Current Biology: CB, 32[18], 4093–4100.e6), these two questions are closely related: brain activity measured by EEG at the offset of stimulus presentation predicts the behavioral temporal decision, being influenced by the current context, and reflecting the relative distance to a decision threshold which is also context dependent.Is there sufficient evidence to make a decision, or has enough time passed to justify making a decision? According to Ofir and Landau ( During a lunch break, you open a cup of instant noodles, pour hot water over the noodles, cover, and wait. Time to open depends on your desired noodle softness and the sense of passage of time. Too early, noodles not ready. Too late, noodles too soft. Using a classic temporal bisection task, Ofir and Landau  studied In a temporal bisection task, participants are first presented with two references: the shortest and the longest durations. After familiarization, they are asked to classify durations that fall between the two references as “short” or “long.” Ofir and Landau  measuredInterestingly, the pattern was similar for the short- and long-range durations. In their Experiment 3, participants performed the bisection task in two separate blocks: one with the subsecond (0.2–0.8 s) range and the other suprasecond (1–2 s) range. Short durations in both blocks, albeit differently in their absolute magnitude, elicited a similar large amplitude of the stimulus offset P3b . This suggests the activation of the offset P3 does not reflect an absolute accumulation, but is rather context dependent, relative to the decision threshold set in that block. It is well-established that time estimation is susceptible to various background contexts, such as stimulus spacing and ensemble statistics (Zhu et al., Contexts set our expectations. For example, we expect to wait a short amount of time for a traffic light to turn green than for a bus to arrive. These expectations influence our decision-making processes, as shown by Ofir and Landau . Five miIt is worth noting that the interpretation of the offset P3b as reflecting temporal evidence is specific to the context of a prospective timing task, where the decision threshold is predetermined and the critical event is immediately monitored upon the stimulus onset. In many everyday timing tasks, we may not know what our decision threshold is or we may not be constantly monitoring every event. For instance, we may not realize we have overcooked noodles or missed an appointment until after the fact, when our attention returns to the event and we are surprised at having missed the decision threshold. This type of retrospective timing differs from the prospective timing process (Shi et al., In sum, Ofir and Landau  establis


Whilst the coronavirus pandemic keeps threatening the world at large, little is yet knownabout the impoliteness implications of user-generated- Covid-related contents on socialmedia such as Facebook. The aim of this study is to examine the comments made in responseto Giuliani’s Covid- 19 diagnosis, from an impoliteness perspective. A merely qualitativeanalysis of a dataset of 3,000 comments evenly collected from three different news outlets, the findings reveal that the reactions to Giuliani’s diagnosisare more focused on him being a politician, than him being a human being affected by thevirus. The reactions attack his actions and the actions of others within his politicalparty, which suggests that impoliteness has a strong dependence on previous actions andpolitical engagement. Giuliani is seen by some users to be undeserving of compassion orempathy not just on the grounds of his active involvement in attempting to overturn thepresidential election results, but also for his disregard toward mask wearing in publicspheres. Not all the users, however, appreciate the attacks against Giuliani. Throughmetadiscursive comments, some users not just feel the need to treat Giuliani as a humanbeing, but more importantly remind fellow users that Covid-19 should be a concern for all.What is particularly critical about these metacomments is that while the users advocatefor civil interactions, they mostly do not condone Giuliani’s actions. This so becausethese users understand what should be obligatory, permissible, or forbidden on the humanlevel under the circumstances. Millions of people worldwide carefully followed thepandemic crisis as it unfolded on social media and live TVs. Contents and statistics on thedevastation induced by the virus became constantly available and reported live on bothtraditional news stations and social media. In the particular case of social media, forinstance, the more alarming the pandemic got, the more polarizing the reactions became,especially when it came to prominent politicians being diagnosed with Covid-19  from fellow users, such reactions areoften influenced by various factors such as the context of the exchange, the topic ofconversation or even the type of audience , 2021a. Previous studies reiterate the argument that impoliteness revolves around the notion ofnorms which can be cultural or situational . Accorditranslocalitydigital environments. Defined as “the complex ways in which diverse local practices cometogether in global spaces”  assessments made byinteractants on the grounds of shared moral order . Haugh aThe term evaluation is crucial when defining impoliteness as a social practice, sinceimpoliteness behaviors depend on the perception, experience and evaluation by not justindividuals involved in the interaction alone, but anyone close enough to experience suchbehavior. Evaluation is what gives an utterance a positive or negative value. Putdifferently, what makes people perceive particular behaviors as impolite is the valueaccorded to them in a particular community  and the However, when examining impoliteness, one has to be aware of not just the importance ofthe hearer’s evaluation , but alsanimator (or utterer) which refers to the person producing talk, an author is the entity that creates or designs the talk, a principal which is the party responsible for that talk, and a figure is the character portrayed within the talk. These roles and responsibilities mayaffect the perspectives from which impoliteness is evaluated and perceived. For example,an animator may produce an utterance that is only perceived as impolite or offensive bythe author, rather than by the intended target. Put differently, social media  have a policy based on which they sanction offensive behaviors notbecause the targets of such offenses complain, but because these acts go against thepolicy of the platform. Trump, for example, has been banned from Twitter for violating theplatform policy.Yet, individuals’ evaluation of social actions, especially on Facebook—which is apolylogual interaction—depends on the participation status of the participants, also knownas footing .FootingThe notion of footing is particularly salient in the case of the data analyzed in thispaper, as these roles can broadly be distributed as follows: the animators are the usersengaged in the interaction the comment threads, the author here is Facebook, theprincipals are the three News outlets and the figure is Giuliani who is portrayed withinthe talk. In this context, while author, principal, and figure seem to have a static andunique role, the animators can be categorized into those that produce impolitenessutterances (producers of comments) and those that morally see and evaluate theseutterances as impolite (producer of metacomments). Evaluations of impoliteness in thiscontext needs to be situated vis-à-vis not only simply speakers or hearers, but alsorelative to a complex array of production and reception footings .Time and space are also of particular importance in understanding impoliteness as asocial practice in the sense that evaluative moments within a particular interaction areusually underpinned by the different understanding of time and space . In otheRecent developments in impoliteness research have shown that impoliteness behaviors canbe interpreted from the scientific standpoint (second order), from lay persons’ standpoint(first order) or from a hybrid approach, which is the combination of the above .This diFinally, whilst It is now widely accepted that any investigation into human behavior on Facebook requires areflection on the questions of privacy, confidentiality, and informed consent . As areIt is important to point out the motive for choosing these three news outlets. Based on thetraditional political standings, Fox News page is a pro-republican, pro-conservative, andpro-Trump news page. CNN is a pro-democratic, pro-liberal, and almost anti-Trump newsoutlet. Finally, as a foreign TV broadcast, the BBC is neutral when dealing with US-relatedissues and would generate an equilibrium of between well-wishing and ill-wishing comments.In this context and since impoliteness implies verbal attacks and criticisms, one mayattempt to argue that there is likelihood for users to act more antagonistically on the CNNFacebook page than on the Fox News one. However, this expectation may be misleading on thegrounds that we may assume that we know where the updates are posted from, but it is hard todetermine where the reactions are posted from. These three Facebook pages have a strongoutreach which goes beyond the national borders and situate them at an international scalewhich, one may argue, defies nationally known political standings. Moreover, unlike Facebookpages held by politicians which often encourage the participation and engagement offollowers or users with clear political and party-line commitment , pages hUnderstandably, there are a number of drawbacks as well as advantages about this type ofdata. One issue about the nature of these data is that (1) the protagonist—that is,Giuliani—is absent from the development of the conversation within the Facebook thread, (2)the researcher bears no physical contact with the participants. Additionally, the copyingand pasting of the data, identification and classification of the comments were carried outin a pen-and-paper fashion. One of the methodological advantages about this type of data,however, is that the data are readily available and can, as a result, be easily andconveniently collected. This easiness consisted of simply copying the comments from the newsoutlet page and posting them into a .doc file. Another advantage is its accessibility. Tothe day of the writing of this paper, the data source remains available to the public.Moreover, what is particularly important about this type of data is that it provides theresearcher with an opportunity to carry out a real time investigation of three differentsets of interactions dealing with the exact same issue at the same time, which otherwisewould be impossible.U to represent both the user and the rank of theirinterventions within the threads in each corpus. Throughout the analysis, the findings arepresented in the following order. Comments from the BBC (U_BBC_) appear first in eachexcerpt analyzed, followed by comments from CNN (U_CNN_). Comments from FOX News (U_FOX_)are presented last.As for ethical considerations, Finally, a multimodal analysis is critical in carrying any investigation on social media,especially Facebook. This rests on the argument that multimodal and mainly textual discourseare inseparable and emotionally charged in digital discourse. Studying impoliteness impliesanalyzing individuals’ emotional representation of social actions. With this in mind, Imeticulously investigated all instances where users hashtag fellow users within theinteraction so as to determine items directed at Giuliani’s diagnosis and those used asreactions to the comments previously made by fellow users within the threads. When a useraddresses a fellow user by means of a hashtag, this is displayed within parentheses in theanalysis. Likewise, all the excerpts are reproduced here as they were naturally uttered bythe users with errors and infelicities so as to keep their naturally occurring forms.Finally, I took into account the display of emojis in the analysis.The analysis of the results will first start with a second-order examination ofimpoliteness as it manifests across the corpora, before elaborating on the first-orderperception that arises therein.idiot Lawyer; U_CNN_201 used morons, idiots, and con to describe the Republican leadership; U_FOX_624 goes even further as to callfellow users evil, sickos, and nasty.There are multiple ways to act impolitely in a particular interaction. In this subsectionI take a second order approach so as to examine the linguistic items used in expressingimpoliteness. In excerpt 1, for instance, U_BBC_198 refers to Giuliani as an Excerpt 1:Idiots Lawyer.U_BBC_198: Poor Public that was exposed to the Morons, idiots, and con men, make up the Republican “leadership.” Time to jump ship and salvage what’s left of your dignity.U_CNN_201: Dear Republicans, It must be really embarrassing to call yourself arepublican at this point. very EVIL people in this world. . I can’tstand Obama, Harris and Biden but I don’t wish them illness either…SICKOS!Nasty, nasty □ people.U_FOX_624: There are some sickos and nasty. U_FOX_624 sees the impropriety of the attacks targeting Giuliani. U624disapproves negative comments that target a fellow being affected by the virus regardlessof the divergence of point of views. Being the results of previous actions, these acts allinvolve pointing out some kind of fault , and expressing disapproval of that fault from the sitting administration. In excerpt 3, for instance, U_BBC_449 and U_CNN_151rhetorically implies that Trump is untrustworthy and no one should rely upon him foraccurate news, whereas U_FOX_85 raises suspicions around the fact that only Republicanshave come down with the virus so far (as was the case of U_FOX_530 in excerpt 3). Theinterests of these items are not Giuliani’s health; rather, these acts serve the politicalinterests of the participants in the interaction.Excerpt 3U_BBC_449: “Trump says???” Couldn’t you find a reliable source?U_CNN_151: Why is trump announcing that? Why would anyone believe him! There are manythings wrong with Rudy that’s evident!U_FOX_85: How come none of the prominent DEMONCRAPS In DC or anywhere else don’t getCovid?????? Has anyone asked that question?? Kind of fishy if you ask me □The questions in this except index the clash of priorities of the users across the threecorpora, as BBC and CNN users mainly attack the credibility of Trump and hisadministration with respect to the information they release to the public, whereas fromFox news users tend to drag Democrats into the reason the virus only affects Republicans,even if the disproportion in terms of infection rates is relatively understandable giventhat the Republicans were reluctant to implement some and appeal to Covid-19 measures suchas mask wearing.In excerpt 4, U_BBC_238 condescends to Giuliani as unstable and incoherent. Likewise,U_CNN_555 treats Trump administration officials as hard-learner individuals. Finally,U_FOX_189 describes Giuliani as a disgraceful person.Excerpt 4U_BBC_238: Probably explains why Giuliani has been making less sense than normallately.U_CNN_555: They don’t seem to be learning anything!!! / U_CNN_574: That’s whathappens when you are reckless!U_FOX_189: One of America’s most toxic men. Rudys fall from grace is beyondpatheticmaking less sense, a difficultlearner or a toxic person falling from grace is undoubtedly atakedown. Regardless of the perspective these comments are approached, referring tosomeone battling Covid-19 as “making less sense than normal lately” orcalling someone “reckless” or “toxic” is far from beinga positive description of Giuliani. The same argument can be made for excerpt 5 in whichU_BBC_726 indirectly orders Republican politicians to wear masks, U_CNN_877 makes an orderfor Giuliani to be isolated, and U_FOX_35 asks Giuliani to stay home.Describing Giuliani as Excerpt 5U_BBC_726: Let your GOP folks to mask up U_CNN_877: Get him isolated and trace his close contactsU_FOX_35: stay home since you felt it was not important enough to mask uplet your GOP folks to maskup, get him isolated and trace his close contacts andstay home since you felt it was not important enough to mask up—showsthe lack of consideration for others, as the implying intent is to treat GOP folks asstupid, less important and irresponsible. It is however important to highlight that thereremains room to interpret the comments in excerpt 5 as somewhat uttered for the benefit ofthe addressee, especially if one sees these comments as an appropriate way to raiseawareness on the issue of mask wearing, self-isolation and contact tracing, which allcontribute to lifesaving in the context of a pandemic.The polarization of views over the issue of mask wearing becomes the grounds on whichthese comments are uttered, as the users enforce the idea that Giuliani’s ownirresponsibility for not wearing masks is what opened the door for him to catch the virus,and if he does not isolate himself, he may end up spreading the virus further. However,although masking up can be beneficial to Giuliani in terms of preventing or fighting thevirus, ordering GOP folks (which includes Giuliani) to mask up is certainly a form ofcondescending behavioral practices through which the users attempt to patronize theinteraction. The use of expressions—such as get lost Rudi,” whereas U_CNN_271 and U_CNN_377 as well as U_FOX_676express their disinterest in the news about the diagnosis.The antagonism around the appropriate conduct during the pandemic generated dismissivecomments across the corpora. In excerpt 6, for instance, U_BBC_72 explicitly uttered“Excerpt 6U_BBC_72: Get lost, Rudi …of us care? Deal with it! /U_CNN_377: I could careless about Rudy what I do care about are the people he infectedand that might die.U_CNN_271: Do you really think most Who cares! Nobody advertises when I catch a virus!U_FOX_676: Get lost,Rudi,” U_CNN_377 and U_FOX_676 elaborate on the reason for their dismissal ofGiuliani. Concretely, while U_CNN_271 appears to be more concerned about people other thanGiuliani, U_FOX_676 takes issue against the attention Giuliani’s test is getting.The clash of expectations leads to an expression of disinterest in Giuliani’s diagnosis.One may, for example, argue that disregarding Giuliani’s illness this way is a markedbehavior in the sense that understanding, showing compassion, and emotional support arethe appropriate conduct in the context of a dreadful pandemic. However, it is important tohighlight the variation in terms of the motives behind each dismissive comment. Forexample, unlike U_BBC_72 who uttered a short dismissing expression “Some reactions to Giuliani’s diagnosis focus on his involvement in attempting to overturnthe results of the election. In excerpt 7, for instance, all the comments intend tosilence Giuliani and have him kept away from the public eye. These users believe that thediagnosis is an opportunity not to hear Giuliani anymore.Excerpt 7U_BBC_409: So maybe, finally, at last Giuliani will shut up for a while at leastU_CNN_835: Someone should take him home and lock the doors.U_FOX_242: Now he can quarantine 14 days and shut his lying mouth up…God works inmysterious ways…Framing silencers such as shut up in a life-threatening context is certainly humiliatingand aggressive, as it shows an explicit lack of consideration for Giuliani’s sense ofworth and dignity. Undermining Giuliani’s sense of identity challenges the notion ofsocial and moral normality which often motivates the expectation of sympathy in moments ofdespair. The absence of this sense of moral normality toward a suffering individual, thus,becomes indexical and marked, as this amounts to a failure to appropriately attend toothers’ needs, which is an affront to the addresser and the addressee.The polarization of views about the pandemic leads some users to question the seriousnessof Giuliani’s diagnosis. In excerpt 8, U_CNN_364 and U_FOX_7 appear to encroach uponfellow users by downplaying the concern over Covid-19.Excerpt 8U_CNN_364: We all will get it sometime. It is what it is. Can’t shut the Worlddown…U_FOX_7: He will be fine. Lots of people I know have had it and been fine. 99%recovery rate sheeple. Stop letting the mainstream state run communist media lead youaround by your short and curlies!Can’t shut the World down…and Stop letting the mainstream state run communist media lead you around by yourshort and curlie,” however, indexes the need to control fellow users’ way ofthinking. As can be seen, the focus of the comments in excerpt 9 shifts from Giuliani’sdiagnosis to the debate on how to behave in the midst of the pandemic.Whether these comments were expressed with panic-avoiding intentions through whichU_CNN_364 and U_FOX_7 attempt to camouflage the seriousness and harmfulness of thepandemic, the use of such lexical stances as “Likewise, across Fox News and CNN a recurrent way to resurge the traditional politicalconflicts is through accusing users with opposing views as responsible for Giuliani’spositive diagnosis. In excerpt 9, for instance, U_CNN_119 and U_FOX_254 accuse theDemocrats as responsible for Giuliani’s health shortcomings.Excerpt 9U_CNN_119: Democrats infected him because he’s been so successful in his efforts toover turn the election results! U_FOX_254: I’ve been saying for a while that leftist would find a way to get thevirus to him.Interestingly enough, other-blaming comments such as those in excerpts 9 are solelypervasive in Fox News and CNN corpora with zero incidence in the BBC corpus. One plausibleexplanation is that the main concern for the users commenting on the BBC page is thethreat that the virus represents for Giuliani’s health and the rest of human beings,rather than the political divide of the US. Another explanation may be that, being aforeign news outlet, the users may not be as enthusiastic about engaging themselves in thepromotion of conspiracy theories as are the US citizens themselves.Giuliani is filing a law suit in the Supreme Court to overturn his positivetest ” inwhich the user ends the comment by means of a face-with-tear-of-joy emoji, the teasingcomment becomes a way of affectionately poking fun at Giuliani while enhancing positivefeeling and relational quality among fellow users who may find the utterance amusing aswell. Building upon this, the reactions of U285: The best one yet, U286:lol and U292: kajajajaaaaaaaa subscribes to theplayful nature of this teasing. A similar example is found in CNN where U27 mockinglyasserts “.he [Giuliani]’ll call the lab and tell them to overturn the results” As in the case ofU_BBC_284, U_CNN_27 ends the comment with the suspension of three face-with-tear-of-joyemoji, generating laughter reactions from U_CNN_ 28 and U_CNN_30. Moreover, U_FOX_176reuses Trump’s infamous phrase “It will go away like a miracle” with twoface-with-tear-of-joy emoji  so as to poke fun at Giuliani’sdiagnosis. All these comments are classic provocative forms of social action that invitespecific forms of response from participants  and antisocial (oraggressive) .In the icipants , p. 209.Excerpt 10/U_BBC_285(Addressing U_BBC_284’s comment): The best one yet/ U_BBC_286 (Addressing U_BBC_284’scomment) lol. /U_BBC_295 (Addressing U_BBC_284’s comment) kajajajaaaaaaaa/U_BBC_889:What is wrong with you people that you are happy someone has covid, bunch ofdisgusting humans.U284: Giuliani is filing a law suit in the Supreme Court to overturn his positivetest / U_CNN_28 (Addressing U_CNN_27’scomment): I wouldn’t wish the virus on anyone, but your comment wins on the internettoday! /U_CNN_29 (Addressing U27’s comment) I don’t think the situation is funny, butI did laugh……/U_CNN_30 (Addressing U_CNN_29’s comment): no you’re not. I laughed too. At this point, if we don’t laugh, we’ll cryand laughter is better for the heart and soul. Laugh on!/U90: Making fun ofanybody’s health scare is juvenile. No matter who it is. . Be betterpeople.U_CNN_27: he’ll call the lab and tell them to overturn the results □□/ U_FOX_209: Those laughing aboutthis are obviously evil and vile!U_FOX_176: Giuliani has been taken to the hospital. It will go away like a miracle. □let us know how that works out for ya Rudy. /U_FOX_207: The flu will go away by EasterThe two ends of these teasing comments show how conflicts unfold across the corporabetween sympathizers who perceive teasing comments as offensive, hurtful and evil, anddetractors—willing to derive joy and pleasure at the expense of Giuliani’s health. It isalso important to highlight the fact that the comments, as shown in excerpt 10, are alldesigned) in ways that invite some kind of affective response (or set of responses) on thepart of fellow users . These abut maybe.” U_BBC_307’s disagreeing comment shows to someextent the consideration U_BBC_307 has with respect to U_BBC_303’s feeling. Anotherexample of disagreement is found in CNN where U_CNN_159 expresses disagreement over theefficacy of mask wearing in preventing the spread of the virus. Likewise, in Fox News,U_FOX_148 questions the relevance of mask wearing and hand washing in preventing fromcatching the virus, pointing to the fact he/she had already been diagnosed with the viruseven after having followed these guidelines. U_FOX_149, however, offers a differentperspective in the mask-wearing discussion, by firstly expressing the explicitdisagreement , before elaborating on his/herreasons which rests on the effectiveness of surgical masks in reducing the chance oftransmission.At this point, there is no doubt that Giuliani’s diagnosis is a polarized topic aboutwhich the users are in a constant antagonism on how to react. This is why strategies suchas agreement and disagreement are not just commonplace across the three corpora, but moreimportantly they play a substantial role in negotiating relationships. However, whileagreement may build rapport between interactants, disagreement is generally accounted foras a face-threatening act which, depending on the degree, may cause conflict or simplydamage the future dynamics of the interaction. In excerpt 11, for instance, U_BBC_303discards the need to offer sympathy to Giuliani. However, the reactive comment made byU_BBC_307 to U_BBC_303’s act offers an opposing opinion. As a way of avoiding anyconflictual misunderstanding, U_BBC_307 starts the comment in a way that seems to approveU_BBC_303’s utterance in an effort to mitigate the impact of the disagreement, beforeelaborating on his/her differing opinion by giving the reason for the disagreement withthe hedge “Excerpt 12quite true, but maybe for humanity’s sake, we shouldn’trejoice.U_BBC_303: … Deserves no sympathy."/ U_BBC_ 307(Addressing U_BBC_303’s comment):Rest giuliani. Standing up for the truth, rooting out thewrong, his mask wouldn’t have stopped the spread of covid anyway. Show other places where it’s working. Display the standardization ofmask use and design nationwide.U_CNN_159: That’s his choice but it’s still not funny for an elderly personto get the virus. I wear a mask, wash my hands religiously and I still got it monthsago. Masks really don’t do much, but we should at least tryU_FOX_148: U149: (Addressing U_FOX_148)That is incorrect. Surgica masks reduce the chance of transmission of particlescontaining viruses from people between 70% and 98.5%. Their effectiveness is VERYhigh…One fact that stands out in the way users utter the comments is that the disagreementdoes not seem to restrict addressees’ action-environment as it would be the case in apower-asymmetric environment see . In otheAs pointed out at the outset, impoliteness rests on individuals’ perceptions of(in)appropriate behavior. This perception is achieved through speech acts  considered to be social actions with implication on the (co-)constituting relation among individuals. In this subsection, the focus is on thefirst-order interpretation of the flow on the interaction across the corpora.In excerpt 12, the intent of the three comments is not to react to Giuliani’s diagnosisper se; rather they are reactions to the behavior underlining the interventions of fellowusers. In other words, the mere belief in these three comments is that there are commentswithin each corpus that are evaluated by U_BBC_89, U_CNN_153, and U_FOX_93 assarcastically expressing joy and happiness about Giuliani’s diagnosis. These users’understanding of the diagnosis is that Covid-19 is an issue to take seriously, and no oneshould joke about another person’s positive diagnosis as has been the intention of somecomments within the thread. Additionally, there is another commonly shared elementattached about these comments; that is, they are not just commenting on the disease assuch, but they target the contents of what has been uttered in the preceding comments. Inother words, the targets of these comments are fellow users within the interaction.Moreover, the fact that these three metapragmatic comments occur at turns 89 (BBC News),153 (CNN), and 93 (Fox News) respectively suggests that these users had read andunderstood the preceding comments, and from this understanding, they take aim at fellowusers’ interventions so as to protect Giuliani’s dignity as a human being.Exceprt 13U_BBC_89: What is wrong with you people that you are happy someone has covid.U_CNN_153: These comments are hilarious. I have to admit they made me laugh. HoweverCovid is not funny at all and I hope the dude gets well. Unfortunately, Im sure he’sspread this to MANY others and some people don’t have stellar healthcare access.U_FOX_93: Really don’t know how people who are reacting to this with laughter canhonestly live with themselves. It’s not just your own countryman who’s come down with#COVID19 but your fellow man too and you all find it amusing. How can you people be socallous…The awareness in the minds of the lay users of what is the appropriate behavior under thecircumstance of positive Covid-19 diagnosis is evident. Such appropriate conduct impliesthat Covid-19 is no laughing matter. The comments are an acknowledgment of the dramaticloss of human life worldwide and the reminder that the risk for anyone (including thoseengaged in the interaction) to get infected or potentially die from this virus is real.This metapragmatic accounts, on the other hand, for the epistemological fact that what isreally at play in the three corpora is the struggle over the norms of interaction. Someusers find Giuliani’s diagnosis as an issue akin to compassion, whilst others take thesituation as a gratifying opportunity to generate laughter and happiness.This paper set out to examine impoliteness in Facebook generated by Giuliani’s Covid testand provide empirical responses to the following questions: How does impoliteness unfold inFacebook comments triggered by Giuliani’s diagnosis? On what grounds are the reactions tothe diagnosis based across the three news outlets? An examination of the comments revealsthat the reactions to Giuliani’s diagnosis are more focused on him being a politician,rather than him being a human being affected by the virus. The reactions attack his actionsand the actions of others within his political party, which suggests that impoliteness inthis context has a strong dependence on previous actions and political engagement. Giulianiis seen to be undeserving of compassion or empathy not just on the grounds of his activeinvolvement in attempting to overturn the presidential election results (see excerpt 10),but also due to his disregard toward mask wearing in public spheres. Political polarizationis, in other words, what shapes and motivates the negative reactions in this context. Notall the users, however, appreciate the attacks targeting Giuliani. Through metadiscursivecomments, some users not just feel the need to treat Giuliani as a human being, but moreimportantly remind fellow users that Covid-19 should be a concern for all. What isparticularly critical about these metacomments is that while the users advocate for civilinteractions, they mostly do not condone Giuliani’s actions. The reason for this is arguablythe salience of the moral order which implicitly shapes these users’ understanding of whatshould be obligatory, permissible, or forbidden under the circumstances, regardless ofGiuliani’s prior actions. These users ground their awareness of what should be theappropriate conduct in a situation of despair such as dealing with Covid-19 and describefellow users’ conducts as the type of behavior against which they identify themselves. Howthey see themselves as human beings is different from how they see others. Commentsconveying a laughing attitude are, for instance, metapragmatically singled out as beingdiscourteous and impolite (see excerpt 13).The findings also further our understanding of the increasing polarization of socialpolitical discourse on Facebook  and its Furthermore, when looking into the nature per se of impolite comments across the threecorpora, the revelation is that there is a difference in terms of the orientations of theattacks and how the users portray Giuliani. For instance, most criticisms in the CNN and theBBC corpora merely convey two main sets of concerns. On the one hand, users question theseriousness and integrity of Trump in delivering the news about Giuliani’s diagnosis,presupposing Trump to be a liar and untrustworthy. The second set of comments in CNN and BBCcorpora are not merely concerned about Giuliani’s health; rather they tend to raise concernsabout the safety of the people with whom Giuliani may have been in contact, raising thequestion of whether those people are safe. However, within Fox News, most comments tend toexpress doubts over the fact that Republican Politicians are the only politicians beinginfected by the virus, raising suspicion and conspiracies. This difference in orientation ofthe intentions is a revelation of not just the political polarization of users’ views but,more importantly, it opens the window to how the coronavirus pandemic has shaped thepolitical expressions of Facebook users.The roles of participants in these interactions are also salient. Not only there are variedtargets the reactions orient to, but mostly, the users perceiving or evaluating comments asoffensive, which is conveyed through metadiscursive comments, are individuals other thanGiuliani himself. The impolite meaning arises here not because the main targets are eitheroffended or not, but because the interpretation of comments as offensive rests on the thirdparty’s understanding of such offense through talk-in interaction. This stresses the viewthat impoliteness evaluation is not a matter of the dyadic addressee-addresser alone , rather Moreover, the findings as presented in this paper go along with what has already putforward in previous studies on individuals’ reactions to Covid-19 on Facebook. This is notjust in terms of stressing the importance of political ideology in shaping individual’sissues such as mask wearing, but also in highlighting the tendency to voicing emotion thatreinforces their dissatisfaction with the way the opposing group (re)acts vis-à-vis theCovid-19 emergency . This reFinally, the present paper is certainly limited in terms of its focus as it examinesimpoliteness alone, without considering politeness comments. With the understanding thatimpoliteness in a context of life-or-death situation is just part of the overall practice,future research shall explore the polite comments so as to see both their contents as wellas their forms, and contrast the results. It would also be interesting to exploresimilarities and differences of the present findings in other platforms. Finally, therelevance of classic sociolinguistic variables of the users as well as their competence inEnglish should be explored in future research so as to determine the connection betweenthese variables and impoliteness practices on Facebook.


The present multi-study article investigates the subjective experience of professional football (a.k.a. soccer) referees and players during the COVID-19 pandemic and the so-called ghost games . Referees from the Austrian Football Association completed questionnaires inquiring about self-efficacy, motivation, and general personal observations and perceptions . In addition, two players and one referee in the Austrian Football Bundesliga were interviewed retrospectively regarding their subjective experience during ghost games and the effects of emotions on behavior and performance using semi-structured, video-taped interviews. Results of the referee survey indicate that the most profound differences between regular games and ghost games lie in the domain of intrinsic motivation and multiple aspects of subjective experience. Specifically, the experience in ghost games compared with regular games was reported by referees as being significantly less motivating, less excited/tense, less emotional, less focused, and overall, more negative, despite being easier to referee and the players behaving more positively. Qualitative analyses of the video-taped interview footage indicated (i) substantial inter-individual variability regarding the extent of the effect of the empty stadiums on the subjective experience of emotions, (ii) consequently, different strategies to regulate emotions and arousal from suboptimal to optimal levels, both before and during competition, and (iii) interactions between reported emotions, arousal, motivation, self-confidence, behavior and performance on the pitch. In addition, non-verbal expressions of emotion were captured using fully automated AI-software that coded facial movements during interviews. The results of this exploratory facial expression analysis revealed varying degrees of arousal and valence in relation to the content of the statements during the interviews, demonstrating the convergent validity of our findings. Our findings contribute to the growing literature on the effects of football games without fans during the COVID-19 pandemic and provide insights into the subjective experience of professional football referees. Concerning referees and players alike, emotions are investigated as potential processes related to home-field advantage and performance in professional football by means of a multi-methods approach. Further, the combination of qualitative and quantitative measures—as well as verbal and non-verbal communication channels—can deepen our understanding of the emotional influence of (missing) spectators on the subjective experience and the behavior of sports professionals is discussed. Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, many European elite football (a.k.a. soccer) leagues played large parts of the 2019/2020 and/or 2020/2021 season(s) without (or with severely limited) attendance of fans . From a sport psychology perspective, this situation presents a unique opportunity to study the influence of spectators on the experience and behavior as well as the performance of professional athletes and other stakeholders, such as referees in the most popular sport in the world. Previous studies have already shown a significant influence of the presence of fans on the experience of social pressure and emotional arousal of the players and referees, and subsequently on individual and team performance  atmosphere in the stadiums. Specifically, one study showed that there were fewer emotional, verbal discussions between players, referees, and coaches during ghost games in contrast to matches with regular attendance  of professional football referees during ghost games (compared with regular games). Self-efficacy denotes the person’s conviction that they can perform a goal-directed behavior Bandura, . ChangesIn addition, we focused on two aspects of motivation that have been found to be predictive of performance in a work context: intrinsic and prosocial motivation Grant, . While iTo this end, we surveyed 36 professional football referees  from the Austrian Football Association (ÖFB) about their personal perception of the ghost games during the COVID-19 pandemic using an online questionnaire. Additionally, we conducted semi-structured, video-taped interviews with one referee and two players participating in the Austrian Bundesliga  as a supplement to our collected survey data and to gain further and deeper understanding of the individual psychological processes underlying the survey results.Based on our previous research on professional football during the COVID-19 pandemic, we postulated the following hypotheses for ghost games compared with games in front of a regular audience: (1) Overall subjective excitement and arousal is lower in ghost games, (2) ghost games are easier to officiate/play, (3) ghost games are subjectively less important/significant, (4) communication with referee colleagues/teammates is easier in ghost games, (5) motivation is lower in ghost games due to the lack of “atmosphere” in the stadium, (6) in ghost games, both referees and players are less emotional in critical situations, and (7) in ghost games, referees’ self-efficacy and self-confidence is higher and players’ self-confidence is lower.Beyond this individual experience, we sought to explore a potential pathway how these individual experiences may influence in-game interactions between players and referees. We therefore explored the expected effects on arousal and emotions in facial expressions. Facial expressions are a common means to communicate affective states professional football referees  from the Austrian Football Association (ÖFB) participated in the study. The sample included referees with regular officiating appearances in the two highest football leagues in Austria . Although many of the referees have regular daytime jobs, the leagues are largely considered “professional”—as indicated by a top ten ranking in the UEFA country coefficient and regular appearances of Austria’s top clubs in the UEFA Champions League.The mean number of years of experience in these two professional football leagues was 8.0 years (SD = 5.2 years), with a mean average number of 24 games per season (SD = 5 games per season). The mean number of ghost games the participants were involved in was 23 games (SD = 5 games). To preserve anonymity, we asked for the age range instead of the exact age. Eight participants were in the age range between 25 and 29 years; 12 participants in the age range between 30 and 34 years; 12 participants in the age range between 35 and 39 years; and four participants were older than 40 years.N = 64; participation rate = 56.3% of the population). The time window for participation was March 18 to April 7, 2021. The study was conducted in accordance with the Declaration of Helsinki and the general data protection regulation and was approved by the ethical review committee of the Paris-Lodron-University Salzburg.The call for voluntary participation in our study was sent out via e-mail by the official referee administration of the ÖFB to all semi-professional football referees in Austria . Participants were instructed to respond honestly and spontaneously. The mean total processing time was 489 s (SD = 275 s). The survey consisted of an instruction including informed consent and a self-report questionnaire including 42 questions with the following structure:Part A: Regular games (with supporters). Eight questions assessed self-efficacy using the German adaptation of the Referee Self-Efficacy Scale . The questions from Part A were adapted to target ghost games instead of regular games, again assessing self-efficacy and motivation. The order of Part A and Part B was counterbalanced across participants. All answers to the questions from Parts A and B were given on seven-point Likert scales .Part C: Direct comparison between regular games and ghost games. Eight questions assessed subjective experience and observations. These questions included subjective evaluation of experience, arousal, emotionality, focus, confidence, difficulty, and behavior of players and coaching staff. All answers to the questions from Part C were given on seven-point Likert scales as well, with 1 and 7 indicating the extreme values of the direction judgment . The complete survey is presented in the supplementary material Part D: One open commentary section and five general questions assessed participants’ demographics and experience as referees .r) for the Wilcoxon tests were calculated using the following formula: p < 0.05.For statistical analysis, Statistical Package for Social Sciences  was used. To account for potential violation of the normality assumption, all comparisons were conducted using nonparametric paired-samples Wilcoxon signed-rank tests for Parts A and B  and one-sample Wilcoxon signed-rank tests for Part C (direct comparisons between regular games and ghost games within single questions). The effect sizes  showed a descriptive trend with ghost games eliciting lower self-efficacy, but this difference was not significant, z = −1.78, p = 0.076, r = 0.30.As shown in Fig. z = −3.66, p < 0.001, r = 0.61, (ii) “Football inspires me”, z = −3.95, p < 0.001, r = 0.66 and (iii) “I enjoy football”, z = −3.82, p < 0.001, r = 0.64. Out of the three items on prosocial motivation, only one item  showed a statistically significant difference between regular games and ghost games, with ghost games again eliciting less prosocial motivation, z = −2.85, p = 0.004, r = 0.48.As shown in Fig. z = −4.51, p < 0.001, r = 0.75, (ii) less excited/tense, z = −4.85, p < 0.001, r = 0.81, (iii) less emotional, z = −4.77, p < 0.001, r = 0.79, (iv) less focused, z = −2.75, p = 0.006, r = 0.46, (v) easier to referee, z = −2.64, p = 0.008, r = 0.44, and (vi) players behaving more positively, z = −2.27, p = 0.023, r = 0.38. One item (“How confident were you?”) showed a descriptive trend with ghost games eliciting lower confidence, but this difference was not significant, z = −1.67, p = 0.096, r = 0.28. The remaining item (“Did the coaching teams behave differently?”) did not differ between ghost games and in-person games, z = −1.04, p = 0.297, r = 0.17.Six items on subjective experience and observations showed a statistically significant difference with the experience in ghost games being (i) more negative, y-axis depicts the deviance of the observed mean for each of the eight items from the  scale mean. A deviance of 0 signals no difference between regular and ghost games. For higher understandability, the item descriptions are included in the figure and were formulated according to the direction of the observed effect .For a visualization of the results, see Fig. The open commentary section of the survey provided the possibility for participating referees to give nuanced insights into underlying psychological processes and to emphasize aspects, which, from their personal perspective, are of particular importance or relevance. The answers to this section largely confirmed the quantitative results from the questionnaire and were as follows :“It’s more fun with an audience! Still, you give 100% because it’s about football and making the right decisions”.“I personally crave spectators again. I think everyone likes to be the center of attention a little bit. Furthermore, it promotes motivation”.“It’s more difficult to motivate yourself. You also have to change the way of communication because everyone can hear everything”.“The atmosphere in the stadium is missing. As this also pushes the referee!”“Ghost games sometimes have a more pleasant effect, as maybe less pressure from outside is perceived, but this can also have negative effects, as the concentration or joy, motivation or tension falls off more quickly or leads to a certain routine or training match atmosphere. On the other hand, it can be perceived more positively, as the focus is forced on the game itself, unpopular decisions against the home team are probably made more unconsciously and without bias, and there is less distraction from the outside. It seems everyone is now more mindful of word choice and outward appearances, as these are now more prominent overall”.“At the beginning it was very unfamiliar, and it was important to keep your concentration high and not lose it. Especially in games where there was little happening on the pitch as well. However, as the year went on, I got used to the situation and learned how to deal with it”.“In the 2nd division, before the imposed ghost games, some matches with the second teams felt very similar because the stadium there was already similarly sparsely filled”.To gain some insights into the processes underlying the unfavorable effects of ghost games on referee motivation, we conducted within-participant moderation analyses using the SPSS macro MEMORE Montoya,  and usinɑ = 0.92) since they all showed significant effects in the same direction. The effect of ghost games on the REFS-D item “To be unaffected by the pressure from the audience” was neither moderated by the general evaluation, all ps > 0.27, nor the subjective experience, all ps > 0.20.In order to avoid overfitting, we clustered similar variables and conducted separate moderation analyses for each cluster: (a) general evaluation: overall experience, players behaving more positively, overall evaluation; (b) own response: less excited/tense, less emotional, less focused. In order to reduce the number of necessary tests, we calculated the mean of all three intrinsic motivation items , all engaged in the Austrian Bundesliga . All had been refereeing/playing in professional football for at least 4 years. The participants gave informed consent. The main purpose of the video interviews was to supplement the survey data and to gain further and deeper understanding of the individual psychological processes underlying the survey results. The personal interviews provided the opportunity for the participants to freely provide their associations regarding the psychological factors around the ghost games.The interviews were conducted and recorded via video-conference software Zoom, . They inEach interview began with a short introduction and information about the study. The main part of the interview consisted of questions regarding the subjective experience of the ghost games and the differences to regular games. The thematic sections of the interviews included (1) arousal, (2) difficulty, (3) importance/significance, (4) communication, (5) motivation, (6) noise/atmosphere, (7) player behavior, (8) referee behavior, (9) own behavior, and (10) self-confidence. Each interview ended with a short farewell.This structure was used to guide the interviews, but participants were unrestricted in the depth and breadth of their answers. On some occasions, the interviewees shared important and crucial information without being prompted. In sum, the principal investigators made sure that the participants felt comfortable, and that the atmosphere of the interviews resembled a private conversation rather than a press conference or an interrogation. This was a difficult but decisive aspect, especially in the context of the work with football professionals, who are trained to be very careful with public statements and not used to talking openly and honestly about internal states. The interviews lasted between 23 and 55 min and had a total duration of 125 min.In addition to qualitative analysis, we used the AI software package FaceReader 9 Noldus,  to analyThe FaceReader software analyses each frame of the provided video input in the following way. First, the software uses a deep learning-based algorithm to identify a face in the image. If a face is found, the software then uses deep neural networks to model the face according to 500 key points . This yields a vector model that describes the state of the face, which can then be categorized according to known emotion expression. The output includes so-called six basic emotions anger, disgust, happiness, sadness, fear, and surprise  substantial inter-individual variability regarding the extent of the effect of the empty stadiums on the subjective experience of emotions, (ii) consequently, different strategies to regulate emotions and arousal from suboptimal to optimal levels, both before and during competition, and (iii) interactions between reported emotions, arousal, motivation, self-confidence, behavior and performance on the pitch. Below, we provide an individual analysis of the content of the interviews. See Arousal, significance, and atmosphere. The player describes the feelings before and during the first training sessions and ghost games after the COVID-19 lockdown as “very strange”, with a mixture of great joy and worry. For him, it was a novel situation (and feeling), which had an impact on his arousal before games. He was used to feeling the tension and atmosphere in the stadium on game-day before regular games (with supporters), and this was lacking in the ghost games. He mentions that this change was already noticeable during the journey to the stadium.[…] it was certainly different to put yourself in that [tension] than now, when there was already a certain… yes, because of the presence of the other people… this alone creates a certain kind of tension. And um… That was the “before”, if I compare it roughly: the way to the game, the environment, the atmosphere, if you are in the stadium. That was definitely just very unfamiliar at the beginning, and it all seemed the same.The player described that he had to develop a new pre-game routine to get himself into the optimal zone of arousal. He said that he used to be too relaxed and that he had to amp himself up before the ghost games. After kick-off, he used his first actions and tackles to get into his preferred state of tension. During the ghost games, he emphasizes internal and external “calmness” and that the lack of emotions from the outside  resulted in relative absence of emotions on the pitch. There was nothing “electrifying”.Communication and atmosphere. The team, including bench players and staff, tried to compensate for this lack of atmosphere and noise, but still, he reported the feeling that everything was a bit calmer and felt slower. This was especially evident in the time between two actions, where everything was more relaxed, and communication was easier. In regular games, he observed “waves of emotions” in the stadium, which were absent in the ghost games. In contrast, the atmosphere, mood, and energy levels were relatively constant during the ghost games and decreased even more towards the end of the games. In regular games, often the opposite is true.To overcome this and to keep alertness, arousal, and focus high, the team worked with short-term performance goals for the last 15 min of the ghost games by means of tables. The player recalls situations playing abroad where they led 0–2 or 0–3 and the opponent scored a goal, which—in regular games with spectators—could be a potentially difficult and match-changing situation, due to the momentum and the atmosphere in the (away) stadium. In the ghost games, however, the team had no problem staying calm and composed and finishing the game without further goals scored by the opponent.Difficulty and own behavior. Regarding his own behavior, the player noted that the missing reaction from the crowd after his good or bad actions may have influenced him subconsciously. To him, it felt easier to stop dwelling about his actions in the calmness of the stadium in the ghost games. In regular games, even if not focusing consciously on the crowd’s reaction, he is still aware of the noise from the stands, which, as he believes, can inhibit or spur him. In the ghost games, it was also easier for him to regulate and block out his own emotions if they were not amplified by the crowd’s emotions.Player behavior. Concerning other players’ behavior, he noted that there were some who profited from the situation of the ghost games. Those players specifically showed less frantic behavior and better—not rushed—decision-making, especially in ball possession. He particularly mentioned attacking players who, in regular games, are full of adrenaline due to the crowd’s noise. With respect to defending players, the empty stadiums led to better communication among players and staff, and better coordination and faster orientation.[…] They have definitely shown less hectic behavior. We’ve often had players who—let’s say—made a decision too hastily at certain moments, because the crowd has pushed them very hard because they’ve won a ball. Especially with our attacking players, offensive players, when we win the ball and they often have a lot of space, and they sprint [forward] and all of a sudden it gets loud in the stadium. And I don’t know… You’re full of adrenaline, so you make rash decisions and don’t play the ball. I rather had the feeling that often in such scenes some players could have made better decisions, because it seemed as if the pressure was less intense [in ghost games].Communication and referee behavior. In addition, the player reported that the ghost games had an impact on the interactions with and the behavior of the referees. There were less provocations and less theatrics by players trying to influence referees with the help of the crowd’s social pressure. In sum, the ghost games were less emotional, with hardly any individual and mass confrontations, fewer provocations, and fewer attempts to influence the referee’s decisions in critical moments of the games. Ghost games were much calmer than regular games in this regard.Especially as a player, you think that in an important, intense game, even small things can make the difference. If, for example, he [an opposing player] already makes the second foul or maybe you can trigger something through some emotion in the moment when the foul happens and maybe the referee or someone gives the player a yellow card, then you know for example: okay now the game changes again. And maybe as a result the yellow-red card… and that’s why I think that depending on—you can also exaggerate […] And he [the referee] consciously wants to calm down the game a bit in order to have less stress. I believe that when everything around gets loud, and you realize as a referee: “Now there are several… so reactions… now do I have to give him yellow or should I wait?” I don’t think that’s so easy, and I do believe that you can have an influence on that.The referees themselves seemed to be deliberately more communicative in the ghost games compared with the regular games. Communication was also easier due to less noise. The referees seemed to be more relaxed and less pressured from the crowd and did not award yellow cards that easily. The player particularly noticed fewer “unnecessary” yellow cards due to hectic or rash behavior. The ability to better communicate with the referees may have led to fairer, calmer, and more factual games.Motivation and self-confidence. Despite all these positive aspects, when asked directly, the player stated that he prefers the tension and the pressure of the regular games with spectators. For him, it is better to feel too tense than too loose and he is convinced that pressure helps him to live up to his full potential. He likes the atmosphere, the euphoria, the energy that the fans bring to the stadium. During the ghost games, he had to change his mental preparation in order to still get to the same intensity without the fans. For him, however, it was also an opportunity to grow into a leadership role on the pitch.[…] But I can imagine that for some young players—maybe in such a phase, where you are new in it [the club]—it was certainly rather an advantage, because they have not received pressure from the outside and all around and have been allowed to play and now they are already longer playing—a year or half a year—where it is a completely different feeling when you play in front of people, because they already have [integrated] into the team.The player also mentions younger colleagues who might have benefited from the less tense atmosphere in the ghost games. In particular, new players who are a bit intimidated and first have to establish themselves as part of the team, probably found it easier without the external pressure from the fans. It takes time to find out how you (as a young player) and others react in certain situations. Self-confidence gradually builds up in this phase and the ghost games allowed for this process in a relatively safe environment, without the relentless emotional intensity of a full stadium. According to the player, this increase in self-confidence could also be perceived by the fans in consequent regular games.Arousal and atmosphere. The player reports that his arousal before the ghost games was significantly reduced compared with the regular games with supporters. He mentions the sound/noise in the stadium (even before the game has started), which leads to a certain “tingling sensation”. The more fans there are in the stadium the higher the arousal. Before regular games, he uses the warm-up in the stadium with the fans to get into his optimal zone of arousal. Before the ghost games, in contrast, he had to compensate for this lack of external stimulation through his personal mental preparation including listening to music and visualizing.[…] you just try to create the right state of mind. So that you’re present right from the start, you’re in the game right away, and you don’t need any time to get started. From that point of view, I would say that it was very intense for us. Because normally, when you go out onto the pitch to warm up, there are already people in the stadium. There’s already a bit of a tingle, a certain sound in the stadium. So it’s not completely quiet, but rather you have a certain noise level and the more people there are in the stadium, the more tingling you have inside.Difficulty and motivation. Once the matches had started, he did not notice any differences with respect to arousal or motivation between ghost games and regular games. According to him, it was just more difficult before the ghost games to get into the right performance state, that is, he had to work “more intensely” to get where he wanted to be mentally. During the ghost games, there was the same degree of ambition and motivation as in any other match. He mentioned the important role of the head coach, who emphasized motivation, focus, communication, and inter-individual support before and during the matches.I’d say that, in my feeling, I was equally motivated. Like how your approach is, or what you plan to do. Very clear. *** He [the manager] did a really good job. He kept the concentration levels really high, so that we were very focused or actually got ourselves in the right mindset more than the spectators did. Just with the communication in the dressing room, on the pitch, the players who were or are on the bench, that they are also more vocal in the game with more enthusiasm and also provide support from the outside. That’s what you’re missing in a game with spectators… you really don’t notice that from the outside… whether it’s one of your coaches or someone else shouting something.Communication. Communication between players was also the most important change in the training sessions before the ghost games. Other training topics did not change. Communication on the pitch between players was more intense and easier, due to the absent noise from the fans. For example, it was possible to communicate between the left and right sides of the field, which under normal circumstances is much harder. He also mentions that communication was “fairer” for each player .Own, player, and referee behavior. Regarding his own behavior, the player states that there was not a big change in his communication, because he in general considers himself a good communicator. He and his teammates had to be a bit more cautious in the ghost games, however, because the referees were able to hear everything. Some other players had to work on their emotion regulation to curb their aggression towards the referee. This worked quite well and the referees themselves also seemed to be more relaxed due to the missing crowd, and immediately calmed down aggressive players. The player cannot recall any situation resulting in a huge upset or a really bad confrontation during the ghost games.Significance and self-confidence. Like the other interviewed player, and despite these positive aspects, he likes the games with fans much more. It is more fun to play in front of a crowd, and especially cheering situations felt a bit awkward without fans. He had, however, no difficulty in accepting the situation with the ghost games and could focus on preparing for and performing the games on his usual level. He thinks that the whole team enjoys playing in front of a crowd—the more fans the better—and that it helps them to perform at their highest level. Interestingly, he noted that switching from regular games to ghost games was more difficult than the reverse.Arousal. The referee describes the time of the first ghost games after the lockdown as a very odd situation and refers to the more general, novel circumstances related to the pandemic affecting everyday life. Social distancing, hygiene measures, etc. were also part of the pre-game procedure and resulted in fewer personal contacts and reduced time spent at the stadium. For him personally, this led to a reduction in arousal, but did not affect his motivation and joy to officiate games at the highest level.Communication, own, and referee behavior. In contrast to the two interviewed players, the referee did not change his pre-performance routines. What changed for him—and for other referees as well (as he points out)—was the communication on the pitch. This was also part of pre-game referee briefings. For example, in the ghost games, the players and staff members could hear the communication within the referee team . Consequently, the team had to adapt to this novel situation by having clear communication guidelines. In addition, the referee team increased their communication to push themselves and to signal alertness and reciprocal trust.[…] you hear everything we say as referees. Or even—actually worse for me—what the… what the players all say to us and we actually always go over it like this, because we know anyway that this is normal and that this is also okay, because I can’t imagine that there is someone who has something against me as a person. But this thing, to find the right balance, when you then look at it on TV afterwards and think “dude you really hear everything they said to us” and then they [the media reporters] ask why we don’t deal harder with them. This justification you have to do then why you don’t book them all off.Even more severe—at least from the personal perspective of the referee—was the situation that in the ghost games, the referees themselves could hear the players’ incivilities towards them. His strategy, in general and specifically in the ghost games, is to not take it personally, because he understands the emotions of the players and the pressure they are exposed to. The issue for him was more that he had to justify to external observers after a game why he was not stricter in sanctioning verbal insults against himself or his team.Atmosphere and own behavior. The calmer and less noisy atmosphere of the ghost games accommodated the referee’s personality, because he does not like the big gestures and the theatrical showmanship that is necessary for a referee to communicate his decisions in a full stadium. During the ghost games, he could communicate in a calm way and use all nuances of language and tonality, which in turn, had a positive impact on the interaction with the players. Another positive aspect of the ghost games was that he did not have to interact with the crowd in an artificially exaggerated way by clearly signaling his decisions to them as part of the show-like character that professional football has. This means that he did not have to “sell” his decisions to the crowd.Player behavior. Regarding the players’ behavior, the referee noted that they seemed to really enjoy playing again (even in the absence of fans) and that they were more careful and a bit reserved with respect to fouls and other confrontations. They tried pulling cheap fouls less often and did not lie around or scream as exaggerated as is often the case in regular games with supporters. In general, they communicated calmer and more respectfully and did not obviously try to influence the referee’s decisions.Difficulty and atmosphere. The referee thinks that the changed acoustics in the stadium are the main factor responsible for the different behavior on the pitch of both players and referees. Regarding acoustics and crowd noise, he added that it was potentially easier for the assistant referees/linesmen to call offsides, as it was easier to literally hear the moment when the pass was played. The referee also noted that the silence in the stadium helped to call fouls, as it was easier to hear when players were hit in tackles.Difficulty, significance, and motivation. When asked directly whether ghost games were easier or more difficult to officiate, the referee gave a nuanced answer. Big, important games were easier because he could focus 100% on the task at hand instead of being distracted by the crowd. Smaller games were more difficult because his tension started to drift, and the crowd would have helped him to stay alert and focused. In general, he likes to be pushed by the fans. This also adds to his motivation and the subjectively perceived meaningfulness of events.So I think even though I certainly don’t want to admit it like that now, that it is like that in my head. It simply gets less meaningful then. So that reminds you more like when you just hold a Landesliga [fourth division] or some similar match then, where there are just fewer spectators or otherwise somehow. This… this spectator thing… that does something to you. It doesn’t matter if you’re going somewhere internationally and suddenly there’s a stadium that has a certain look and no people are coming.Motivation and self-confidence. With respect to self-confidence, the ghost games were beneficial for the referee because he could fully focus on his decision-making, and this led to the feeling that he increased his skills and became better from game to game. Because even in regular games he was already relatively calm, he had no big problems in adapting to the more relaxed situation of the ghost games. For long-term motivation, however, he stressed the importance of fans in the stadium, because they add to the meaningfulness by producing this unique flair that is a big part of professional football.In addition to the qualitative analysis of the interviews, we captured non-verbal expressions of emotions using fully automated AI-software (Noldus FaceReader), that coded facial movements during the interviews. Based on the observed activation of 20 Action Units (AUs), FaceReader provides emotion expression intensity scores for each of the six basic emotions plus contempt, as well as summary scores of valence and arousal. Expression intensity scores and arousal vary from 0 (not present) to 1 (maximum intensity); valence scores range from −1 (maximum-negative intensity) to 1 (maximum positive intensity). As illustrated in Fig. Furthermore, we examined the relationship between each thematic section of the interviews  and the basic facial expressions of the interviewed players and referees according to Ekman’s basic emotions: happy, sad, angry, surprised, scared, and disgusted  in our post-analyses. Table Since the interviews were video-recorded, we could extract the speaking durations on the ten predefined topics , arousal (08:05 min), and behavior of other players (07:47 min) are topics that were discussed the longest across all interviewees. Similarly, behavior of the referee (06:21 min), difficulty (06:16 min), self-confidence (05:46 min), and own behavior (05:11 min) were also topics of interest when talking about the effect of ghost games. Compared to this, the interviewees talked less about importance/significance (04:31 min), communication (04:12 min), and noise/atmosphere (03:38 min). Importantly, these latter topics—especially communication and noise/atmosphere—also came up when talking about the other topics.The variance between the participants’ speaking time was accompanied by a great variance in their facial expressions  in ghost games subjective emotional excitement and arousal was lower, (2) ghost games were easier to play/officiate, (3) they were subjectively less important/significant, (4) communication with teammates/colleagues was easier, (5) motivation was  lower due to the lack of “atmosphere” in the stadium, (6) both players and referees were less emotional in critical situations, and (7) players’ self-confidence was affected depending on maturity and referees’ self-confidence was higher.The interpretation of the results from the qualitative and quantitative analysis of the interviews suggests that at least two central aspects  played a role in ghost games among the players and the referee, which will be discussed in detail in the following sections “Lack of external stimulation” and “Altered acoustic conditions”.Our quantitative analyses of the underlying psychological processes indicated that cognitive variables were related to changes in referee motivation due to ghost games. In particular, measures of overall evaluation and experience were significant moderators of intrinsic as well as prosocial motivation effects. Being more focused during ghost games moreover contributed to smaller decreases in intrinsic motivation. In contrast, self-reported emotions or perceived changes of the players’ behavior had no consistent impact on these outcomes. One might therefore conclude that the influence of ghost games on referee motivation is mainly cognitive, with emotions playing a smaller role . For example, hit sounds were much easier to hear in the case of failed tackles, or in the case of offside decisions, the assistant referee could better hear the sound when the ball was played and at the same time visually check whether the offensive player was offside or not. At the same time, the ghost games’ silence also means that players must control their emotions more strictly because any verbal lapse towards the opponent or the referee is easier to hear and could potentially result in a warning or booking.[…] it was just like this that you have now heard everything. You didn’t have to be really loud now, you could have just talked normally and that’s also a little part of the emotions, when you get a little bit louder and want to say something to someone ***, because otherwise he can’t hear it exactly or things like that. That wasn’t so necessary now, I’d say, and that was certainly a point where I had to somehow [..] always make sure that I am always maintaining a certain tension […]Player 1 also emphasizes that there were marked differences compared to games with regular attendance due to the change in the overall acoustic situation. On the one hand, the players had to be careful not to say things that are normally easily overheard , and on the other hand, the loudness of their own voices could also be adjusted to the new situation.[…] if you take normal games with spectators […] you have such phases in the game, in which it is briefly a bit calmer, depending on how you have played in the game and maybe you are playing it a bit calmer and more like keeping the ball or are we now consciously trying to score a goal… […] And then you’ve always noticed these mood swings in the stadium: “okay, now it’s a bit calmer, okay now is a bit more energy inside, now it’s a bit more energetic”. And you didn’t have that […] In the ghost games… […] it became even more relaxed, because maybe the game is already decided or you have already noticed from the opponent: “okay, there is absolutely nothing more coming, the game is over”. So [...] we worked with tables. For example, we wanted to stay as focused as possible in the last 15 minutes and did not want to concede a goal. We have set psychology goals for ourselves, so that we still maintain that [concentration] […]Particularly interesting against this background appear the further reports of Player 1. Due to the circumstance that in far advanced games, which were felt to be decided in their own favor, the inner tension threatened to drop due to the lack of external stimulation by the audience Allport, . The coaResearch over the past two years on the absence of football audience points towards changes in both players’ and referees’ emotions, interactions, behaviors, and decision-making processes , actions, and interpretations of professional football referees during the COVID-19 related restrictions in professional association football. We also conducted in-depth semi-structured interviews with two professional football players and one referee . The video-taped recordings were analyzed by means of a multi-methods approach using both qualitative and quantitative methods (Johnson and Onwuegbuzie, The unique insights gained by investigating both verbal and non-verbal forms of communication (e.g., Furley, Supplemental material