Work in Progress: A Glance at Social Media Self-Censorship in North America

There is a growing trend of social backlash and ostracism for thoughts and opinions shared online. Coupled with the rise of strict content moderation or digital nudges discouraging unpopular opinions, this trend calls into question whether users feel comfortable expressing their views freely on social media. Self-censorship can be defined as the “act of intentionally and voluntarily withholding information from others in the absence of formal obstacles” [4].In this work, we sought to understand the self-censorship behavior of Canadian and United States social media users through an online survey. Our analysis suggests that users’ exhibit different degrees of concern when posting controversial content, and that these differences can be explained by demographic, psychometric and political orientation factors. Our results also suggest that there seems to be a consensus on the type of content that is more prone to be self-censored.