How We Express Ourselves Freely: Censorship, Self-censorship, and Anti-censorship on a Chinese Social Media

TL;DR

This study investigates how Chinese social media users experience censorship, self-censorship, and anti-censorship behaviors through a large-scale survey, revealing their strategies, influencing factors, and implications for social media design.

Contribution

It provides a comprehensive analysis of censorship dynamics on Chinese social media, including new metrics, influence factors, and a mediation model linking censorship and self-censorship.

Findings

Users employ various anti-censorship strategies.

Censorship and self-censorship are influenced by multiple factors.

A mediation model links censorship and self-censorship behaviors.

Abstract

Censorship, anti-censorship, and self-censorship in an authoritarian regime have been extensively studies, yet the relationship between these intertwined factors is not well understood. In this paper, we report results of a large-scale survey study (N = 526) with Sina Weibo users toward bridging this research gap. Through descriptive statistics, correlation analysis, and regression analysis, we uncover how users are being censored, how and why they conduct self-censorship on different topics and in different scenarios (i.e., post, repost, and comment), and their various anti-censorship strategies. We further identify the metrics of censorship and self-censorship, find the influence factors, and construct a mediation model to measure their relationship. Based on these findings, we discuss implications for democratic social media design and future censorship research.