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How We Express Ourselves Freely: Censorship, Self-censorship, and Anti-censorship on a Chinese Social Media

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Information for a Better World: Normality, Virtuality, Physicality, Inclusivity (iConference 2023)

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Abstract

Censorship, anti-censorship, and self-censorship in an authoritarian regime have been extensively studies, yet the relationship between these intertwined factors is not well understood. In this paper, we report results of a large-scale survey study (\(N=526\)) with Sina Weibo users toward bridging this research gap. Through descriptive statistics, correlation analysis, and regression analysis, we uncover how users are being censored, how and why they conduct self-censorship on different topics and in different scenarios (i.e., post, repost, and comment), and their various anti-censorship strategies. We further identify the metrics of censorship and self-censorship, find the influence factors, and construct a mediation model to measure their relationship. Based on these findings, we discuss implications for democratic social media design and future censorship research.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    https://www.wjx.cn/.

  2. 2.

    https://www.qualtrics.com/.

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Acknowledgements

We would like to thank the respondents who contributed to the survey data, and those who helped us distribute the survey. We also thank the anonymous reviewers for their good words and insightful feedback. We further thank Yifei Wang, Chuanli Xia, Zijie Shao, among many others, who provided useful feedback in the early stage of the study.

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. King Abdullah University of Science and Technology, Thuwal, Saudi Arabia

    Xiang Chen

  2. Wuhan University, Wuhan, China

    Jiamu Xie

  3. Zhejiang University, Hangzhou, China

    Zixin Wang

  4. BNU-HKBU United International College, Zhuhai, China

    Bohui Shen

  5. University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Champaign, USA

    Zhixuan Zhou

Authors
  1. Xiang Chen
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  2. Jiamu Xie
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  3. Zixin Wang
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  4. Bohui Shen
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  5. Zhixuan Zhou
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Zhixuan Zhou .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. iSchool Organization, Berlin, Germany

    Isaac Sserwanga

  2. Victoria University of Wellington, Wellington, New Zealand

    Anne Goulding

  3. University of Missouri, Chicago, IL, USA

    Heather Moulaison-Sandy

  4. University of South Australia, Adelaide, SA, Australia

    Jia Tina Du

  5. University of Porto, Porto, Portugal

    António Lucas Soares

  6. Monash University, Clayton, VIC, Australia

    Viviane Hessami

  7. University of Tennessee at Knoxville, Knoxville, TN, USA

    Rebecca D. Frank

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Chen, X., Xie, J., Wang, Z., Shen, B., Zhou, Z. (2023). How We Express Ourselves Freely: Censorship, Self-censorship, and Anti-censorship on a Chinese Social Media. In: Sserwanga, I., et al. Information for a Better World: Normality, Virtuality, Physicality, Inclusivity. iConference 2023. Lecture Notes in Computer Science, vol 13972. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-28032-0_8

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-28032-0_8

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  • Publisher Name: Springer, Cham

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-031-28031-3

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-031-28032-0

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