Conspiracy and Environment Communities on Reddit Sort Along Different Demographic Axes

2026-09-28

AI Summary

This study investigates the differential effects of online political mobilization across demographic groups. Methodologically, it proposes an attention-flow-based hierarchical transition network that integrates network inference techniques to identify user attributes, such as age and gender, and constructs a hierarchical social network model. This framework analyzes the divergent pathways and ranking mechanisms through which Reddit users enter conspiracy theory versus environmental communities. The findings demonstrate that engagement trajectories in conspiracy theory communities are predominantly shaped by gender and partisanship, whereas participation in environmental communities is primarily driven by age and wealth. By elucidating the heterogeneous formation mechanisms of information ecosystems across distinct issue domains, this work offers novel insights into understanding online political mobilization.

Abstract

The impact of online platforms in political mobilization is widely documented, yet it remains unclear how it affects different demographic groups. To shed light on this phenomenon, we examine two contrasting cases: engagement with environmental causes on one side, and with conspiracy theories on the other. Both are well represented on Reddit, allowing us to study the different origins of these groups using a network-based method. By inferring age, gender, affluence, and partisanship of Reddit users, we construct stratified transition networks to compare the entry pathways of different demographic groups toward these communities. We find that demographic differentiation operates differently in these two domains. Entry into conspiracy communities is primarily structured by gender and partisanship: masculine users disproportionately arrive through overtly political and alt-right spaces and share right-wing media sources, whereas feminine users more often pass through esoteric and spiritual subreddits before converging on r/conspiracy. In contrast, environmental communities are differentiated mainly by age and affluence. Affluent users tend to approach environmental subreddits via discussions of individual energy management, technology, and finance, while less affluent users arrive through protest-oriented and climate movement spaces. By comparing these two issue domains, the study shows that sociodemographic sorting does not operate uniformly across polarized topics. Instead, distinct demographic groups build their own paths, shaping both the routes through which they engage with political content and the informational ecosystems that sustain their engagement. Our approach, based on the attention-flow graph, refines our understanding of how different groups become embedded in online political communities.

Problem

• online political mobilization
• demographic groups
• conspiracy communities
• environmental communities
• Reddit

Innovation

• Stratified Transition Networks
• Attention-flow Graph
• Demographic Inference
• Network-based Method
• Reddit Communities