"Edit: I'm sorry for being offensive, this is getting downvoted and I feel terrible": Implicit Social Norms as Governance in Identity-Based Communities

Community norms are important in regulating online identity-based communities as they help shape both online and offline discourse.

Yet, not all expressions of identity are treated equally as acceptable forms of speech and expression of identity differ among communities.

We used mixed-methods to understand how implicit norms within a set of non-binary communities are reinforced and shaped through influence within these communities. We analyzed approximately 2 million Reddit posts and comments to measure the effect of scores, replies, and self-disclosures, on user editing behaviors, which we use as means to observe norm regulation. We find self-disclosures and the number of replies a post receives is positively associated with editing behaviors, while the influence of scores on the likelihood of a message being edited is highly dependent on whether the message is a post or comment. Our qualitative analysis of posts, comments, and threads finds community norms are created, contested, and reinforced through the interactions between community and individual-level understanding of what it means to be non-binary. We propose a model for implicit norms as governance in identity-based communities, and discuss how platform designers can better use implicit norms to support governance in identity-based communities.

CCS Concepts: • Human-centered computing → Empirical studies in HCI; • Social and professional topics → Gender.