Managing unpleasant moods

Affective discipline in Facebook discussions

Bibliographic Data

ID12599862
AuthorsAnna Rantasila (0000-0002-7703-401X, Tampere University, corresponding author)
Year2020
Volume25
Issue1
Pages256-274
Publication date2020-12-06
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueEuropean Journal of Cultural Studies (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 1367-5494 • E-ISSN: 1460-3551
PublisherSAGE Publishing (PUBLISHER • US)
DOI10.1177/1367549420973217
OpenAlexW3113201508
LanguageEN
Citations received4
References cited39

The article explores how affect is circulated and managed in comment discussions on networked online platforms, such as Facebook. A mixed-methods analysis is conducted of comments on news about the triple disaster of an earthquake, a tsunami and a meltdown of three reactors at Japan’s Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant in March 2011 on public Facebook pages of seven Finnish mainstream news media. The article examines how affect sticks and circulates in these discussions, and how the commenters direct and sustain the mode and mood of Facebook discussions. The main findings of the article concern how online discussions are structured by what the author calls affective discipline, in which participants the discussion manage the mood of the discussion through various means. The results open up an important way to study the internal, affective dynamics of contemporary online discussions. In particular, the study helps us understand how flows of affect are shaped and steered in online discussions, and how the same discussions may simultaneously sustain multiple affective dynamics. These dynamics may, in turn contribute to how publics respond to news and official information in crises

Affect (linguistics · Dynamics (music · Mainstream · Media studies · Mood · Political science · Power (physics · Public relations · Social media · Sociology · Media Studies and Communication · Psychology · Public Relations and Crisis Communication · Social Media and Politics · Social Psychology