The characterizations and the anonymity of comments: A case study on Lizzo’s videos

Social media platforms have become a very popular means of communication, especially among adolescents. Despite controversies surrounding the link between social media use and negative mental health outcomes, people are using social media increasingly. Even celebrities are growingly relying on social media to engage with their audiences, but negative comments are becoming a growing concern. We examined the types of criticism and praise that celebrities receive in their social media comments, focusing on Lizzo, an American musician, rapper, and social media influencer with millions of followers on Instagram, to investigate the comments from the public. Additionally, we focused on analyzing the types of comments posted and examined whether anonymous usernames (e.g., "NYC123") were more likely to post negative comments. We analyzed and categorized comments from 10 YouTube videos about Lizzo and found that there were approximately 1.72 times more positive comments than negative ones. Among the negative comments, the category which has the highest percentage was the comments that mentioned physical appearance. Among the positive comments, the category which has the lowest percentage was the comment that mentioned body positivity. Furthermore, our analysis revealed that comments were 1.532 times more likely to be anonymous when commenting negative comments. To address this issue and promote better mental health for individuals, we recommend YouTube to make it compulsory for users to verify their real names and display them when posting comments and facilitating the removal of negative comments.