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Sanjay Kairam @skairam.bsky.social · 29d

Big thanks to @galenweld.bsky.social for leading this work , along with Carl Pearson, @bradspahn.bsky.social, @timalthoff.bsky.social, and @amyxzhang.bsky.social, along with colleagues at Reddit for supporting this research!

Sanjay Kairam @skairam.bsky.social · 29d

This paper used a broad set of tools under the hood to study communities: from factor analysis to LIWC-22 to interaction motifs to hierarchical models. Check out the paper to learn more! arxiv.org/pdf/2508.08596

arxiv.org

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Sanjay Kairam @skairam.bsky.social · 29d

If you design or manage communities, how do you think about encouraging replies, surfacing gratitude, and encouraging inclusive language? What strategies have worked (or not) for you in the past?

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Sanjay Kairam @skairam.bsky.social · 29d

Style: More expressions of gratitude, feeling, and third-person plural drive SOVC generally. "Netspeak" (e.g. lol, haha, emoji) and a focus on the future are signals of stronger membership & belonging. Is this the case in your favorite communities?

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Sanjay Kairam @skairam.bsky.social · 29d

Structure: We find that reciprocal replies are great predictors of stronger communities across all three dimensions; reciprocal upvotes drive feelings of membership, while reciprocal downvotes surprisingly don't decrease SOVC.

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Sanjay Kairam @skairam.bsky.social · 29d

We identify 19 features capturing the style and structure of conversations, which together explain 33% of the variance in SOVC scores, with style capturing more than structure.

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Sanjay Kairam @skairam.bsky.social · 29d

We find that community experiences (SOVC) on Reddit can reliably be distinguished along three dimensions: Membership & Belonging, Cooperation & Shared Values, and Connection & Influence.

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Sanjay Kairam @skairam.bsky.social · 29d

Think of a community as an engine. What would you listen for to know if it's running right? The murmur of messages, the rumble of replies, the sparks of support

In this #ICWSM2026 paper, we identify topic-agnostic conversation features that reveal how well a community is vibing.

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Sanjay Kairam @skairam.bsky.social · 29d

Crunching away on a paper for #CHI2026 about online communities, moderation, or sociolinguistics?

You may be want to check out recent work led by
@galenweld.bsky.social on predicting SOVC within subreddits based on the style and structure of conversations.

arxiv.org/abs/2508.08596

How Conversational Structure and Style Shape Online Community Experiences

Sense of Community (SOC) is vital to individual and collective well-being. Although social interactions have moved increasingly online, still little is known about the specific relationships between t...

arxiv.org

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Reposted by Sanjay Kairam

Marianne Aubin Le Quéré @mariannealq.bsky.social · Jun 5

Out today in Social Media + Society!

In a new paper with @skairam.bsky.social, we conduct a longitudinal survey with Reddit trace data to compare the demographics and behaviors of users who follow local subreddits and those who do not.

Here's what we learned🧵

journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/...

Screenshot of title and abstract of article in Social Media & Society.

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Sanjay Kairam @skairam.bsky.social · Apr 7

Excited to be talking about my online communities research tomorrow at @princetoncitp.bsky.social! Hope to see you in person, but otherwise you can catch the livestream from anywhere!

Princeton Center for Information Technology Policy @princetoncitp.bsky.social · Apr 7

Tomorrow at #CITP: Tuesday Seminar at 12:30pm w/
@skairam.bsky.social presenting his talk: "The Threads That Bind: Crafting Successful Online Communities" in Sherrerd Hall 306. Sanjay previously launched #Reddit for #Researchers & is now at #OpenAI.

4/8/25 - Livestream available for all.

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Sanjay Kairam @skairam.bsky.social · Nov 27

I’m excited about how far we got the program in a short time and am very confident in the Reddit team’s ability to keep making progress on RFR.

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Sanjay Kairam @skairam.bsky.social · Nov 27

What a treat to work on this project with @manoelhortaribeiro.bsky.social -- so happy to see it out in the world!

What if we could help prevent rule-breaking in online communities by guiding contributors towards better contributions before they even hit submit?

Read Manoel's thread to learn more!

Manoel Horta Ribeiro @manoelhortaribeiro.bsky.social · Nov 27

New @acm-cscw.bsky.social paper, new content moderation paradigm.

Post Guidance lets moderators prevent rule-breaking by triggering interventions as users write posts!

We implemented PG on Reddit and tested it in a massive field experiment (n=97k). It became a feature!

arxiv.org/abs/2411.16814

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Sanjay Kairam @skairam.bsky.social · Nov 27

Thanks!

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Sanjay Kairam @skairam.bsky.social · Nov 27

Definitely exciting! Thanks!

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