The proportion of reports per subreddit has always intrigued me. Take /r/science and pics, for example. In /r/pics, the number of reports per day was high; I have no official numbers but I can say it’s between 20 and 80. In science, the number of reports per day is very small, in the single digit region sometimes.

The reports by large are for trivial things, such as redditors who think that NSFW should never be allowed on /r/pics, or that any science that can be politicised should not be allowed on /r/science (e.g., the climate change scientist scandal). But what happens when you place a little note in the right sidebar asking for reports to cease over these matters, and only to be used for when an item does not belong in the subreddit?

In pics, the number of reports fell slightly, but stayed around the same. In science, however, the number of reports fell dramatically. To state the obvious here, it shows the kind of people who read either. There are about a hundred and eighty thousand people subscribed to each, so the number of impressions on their respective front pages should be the same… but it is not. It is not because of the mental attitudes towards the subreddits. Most redditors instinctively click anything with a [PIC] in the title, as time has conditioned us to expect a quick content boost when we see words with this next to them. This is the equivalent of reddit fast food - the titles in /r/pics are short, usually humourous and have some semblance of context. By contrast, in /r/science, the titles are serious, showing a casual observer who glances at the front page and who sees a science post that clicking through this link will introduce them to think, and perhaps care about the subject at hand. This is more the equivalent of a balanced reddit meal.

Redditors are more inclined to click through for a quick content boost than for a serious discussion - but there is a disparity with the comment systems. On reddit, nearly any post can have a thoughtful long discussion or merely a pun thread devolving into misogynistic sex jokes. When browsing the front page of /r/pics, one is more put forward to think quickly and in a easy fashion. Reports are handed out to items one does not like. In /r/science, the front page reader here has a different attitude. Already attuned to details (the reason why they’re browsing here), they have most likely read the details on the right, and pay attention to the discussion threads. This is how the report rate fell; those who were doing it wrongly realised this, and learned as they were in a higher state of mind.

To browse the front page of science, you require to have a higher mental processing ability than to browse through pics. I have not taken into account those who report from the front page of the entirety of reddit, nor have I taken into account the amount of legitimate spam that gets through the filters. That, is for another time perhaps.