Temporal Dynamics of User Engagement in Professional Video Communities: A Time-Series Clustering Analysis Based on...

Presently, video communities such as YouTube, bilibili and TikTok have emerged as core fields for information dissemination and public opinion generation. Their embedded user dynamic interaction data support research on public cognitive behavior and content dissemination laws. This study used web crawling technology to construct a complete dataset including 367 video metadata and 2.39 million comment records from Luo Xiang Speaks on Criminal Law-a prominent legal popularization account on the bilibili platform-and systematically explored the temporal evolution patterns of comment interactions in video communities. By establishing a four-dimensional feature system alongside the k-means++ clustering algorithm, this study successfully identified three distinct comment growth patterns (p < 0.001): the burst-decay, the multi-wave oscillation, and the delayed peak. The results of non-parametric tests showed that these three patterns have significant differences in core features (e.g., peak delay time, skewness) and are systematically related to user grade structure, content interaction depth, and release timing. In addition, the user interaction networks of different videos demonstrate significant structural heterogeneity and disassortative mixing, characterized by a highly active minority dominating the discourse, while peripheral nodes gravitate toward high-profile hubs. These findings offer researchers deeper insights into the micro-mechanisms of information dissemination.