Twitter versus Facebook: Comparing incivility, impoliteness, and deliberative attributes

TLDR

The study aimed to determine whether user-generated posts would differ in incivility, impoliteness, and deliberative attributes on Twitter versus Facebook. It employed a quantitative content analysis of 1,458 posts and a 198‑participant experiment to compare these dimensions across the two platforms. Results showed that White House tweet responses were more uncivil and impolite and less deliberative than Facebook responses, comments on sensitive topics were more uncivil, impolite, and deliberative, and the experiment confirmed greater deliberation on Facebook but no difference in incivility or impoliteness, indicating that platform affordances and differing user populations drive these patterns.

Abstract

Using two quantitative methods, this study sought to understand whether user-generated posts would vary in frequency of incivility, impoliteness, and deliberative attributes on Twitter versus Facebook. A quantitative content analysis ( N = 1458) revealed that posts responding to the White House’s tweets were significantly more uncivil and impolite and less deliberative than responses to White House Facebook posts. Also, comments on posts that concerned sensitive topics (such as same-sex marriage) were more uncivil, impolite, and deliberative than comments regarding less sensitive topics (such as technology). An experiment ( N = 198) showed that people were more deliberative when responding to White House Facebook posts, compared with White House tweets, but no differences were found for incivility and impoliteness. Results suggest that both the varying affordances of the two platforms and the fact that the two sites may attract different types of people might explain these results.