Trauma is a common experience affecting millions of people worldwide, with many survivors seeking support from online communities. Yet few studies explore how online spaces can help trauma survivors who are in muted groups (i.e., those who cannot articulate due to a lack of language or vocabulary) disclose—online or offline—and gain access to health resources. In “If Someone Downvoted My Posts—That’d Be the End of the World”: Designing Safer Online Spaces for Trauma Survivors, we investigate this gap by pulling from 29 in-depth interviews with muted trauma survivors who belong to online communities where trauma narratives are commonplace.
Findings
The role of algorithms in trauma recovery:
Our findings challenge the notion of algorithmic filter bubbles and highlight the potential for algorithms to counteract societal filters for muted groups.
Results reveal survivors’ reactions to algorithmic recommendations, which vary depending on their emotional capacity.
Some perceived themselves to be in partnership with their algorithm, working alongside it to further personalize recovery related content.
Others resist the algorithm and obfuscate their data to prevent algorithmic intervention in trauma recovery.
New social media affordances--indirect feedback and transportability:
Indirect Feedback: The degree to which users internalize feedback (e.g., downvotes, replies) to others’ posts. Indirect feedback differs from direct feedback in the way communication indirectly flows among users.
Transportability: The extent to which platforms afford transportation to new communities or worlds of information. This affordance stems from the research on narrative transportation which we adapt to online platforms by conceptualizing the platform as the mode of transportation
The limitations of anonymity designs:
Anonymity helped some participants access social support, echoing previous research. However, fear of direct feedback overruled anonymity for participants with social anxiety, leading them to lurk for protection.
Despite lurking, participants still felt engaged in their communities, contradicting prior notions of community engagement.
We also note the limits of anonymity designs in Facebook Groups (e.g., Anonymous Post), particularly for survivors of intimate partner violence.
Distributing trauma-care tools (e.g., RedditCares) to members of online communities can welcome harassment, diminishing the perceived value of these resources.
True crime online groups (e.g., podcasts, documentaries) and websleuth forums (e.g., missing person cases) can act as alternative safe spaces (i.e., online groups whose members feel comfortable retrieving and giving support despite it being unrelated to the group's main purpose). Alternative safe spaces can bear the weight of identity-based stigma, allowing survivors to"tip-toe" up to trauma from a safe distance.
Spinning Effects Model
We used a spinning top as a metaphor to visualize the often unobservable sociotechnical behaviors of trauma survivors.
Models the disclosure decision-making process, leading to a deeper understanding of the influence of platform design on trauma recovery.
Suggests the interplay of psychological, social, and technological factors that impacts disclosure efficacy.
Outlines three effects which we outline below.
Activation Effect
Encountering a public disclosure that mirrors one's personal experience can activate an emotional response, just like how a spinning top remains dormant until it is activated.
To illustrate, if Sam shares her sexual assault experience in an online group and Brianne, a muted trauma survivor, identifies with Sam's post, it can activate an emotional response within Brianne, creating an activation effect.
Toppling Effect
The force behind the initial push will determine if a top spins or falls. Likewise, different affordances and varying community designs can contribute to a toppling effect, weakening one’s confidence in their ability to disclose.
If Brianne perceives the feedback on Sam's post as negative, it can create a toppling effect and weaken her confidence in her ability to disclose, pushing her further towards nondisclosure.
Steadying Effect
By contrast, the design of online spaces and different affordances can contribute to a steadying effect, strengthening one's confidence in their ability to disclose.
If Brianne perceives the comments on Sam's public disclosure to be supportive, it can create a steadying effect and strengthen her belief in her ability to disclose. Even though the feedback on Sam's post is indirect, Brianne internalizes the support as if it is being directed at her, creating a positive experience (i.e., indirect feedback).
Randazzo, C. & Ammari, T. (2023).“If Someone Downvoted My Posts—That’d Be the End of the World”: Designing Safer Online Spaces for Trauma Survivors. In Proceedings of the 2023 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems (CHI '23).
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