From Network Positions to Language Use: Understanding the Effects of Brokerage and Closure Structures from a Linguistic Perspective

ABSTRACT

We investigated cancer survivors’ interactions on an online breast cancer support forum, focusing on how the network structures of brokerage and closure relate to the types of support received and to the language used in posts. Data came through the extraction of 1,443 forum members’ online networks. Automated linguistic analysis was carried out on the 27,248 threads these survivors made and the 336,151 replies they received. Survivors’ brokerage and closure levels were positively correlated with the use of positive affective words in their posts, a linguistic marker of well-being. Different network positions fostered different types of support in the community. Specifically, people bridging unconnected users (the broker role) were more likely to receive informational support whereas people in closely knit groups (the closure role) were more likely to receive emotional support. Theoretical, methodological, and practical implications are examined.

Acknowledgments

The authors would like to thank Editor Dr. Teresa L. Thompson and three anonymous reviewers for their constructive comments on earlier drafts of this article. The authors also wish to express their gratitude to Dr. Liang Zhao for his help in writing a Python program to web-scrape data from the online support forum.

Disclosure of potential conflict of interest

The authors declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Additional information

Funding

The authors received no financial support for the research, authorship, and publication of this article.