Opponents and proponents of the war in Ukraine in Russian social media: who are they?

TL;DR

This study analyzes Russian social media users' profiles to understand the personality traits, values, and interests of those supporting or opposing the Ukraine war, revealing nuanced differences and commonalities.

Contribution

It introduces a novel social media-based approach to profiling political identities and values related to the Ukraine war in Russia, supplementing traditional sociological methods.

Findings

Pro-war supporters tend to have weaker political identities, often identifying as 'moderate'

Opponents of the war more frequently identify as 'liberal' and align with government-promoted values

Both groups share interests in music, history, and sports, and value kindness and honesty

Abstract

Understanding the personality of Russians who support the war in Ukraine is one of the key steps to understanding how this war became possible. However, during the war, traditional sociological methods are not always applicable. Social media provides an alternative source of what is inside people's heads. In this paper, I compare the political identities, values, and interests of social media users in Russia who hold a strong position for or against the war in Ukraine. I collect data from VK, the most popular Russian social media platform, and analyze self-filled profile information as well as the groups that the users subscribed to. I found that proponents of the war tend to have a weaker political identity (self-identified as "moderate") compared to opponents, who specify it more precisely (often, but not limited to, "liberal"). Additionally, the values of the proponents more frequently align with those promoted by the Russian government, such as orthodoxy and family. Despite these differences, pro-war and anti-war users share many common interests, as evidenced by their subscriptions to the same groups focused on music, history, and sport. When asked to state the most important trait in people (a field users can fill in VK), the most frequent answer for both groups is "kindness and honesty". The analysis results, in addition to contributing to the understanding of public opinion in Russia, can be utilized for predicting one's position on the war based on their social media profile.