Does Anonymity Increase the Chance to Get Feedback?
This addresses how anonymity policies affect online community engagement for platform designers and users, but it is incremental as it builds on existing social science research.
The study analyzed YouTube comments to test the effect of anonymity on user participation, finding that allowing pseudonyms (vs. real names) led to slightly less active feedback environments with fewer polite and rude comments at the expense of neutral ones.
To generate a hypothesis about the effects of anonymity on user participation in online communities, comments on Youtube were analysed for effects of the change from allowing pseudonyms to Google+ with its real name policy. Small differences were detected, leading to the hypothesis that the option to remain anonymous leads to a less active environment for getting feedback, with less polite and less rude comments on the expense of neutral ones.