Reasearch_data.

In a series of three studies, we probed the extent and manner in which civic responsibility influences online engagement, concurrently assessing its impact on the dynamics of news engagement. Study 1 (n = 240) established that civic responsibility is significantly correlated with increased engagement with positive news and decreased engagement with negative news through a questionnaire-based analysis. Study 2 (n = 153) employed an experimental framework to investigate the causal impacts of civic responsibility, finding that it enhances engagement with beneficial news and diminishes interactions with detrimental news. Study 3 (n = 220) implemented a nudge approach to foster civic responsibility, revealing that a social impact judgment task reduced the participants' propensity to engage with negative news online. Collectively, these studies demonstrate a consistent positive bias and confirm that civic responsibility can modulate online engagement. These findings provide actionable insights for media outlets in managing the dissemination of news according to its valence, highlighting the practical relevance of fostering civic responsibility to influence news reading and sharing.