Moderation Disrupts Echo Chambers

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Abstract

How does moderation shape who joins online communities and what they say? We answer this question with a preregistered field experiment on Facebook that takes place during the week of the 2024 presidential election. We offer participants the option to join a Facebook group, randomizing the moderation policy and political composition of the group. In the moderation treatment, discussions are moderated for civility. Groups are either "echo chambers" (composed only of co-partisans) or mixed-party (an even split of Republicans and Democrats). Moderation decreases participation in echo chambers by 9 percentage points, but increases participation in mixed-party groups by 13 percentage points. We elicit opinions on immigration policy, and ask if we can share these options with the group. Moderation causes participants to be exposed to fewer opposing opinions in echo chambers, but more opposing opinions in mixed-party groups. We find no effect of moderation on turnout, voting decisions, immigration opinions or beliefs about others' opinions. However, moderation decreases polarization in echo chambers and increases polarization in mixed-party groups.

Speaker bio

Karthik Srinivasan is an assistant professor at the University of Michigan School of Information. He studies behavioral economics, labor economics and political economy, with a particular focus on social media platforms. He uses field experiments to explore how digital environments shape decisions in the real world. Before joining the School of Information, Karthik spent a decade in Chicago, earning a degree in Mathematical Methods in the Social Sciences from Northwestern University and completing a Ph.D. in economics at the University of Chicago Booth School of Business.

About the SBEE seminar series

The Social, Behavioral and Experimental Economics seminar series brings together a community of economics scholars from three units at the University of Michigan — the School of Information, the Department of Economics and the Ross Business School — whose research aims to broaden the understanding of the social, economic and political consequences of real-life decisions and behaviors.

Top researchers from around the globe come to Michigan to present their work at the SBEE seminar series, exploring the intersection of economics, psychology, computer science and information science.

The seminar series is organized by U-M faculty members Yan Chen (UMSI), Alain Cohn (UMSI), Erin Krupka (UMSI), Stephen Leider (Ross), Christine Exley (Econ), A. Yesim Orhun (Ross), Tanya Rosenblat (UMSI), and Basit Zafar (Econ). Todd Stuart serves as seminar coordinator.