Can Communication Increase Empathy and Perspective-Taking in Online Discussions?

When participants in online discussions do not respond empathetically to others, or do not take another’s perspective, this can lead to polarization, entrench opinions or even contribute to offline violence. We need to understand how to solve or prevent such escalations. But are established methods of conflict resolution – like using conciliatory language to encourage parties to create a shared understanding - effective in online discussions? Traditional ways to solve conflict may not work in online discussions due to the specific affordances of computer-mediated communication (CMC), like higher conversation speed and number of participants in online discussions, which makes following and brokering between discussions difficult. It seems inevitable that novel conflict resolution methods are required for online conflicts on social media. However, no overview on this topic exists so far. Therefore, we conducted a pre-registered systematic review (osf.io/tbdaw) that integrates the scientific knowledge about conflict resolution offline and online to help scholars to update their knowledge for the digital age of public discussion. We synthesize what we know about conflict resolution, and particularly its influence on perspective-taking and empathy, in online and offline discussions. Using a grounded theory approach, we will systematically review existing literature on how communication interventions that can increase perspective-taking and empathy differ in online and offline contexts. Our preliminary framework considers the effect of communication styles, individual motivations and platform affordances on increasing empathy and perspective-taking in online discussions. These insights are based on a pre-registered query search of multi-publisher databases, and backward and forward citations of relevant academic articles, on the use of communication to increase empathy or perspective-taking in online discussions (9673 unique records). After extensive coding, a descriptive analysis of 171 relevant records indicates that scholarship to date focused on various levels of analysis, from micro-level (like individual motivation, Computers in Human Behaviour) to meso-level (teams, Group Decision and Negotiation) to macro-level (social groups, Peace and Conflict). In line with the different disciplines and analysis levels, we observe diverse methods to study the effect of communication on empathy and perspective taking in offline and online discussions. Whereas studies have investigated how CMC by an interactive bot influences empathy and perspective-taking in an online discussion, similar studies have not been conducted for face to face discussions. Whilst studies of FTF communication have investigated the effect of non-verbal cues on empathy towards other discussion partners, similar studies are lacking for CMC discussions. We will conduct a thematic analysis using grounded theory on mechanisms that underlie how communication is able to influence empathy and perspective-taking on our final sample. Based on findings of our future substantive analysis, we develop a theoretical framework on how different communication styles and strategies can influence felt or expressed empathy and perspective-taking, as well as the affordances and audiences of different online environments, or the role of individual differences and motivations to communicate. It may serve as a starting point for evidence-based recommendations for future research and practice in conflict resolution or social media affordances that enable effective exchanges of perspectives.