Conflict and Negotiation: A Study of Public Opinion Conflict on Online Opinion Platforms

Abstract

As one of the hot issues in public opinion research, online public opinion has been attracting much attention from scholars. This paper explores the reasons why people tend to express their opinions in the form of confrontation and conflict in social networking platforms and the impact of this tendency from the perspectives of communication science, sociology and psychology. First of all, This paper uses the video "The Story of the Second Uncle" on Bilibili as an example, and uses the interview method to investigate the tendency of respondents to speak in the network in depth. The study found that users would choose consensus discussions to avoid conflicts for their own interests on online social networking platforms where interpersonal networks exist. But users tend to express their true views and opinions in online platforms with fewer interpersonal relationships, such as Weibo and Bilibili, which may lead to conflicting discussions. Secondly, this paper analyzes the causes and effects of the above situation by applying the spiral of silence hypothesis, catharsis theory and Shirley Turkle's concept of the "playground of humanity". Finally, the paper reflects on the shortcomings of the study and points out that the study of Internet users' psychology is also an important factor that needs to be taken into account in the governance of online public opinion.