Polarisation

Definition

Polarisation examines distinguishing healthy disagreement from identity-based separation, hostility and loss of shared reality within the broader domain of the cohesion, inclusion, participation, resilience, safety and discourse quality of communities.

Why this matters

Polarisation can materially affect autonomy, safety, public trust, market integrity, community cohesion and institutional decisions. Poorly designed interventions can suppress legitimate speech, entrench bias or create false confidence.

Research questions

Under which conditions can distinguishing healthy disagreement from identity-based separation, hostility and loss of shared reality be measured or improved reliably, and how do effects vary by platform, population, context and intervention?

Hypotheses

A transparent, context-aware approach combining provenance, behavioural evidence and accountable human review will improve affective polarisation and cross-group understanding more than single-score, content-only or opaque automated approaches.

Proposed methods

community surveys; network and discourse analysis; participatory research; moderation experiments; deliberative trials; longitudinal cohort tracking; incident review; expert review; affected-user interviews; reproducibility testing; methods adapted specifically to Polarisation

Stakeholders and beneficiaries

community members; moderators; local government; civil society; educators; platforms; researchers; public-interest organisations