News/discussion values and interactivity in corporate social responsibility communication via social media

Abstract

Social media have great potential to facilitate corporate social responsibility (CSR) dialogue between companies and their stakeholders, but two fundamental issues remain: how to encourage greater participation/dialogue and how to avoid the development of echo chambers, whereby participants merely reinforce their previously held views, potentially increasing the polarization of stakeholders. The problem of participation is grounded in people’s reluctance to comment on social media, and concerns with echo chambers arise when social media comments merely reinforce company statements. This research hypothesized that people’s willingness to comment increases when company replies are perceived to be contingent on past comments and when there is uncertainty, rather than negativity, in the comments. Results supported only the latter. Additionally, the study investigated the valence of comments and responses, exploring whether valenced comments engender potentially opinion-reinforcing echo chambers. Results showed that uncertainty tended to foster more interaction and questions, and that negativity inspired more negative comments.