How could you think that?!?!: Understanding intentions to engage in political flaming

Abstract

Communication scholars have both lauded and questioned the Internet’s role in facilitating democracy. However, few studies have examined aggressive communication behavior in online political discussion spaces. Two studies were conducted to examine use of aggressive discussion behaviors online, otherwise known as flaming. Study one utilized a survey of 289 undergraduate students at a large public university. Study two utilized a survey of 305 individuals who frequent political blogs. Results from both studies suggest that individuals are more likely to engage in political flaming when their beliefs are directly challenged. In addition, results indicate that whether an individual’s identity is known or unknown did not influence their intention to flame within the student sample. In the blog-user sample, we found that direct challenges when identities were not known increased intention to flame. Finally, we examine the relationship between political flaming and several individual-level variables.