Diplomacy Online: A Case of Mistaking Broadcasting for Dialogue

Discussions on social media have been considered a contributing factor to the increasing polarization the Western world is witnessing. In this study, we use automated and manual coding to analyze diplomatic behavior in online discussions and its consequences for polarization dynamics. We analyze Reddit forums with differing norms: reddits known for civil debate (N = 4594), reddits considered incivil discussion spaces (N = 2126), and reddits dedicated to social support (N = 1401). The automated content analysis shows diplomatic behavior in all forums, but diplomacy does not affect the subsequent discussion. The manual discourse analysis reveals why: discussions consist of disjointed statements rather than dialogic exchange, which makes diplomacy inconsequential. These results have consequences for the field. First, evidence of online polarization needs to be studied very closely, because what appears to be polarized dialogue might actually be a string of personal viewpoints broadcasted in a shared space. Second, the usefulness of automated content analysis in studying interaction dynamics is limited because of difficulties distinguishing broadcasting from dialogue.