IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/bla/jamist/v63y2012i12p2536-2548.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

The structure of argument patterns on a social Q&A site

Author

Listed:
  • Reijo Savolainen

Abstract

This study investigates the argument patterns in Yahoo! Answers, a major question and answer (Q&A) site. Mainly drawing on the ideas of Toulmin (), argument pattern is conceptualized as a set of 5 major elements: claim, counterclaim, rebuttal, support, and grounds. The combinations of these elements result in diverse argument patterns. Failed opening consists of an initial claim only, whereas nonoppositional argument pattern also includes indications of support. Oppositional argument pattern contains the elements of counterclaim and rebuttal. Mixed argument pattern entails all 5 elements. The empirical data were gathered by downloading from Yahoo! Answers 100 discussion threads discussing global warming—a controversial topic providing a fertile ground for arguments for and against. Of the argument patterns, failed openings were most frequent, followed by oppositional, nonoppositional, and mixed patterns. In most cases, the participants grounded their arguments by drawing on personal beliefs and facts. The findings suggest that oppositional and mixed argument patterns provide more opportunities for the assessment of the quality and credibility of answers, as compared to failed openings and nonoppositional argument patterns.

Suggested Citation

  • Reijo Savolainen, 2012. "The structure of argument patterns on a social Q&A site," Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, Association for Information Science & Technology, vol. 63(12), pages 2536-2548, December.
    • Handle: RePEc:bla:jamist:v:63:y:2012:i:12:p:2536-2548
    DOI: 10.1002/asi.22722
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://doi.org/10.1002/asi.22722
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1002/asi.22722?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:bla:jamist:v:63:y:2012:i:12:p:2536-2548. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Wiley Content Delivery (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.asis.org .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.