The Role of Social Norms for Online Prosocial & Antisocial Behavior Among Adolescents in Singapore

Although features of social media such as visibility and quantifiability might intensify processes of peer influence, there still is little systematic research on these mechanisms in the online context, especially when it comes to prosocial behavior. This study systematically investigated normative influences on adolescents’ antisocial and prosocial online behavior. We applied an extesnded version of the Theory of Normative Social Behavior to analyze how and under which conditions descriptive and injunctive norms influence social online behavior. We conducted an online survey among 420 Singaporean adolescents aged 14–17 years (M = 15.84, SD = 1.10) and applied
structural equation modeling. For antisocial online behavior, we found that stronger perceived antisocial behavior of friends (descriptive norms) was related to more online antisocial behavior for those adolescents who also perceived a higher social approval of such behavior (injunctive norms). This relationship was further strengthened for adolescents who had more positive outcome expectations towards antisocial actions, both for descriptive and injunctive norms. For prosocial online behavior, we found that
a stronger perception of friends behaving accordingly (descriptive norms) was directly related to more online prosocial behavior. Stronger positive outcome expectations towards prosocial online behavior were also directly related to more prosocial actions.
The study underscores a complex interplay of norms and outcome expectations
particularly for understanding antisocial online behavior, while suggesting other
theoretical mechanisms might be more relevant for prosocial online behavior.