Abstraction and Expression on the Web

Abstraction and Expression on the Web

Srinath SrinivasaWeb Sciences Lab

IIIT Bangalorehttp://cds.iiitb.ac.in/wsl

Web Observatory Launch Workshop, IIIT Bangalore, Bengaluru, India, 17 Feb 2015

http://cds.iiitb.ac.in/wsl

The Free Speech Conundrum

The Free Speech Conundrum

The holy grail of democratic societies – freedom of speech (and expression) – is suddenly at the center of a new found controversy

At the core of this debate is a call to distinguish between “free speech” and “bad speech”

Free Speech and Bad Speech

The line is not always clear:

Disagreeing with popular opinion (free speech)

Supporting/opposing a political party (free speech)

Racial slur (bad speech)

Inciting mob violence publicly (bad speech)

Scholarly writing criticizing government or specific religions (free speech considered bad speech in some places)

Artistic depiction that offends religious sentiments (hotly debated)

Characterizing Speech

Claim:

The free speech versus bad speech debate presents a false dilemma, which can never be completely resolved

Need:

Semantic characterization of speech and conversations and creating awareness and tool-support for online conversations based on this characterization

Abstraction and Expression

Articulation of our objective understanding of something

Communicates an idea

ExpressionExpression

Articulation of our subjective feeling about something

Communicates an emotion

Abstraction

Abstraction and Expression

Reporting: mostly abstraction

Opinion: mix of abstraction and expression

Emotional reaction: mostly expression

Abstraction

● Semantic construct used to build our worldview

● Processing is resource intensive (“System 2” in Prospect Theory [KT79] terminology)

● Subject to resistance in assimilation due to factors like bounded rationality and conformance pressures

Images source: Wikipedia

Abstraction and conformance

Asch Conformance Experiments

Conformance and Diffusion of Ideas

Information diffusion is faster in sparsely connected parts of a network, rather than densely connected (entrenched) parts due to conformance effects.

Node d in the above figure does not switch to the new idea because of conformance pressures from nodes e, f and g

Image Source: [Sri 06]

Models for Diffusion of Ideas

Typically based on an element of “criticality” that balances between ability to communicate a new idea and pressure to conform to existing ideas

Example models [EK 10]

Percolating clusters

Ising model

Cluster density based diffusion

Expression

● Semantic construct encapsulating our emotional state for communication

● Affects receiver's emotional state by means of emotional contagion

● Emotional contagion also spreads through the web (Ex: Facebook Experiment [KGH 14])

● Characteristically different from spread of ideas, which have a natural resistance due to conformance effects

Images source: Wikipedia

Modelling Spread of Emotions

Models based on spread of epidemics, useful in modeling spread of emotions

Emotional state entails physiological change in humans

People hence “recover” from emotional states after a while -- akin to the spread of epidemics

Example epidemic models [EK 10]

– SIR (Susceptible-Infected-Recovered)

– SIS (Susceptible-Infected-Susceptible)

Mental Model: Linking Abstractions and Expressions

Axiomatic framework within which we perform reasoning.

Encapsulates underlying assumptions, ground truths and inference rules

Active mental modelReasoning and deduction carried out within the framework of the currently active mental model

A sudden change in active mental model usually elicits an emotional reaction (laughter, terror, etc.)

Characterizing Online Communication

Communication (both online and offline) comprise of both abstractive and expressive elements

The spread of a meme varies greatly if it is spreading due to its abstractive content or due to its expressive content

Ex: Spread of rumours, primarily due to the emotions they elicit, rather than the content they embody

Online communication especially prone to this A/E interplay due to online disinhibition [Sul 04] factors like anonymity, solipsistic introjection, asynchrony, etc.

Specifically, online communication lacks coherence in mental models between conversationalists.


Mental model 1 Mental model 2




End Result?



Online communication complicated by following factors:– Lack of coherence between mental models (due to anonymity,

asynchrony, solipsistic introjection, etc.)

– Interplay between abstractive and expressive content in conversation

Emotions spread faster than ideas

Spread of emotions greatly complicates the spread of ideas

Coherence

Abstraction and Expression can affect group behaviour in different ways

A given abstraction or expression can gain “coherence” over a group of people (most people in the group think the same way / most people in the group feel the same way)

Coherence in abstraction and expression can explain some failures of crowdsourcing efforts

Wisdom of Crowds?

Not all groups of people form“wise” crowds!

Classification of Groups

Some coherence inabstractions(Ex: NPOV, NOR,Vfor Wikipedia)


Crowds

Group of people having shared attention but no shared abstraction or shared expression

Rich in insights due to diverse opinions

No major emotional contagion

Members act as individuals

Pose high cognitive load on members

Unstable

Wise Crowds

Share some common abstraction in the form of “ground rules” to facilitate management of diverse opinions without degenerating


Herds

Group sharing a common abstraction

“Herd mentality” pertains to every member of the group thinking in the same way

High in persuasive power

Low on collective insight

Manipulable by external forces if the characteristics of the herd are known


Mobs

Groups sharing a common emotional state

Common emotional state could be either positive emotion (jubilant football fans) or negative emotion (lynch mobs)

Need not have common abstraction (members of an angry mob may each be venting personal frustrations through the mob)

Highly unpredictable behaviour


Gangs

Groups sharing both a common abstraction and common emotion

All members of the group think and feel the same way about something

Passionate and highly persuasive

Common emotion could be positive (The researcher “gang of four” on design patterns) or negative (bandits and other organized criminals)

Powerful and highly impactful collective actions

Free speech revisited

What appears as the online free speech conundrum is actually a complex phenomenon caused by abstraction, expression, dissonance across mental models and group coherence of abstractions and expressions

The issue is not (just) a question of what is or should be legal provisions

The issue is of understanding the cognitive and emotional aspects of human communication

Free speech revisited

The web is affecting who we are as a person – at a very fundamental level, offering both opportunities and challenges

Our understanding of web-scale abstraction and expression dynamics too premature to advocate any form of regulatory solutions

Specific solution proposals beyond the scope of this talk..

May you be born in interesting times...-- an ancient Chinese curse

Thank You!

References

[EK 10] David Easley, Jon Kleinberg. Networks, Crowds and Markets: Reasoning about a Highly Connected World. Cambridge University Press, 2010.

[KA 79] Daniel Kahneman and Amos Tversky. "Prospect theory: An analysis of decision under risk." Econometrica: Journal of the Econometric Society (1979): 263-291.

[KGH 14] Kramer, Adam DI, Jamie E. Guillory, and Jeffrey T. Hancock. "Experimental evidence of massive-scale emotional contagion through social networks." Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 111.24 (2014): 8788-8790.

[Sul 04] Suler, John. "The online disinhibition effect." Cyberpsychology & behavior 7.3 (2004): 321-326.

Abstraction and Expression on the Web

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