Lab Rats...Twitter Will Publicize Abuse Rules To See If Users' Behavior Improves

There is an inherent dilemma in this research effort. Since prior research has demonstrated that anonymity is what fuels some of the most obnoxious online behavior, continuing to guarantee that sort of protection to those who have consistently abused the rules will not cause them to change. The conflict comes from cultural norms that, especially in Europe, demand anonymity.

And since many of the abusers appear to revel in their ability to break rules, we look forward to seeing the results - but would be betting on behavioral improvements. JL


Megan Dickey reports in Tech Crunch:

Twitter is going to start testing an idea that if it shows people its rules, behavior will improve. Researchers point to evidence of when institutions clearly publish rules, people are more likely to follow them. The privacy of Twitter users will be protected. Twitter will only provide anonymized, aggregated information.

As part of Twitter’s efforts to rid its platform of abuse and hate, the company is teaming up with researchers Susan Benesch, a faculty associate at the Berkman Klein Center for Internet & Society at Harvard University, and J. Nathan Matias, a post-doc research associate at Princeton University, to study online abuse. Twitter is going to start testing an idea that if it shows people its rules, behavior will improve.

Via TechCrunch. This appeared at the top of one user’s Notifications tab.

“In an experiment starting today, Twitter is publicizing its rules, to test whether this improves civility,” Benesch and Matias wrote on Medium. “We proposed this idea to Twitter and designed an experiment to evaluate it.”

The idea is that by showing people the rules, their behavior will improve on the platform. The researchers point to evidence of when institutions clearly publish rules, people are more likely to follow them.
The researchers assure the privacy of Twitter users will be protected. For example, Twitter will only provide anonymized, aggregated information.

“Since we will not receive identifying information on any individual person or Twitter account, we cannot and will not mention anyone or their Tweets in our publications,” the researchers wrote.
Last month, Twitter began soliciting proposals from the public to help the social network capture, measure and evaluate healthy interactions on the platform. This was part of Twitter’s commitment “to help increase the collective health, openness, and civility of public conversation,” Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey said in a tweet.
It’s not clear how widespread the test will be, but it seems that the company won’t be releasing specifics.

“We’re collaborating with a group of academic researchers and scholars led by Susan Benesch, J. Nathan Matias, and Derek Ruths on an initiative to remind people of the Twitter Rules, to evaluate whether increased awareness of our policies results in improved behavior and more respect on Twitter,” a Twitter spokesperson said in a statement.