tom tyler

Approaches to content moderation online draw from models used to manage behavior in the offline world—undesirable content and behaviors are identified and sanctioned are issued as a means of deterrence. Recent discussions in both offline and online contexts have emphasized the limits of a sanction-based approach and highlighted the gains that would flow from building self-regulatory models within which users are encouraged to take personal responsibility for following rules. Our concern is whether a procedural justice model—a model which has increasingly been adopted in offline legal settings—can be used for content moderation online, and furthermore, if the benefits of this self-regulatory model persist in an online setting where algorithms play a more central role. We review recent studies which demonstrate that it is possible to promote self-governance by having platforms employ enforcement …

Existing psychological theories about justice developed during a classic period when social justice was a core aspect of social psychology. These theories have gone on to have impact on a number of fields concerned with addressing social, political and economic issues. At the same time shifts in the field of psychology have increasingly marginalized social justice scholars, diminishing new theoretical developments. This paper identifies organizational changes that would encourage a new generation of social justice theory researchers, something made important by the increasing number and severity of the justice relevant problems arising in the world.

The abstract was from this article and should have read “Existing psychological theories about justice developed during a classic period when social justice was a core aspect of social psychology. These theories have gone on to have impact on a number of fields concerned with addressing social, political and economic issues. At the same time shifts in the field of psychology have increasingly marginalized social justice scholars, diminishing new theoretical developments. This paper identifies organizational changes that would encourage a new generation of social justice theory researchers, something made important by the increasing number and severity of the justice relevant problems arising in the world.”

My scholarly career has centered around articulating and testing a model of legitimacy-based law and governance. In recent decades, that model has achieved considerable success in shaping the way legal authority is understood and exercised. At the same time the legitimacy of legal, political, and social institutions and authorities has declined, raising questions about the future viability of a legitimacy-based model. In this review, I discuss the ascension and potential decline of legitimacy-based governance and outline alternative models of authority that may emerge in the twenty-first century. Three issues are addressed: whether there are ways to reinvigorate legitimacy-based law and governance; whether social norms, moral values, or ideologies are viable alternative forms of authority; and whether it is better to accept that no single form of authority works best in all situations and theories should focus on …

The effectiveness of behavioral regulation depends in significant part on the willingness of citizens to consent to the commands of legal authorities and to actively cooperate with them. Two values constituting what sociologist Max Weber called “legitimacy” are of particular importance to compliance: the individual’s sense of obligation to obey authorities, and his or her sense of trust and confidence in legal authorities. While it is sometimes possible to motivate compliance by creating a risk of punishment for non-compliance, regulating behavior through threats can undermine people’s own commitment to norms, rules, and authorities. Voluntary healthy behavior that is motivated by a person’s own attitudes and values is superior from a regulatory perspective to behavior that has to be coerced. When values are the driver of behavior, rule adherence does not need to be sustained either by enacting a credible system of surveillance and sanctioning or by developing a way to incentivize desired behaviors.Legitimacy is a quality that is possessed by an authority, a law, or an institution that leads others to feel obligated to accept its directives. Self-regulatory motivations are activated when people believe that legal authorities are legitimate and they therefore have an obligation to conform to the law, and when people have trust and confidence in those authorities. People who identify with legal authorities and imbue the legal system with legitimacy will voluntarily abide by laws and defer to authorities. Legitimacy can be built through procedural fairness. Procedural justice is the study of people’s subjective evaluations of the justice of procedures–whether they …

One of the most important human capacities is the ability to cooperate with others in groups. This aspect of human adaptation is key to sustaining the growth and development of increasingly complex societies. For large numbers of individuals to not only coexist in the same physical space but also cooperate and innovate requires the development of institutions to support the coming together of individuals and groups with diverse perspectives, values, and interests. This chapter focuses on the perspective of the host society members and their reactions to immigrants. It reviews psychological research that offers insights into the concerns that sway individuals of existing societies to either oppose or welcome immigrants. Next, the chapter outlines psychological strategies that may lead people in host societies to be more willing to welcome already arrived immigrants.(PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2022 APA, all rights …

This study tests whether the architecture of a social media platform can encourage conversations among users to be more civil. It was conducted in collaboration with Nextdoor, a networking platform for neighbors within a defined geographic area. The study involved:(1) prompting users to move popular posts from the neighborhood-wide feed to new groups dedicated to the topic and (2) an experiment that randomized the announcement of community guidelines to members who join those newly formed groups. We examined the impact of each intervention on the level of civility, moral values reflected in user comments, and user’s submitted reports of inappropriate content. In a large quantitative analysis of comments posted to Nextdoor, the results indicate that platform architecture can shape the civility of conversations. Comments within groups were more civil and less frequently reported to Nextdoor moderators than the comments on the neighborhood-wide posts. In addition, comments in groups where new members were shown guidelines were less likely to be reported to moderators and were expressed in a more morally virtuous tone than comments in groups where new members were not presented with guidelines. This research demonstrates the importance of considering the design, structure, and affordance of the online environment when online platforms seek to promote civility and other pro-social behaviors.

Online platforms are increasingly being held to account for the content that their users post. Regulation of content has long been a secondary concern of platforms, but more recently as platforms focus on their content governance, they have typically drawn their regulatory model from offline legal frameworks built around sanctioning and punishment of rule violators. This study approaches these problems using an alternative approach, also drawn from legal scholarship, that is based upon motivating voluntary rule following by emphasizing the fairness of platform rules and the justice of the processes used to communicate content moderation decisions. Using a survey (n= 10,487) sent to rule violators on Twitter paired with an analysis of participants’ platform behaviors, this study looks at the relationship between people’s judgments of the procedural justice of an enforcement action and the participants’ likelihood of reoffending in the future. We find that those who felt more fairly treated during their enforcement were less likely to recidivate (beta=-. 05, p<. 001). This, along with the study’s other findings, indicates an opportunity for platforms to put a stronger focus on people’s experience with enforcement systems as a potential pathway for reducing recidivism.