ABSTRACT Previous research has identified two competing outcomes of regulatory disclosure for negative online sentiment: chilling effects, which suppress negative online sentiment, and reactance effects, which intensify it. In this study, we apply these theories to examine the impact of mandatory IP location disclosure on citizens' negative online sentiment expressed on Sina Weibo, a leading Chinese social media platform. We argue that the mandatory IP location disclosure can have opposite effects on negative online sentiment depending on the type of social media context. To test this, we use a quasi‐natural experiment and analyze more than 160,000 comments posted before and after the implementation of the mandatory IP location disclosure policy. Employing a regression discontinuity design (RDD), we find that mandatory IP location disclosure reduces negative sentiment under government accounts while amplifying it under non‐government accounts, particularly in the re‐post section. These findings reveal the heterogeneous effects of regulatory disclosure and shed light on how citizens adapt their online expression strategies in response. More broadly, the study advances our understanding of the interplay among citizens, platforms, and governments in regulated social media environments.
Li et al. (Sun,) studied this question.