The Influence of Online Political Expression on Disagreement and Incivility: The Moderating Role of Social Identity

This study theorized that active political expression on social networking sites (SNS) facilitates political disagreement since it diversifies one’s communication network, which likely leads to political incivility. Additionally, individuals’ social identity might condition this indirect relationship. Relying on a two-wave panel survey in Hong Kong, this study found that political expression on SNS is significantly associated with political disagreement. However, political disagreement does not lead to political incivility, indicating that it does not mediate the relationship between political expression and incivility. Further analysis showed that the mediating relationship between political expression, disagreement, and incivility is only significant for dual identifiers.