following financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article: This work was supported by the National Science Foundation (Grant Numbers SES-0937591 and SES-DMR-0832760). Any opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this material are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of the National Science Foundation.
Publisher Copyright:
© The Author(s) 2020.
PY - 2021/5
Y1 - 2021/5
N2 - Building on existing theoretical frameworks for the study of incivility, interactivity, and negativity bias, this study contributes to the growing body of literature on the impact of incivility in online comments. Specifically, it tests incivility’s impact on news engagement intentions; investigates political and personality predispositions’ roles as perceptual filters; and extends this scholarship to the context of multiple scientific news topics. It found that, when dealing with news about two of the more politically divisive technologies—fracking and synthetic biology—ideology moderated the effects of incivility, with uncivil comments encouraging engagement among conservatives but not among liberals. However, in the less politically divisive context of nanotechnology, self-monitoring played a significant role in moderating incivility’s effects: with high self-monitors being more motivated, and low self-monitors less motivated, to share nanotech news after exposure to uncivil comments. These results imply that individual predispositions and topic-specific factors both underlie the impact of incivility on news engagement intentions.
AB - Building on existing theoretical frameworks for the study of incivility, interactivity, and negativity bias, this study contributes to the growing body of literature on the impact of incivility in online comments. Specifically, it tests incivility’s impact on news engagement intentions; investigates political and personality predispositions’ roles as perceptual filters; and extends this scholarship to the context of multiple scientific news topics. It found that, when dealing with news about two of the more politically divisive technologies—fracking and synthetic biology—ideology moderated the effects of incivility, with uncivil comments encouraging engagement among conservatives but not among liberals. However, in the less politically divisive context of nanotechnology, self-monitoring played a significant role in moderating incivility’s effects: with high self-monitors being more motivated, and low self-monitors less motivated, to share nanotech news after exposure to uncivil comments. These results imply that individual predispositions and topic-specific factors both underlie the impact of incivility on news engagement intentions.
KW - Incivility
KW - information-seeking
KW - information-sharing
KW - interactivity
KW - negativity bias
KW - online comments
KW - science communication
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U2 - 10.1177/1461444820904365
DO - 10.1177/1461444820904365
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:85079458906
SN - 1461-4448
VL - 23
SP - 894
EP - 919
JO - New Media and Society
JF - New Media and Society
IS - 5
ER -