Hostile comments and withdrawal from public discourse: experiences of social exclusion in Chinese online news comment sections

Online news comment sections were designed as spaces for public deliberation, yet hostile comments have become a routine feature of everyday news engagement. Grounded in the temporal need-threat account of ostracism and the spiral of silence framework, this study examined whether hostile comment experiences relate to withdrawal from public discourse, whether perceived social exclusion and fear of isolation explain this association, and whether perceived platform moderation buffers the first stage of the pathway. A cross-sectional survey was administered to 512 Chinese adults who read or post comments on news portals at least weekly (48.2% female; mean age 30.6 years). Measures covered hostile comment experience, perceived social exclusion, fear of isolation, withdrawal from public discourse, and perceived platform moderation. Confirmatory factor analysis supported the five-factor structure [chi-square(265) = 399.1; CFI = 0.97; TLI = 0.97; RMSEA = 0.031; SRMR = 0.055]. Structural equation modeling showed that hostile comment experience was positively associated with perceived social exclusion (beta = 0.57, p < 0.001), which was positively associated with fear of isolation (beta = 0.43, p < 0.001), which in turn was associated with withdrawal from public discourse (beta = 0.46, p < 0.001). The sequential indirect effect was 0.104 [95% CI (0.075, 0.136)] and the total effect was 0.324 [95% CI (0.250, 0.400)]. Perceived platform moderation moderated the first stage: the conditional indirect effect was stronger at low [0.131, 95% CI (0.094, 0.172)] than at high [0.077, 95% CI (0.052, 0.106)] levels of perceived moderation. These findings suggest that hostile comments are experienced as social exclusion and that this experience accompanies reduced willingness to participate in news comment sections, while perceived effective moderation is associated with a weaker pathway. Strengthening comment section governance is therefore relevant both to platform design and to the vitality of online public discourse.