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Rasmus T Pedersen

@rtpedersen.bsky.social

489 followers 336 following 19 posts

Political Scientist, Senior Researcher at VIVE - The Danish Center for Social Science Research. Interested in political behavior, online abuse of politicians and all things democracy

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Rasmus T Pedersen @rtpedersen.bsky.social · 19/12/2024

I'm pretty sure that ChatGPT isn't sentient, but I still can't help think that after a day of helping me debugging code, it somehow appreciates the tasks given by my youngest kid more

Here's the image of a cat in outer space! The feline is floating in a galaxy filled with stars, wearing an astronaut suit.

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Rasmus T Pedersen @rtpedersen.bsky.social · 08/10/2024

Women are more averse to abusive comments than men (and people are generally more averse to sexist comments when the comments were directed at women in politics). These results are, we think, important to understand how abuse of politicians may further marginalize women in politics. (4/4)

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Rasmus T Pedersen @rtpedersen.bsky.social · 08/10/2024

Perceptions of abuse varied significantly depending on political ideology. Left-leaning citizens were more likely to view insults, sexism, and threats as abusive. Finally, gender plays an important role... (3/n)

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Rasmus T Pedersen @rtpedersen.bsky.social · 08/10/2024

We found no partisan bias in how people respond to criticism and the different types of abuse. However, this does not mean that politics is inconsequential... (2/n)

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Rasmus T Pedersen @rtpedersen.bsky.social · 08/10/2024

What do ordinary people think about online abuse of politicians? In a new paper, we show how citizens perceive criticism, insults, threats and sexist remarks directed at politicians on social media (open access link: ejpr.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/...). Surprisingly... (1/n)

Abstract
Online abuse is becoming an increasingly pressing issue for democratic societies. Citizens play an important role in curtailing abuse as they often moderate online content through counter speech and by reporting abusive messages. However, we know little about when citizens actually perceive negative comments directed at politicians as being abusive, and the factors shaping these perceptions are also understudied. In this study, we therefore investigate how citizens perceive criticism, insults, threats and sexist remarks directed at politicians on social media. Based on a survey experiment with 2,000 Danish citizens, we show that citizens’ assessments of the abusiveness of such remarks are not only affected by the content of the messages, but also by political ideology, political trust and gender. Surprisingly, partisanship does not seem to substantively affect perceptions of abuse. Our study provides novel insights into what exactly citizens consider to be abusive behaviour on

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