Developing a strong community requires empowered leadership capable of overcoming governance challenges. New online platforms have given users opportunities to practice governance through content moderation roles. The over 2.8 million "subreddit" communities on Reddit are governed by hundreds of thousands of volunteer moderators, many of whom have no training or prior experience in a governing role. While moderators often devote daily time to community maintenance and cope with the emotional effects of hate comments or disturbing content, Reddit provides no compensation for this position. Thus, moderators' internal motivations and desire to continue filling this role is critical for their community. Drawing upon the relationship between governance procedures and internalized motivation, we investigate how the processes through which subreddit moderators generate community rules increase moderators' motivation through the meeting of social-psychological needs: Procedural Justice and Self Determination, and Self-Other Merging. Preliminary analysis of survey data from 620 moderators across Reddit shows a correlation between moderators' administrative behaviors and the social-psychological needs underpinning their motivations. Understanding these relationships will allow us to empower moderators to build engaging and cooperative online communities.
翻译:新的在线平台为用户提供了通过内容调适作用进行治理的机会。 在Reddit上,超过280万个“附属”社区由成千上万的志愿主持人管理,其中许多人没有受过管理职责方面的培训或以前的经验。主持人常常每天花时间进行社区维护,处理仇恨评论或令人不安的内容的情感影响,但Reddit没有为此职位提供补偿。因此,主持人的内部动机和继续担任这一角色的愿望对其社区至关重要。利用治理程序与内部化动机之间的关系,我们调查次级主持人产生社区规则的过程如何通过满足社会心理需要来增强主持人的动力:程序公正和自决,以及自选合并。620名主持人对调查数据进行的初步分析显示主持人的行政行为与作为其动机的社会心理需求之间的相互关系。了解这些关系将使我们能够增强主持人建立参与和合作在线社区的能力。