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As a new user, I find it frustrating when I put effort into an answer and receive down votes with no explanation why. When a user flags a comment, they are given a few choices to explain why they are flagging the comment and an "other" choice if they wish to provide more detailed information.

I would appreciate it if a similar system were put into place for downvotes - a popup where a person can choose WHY they are downvoting from a list of general reasons and an "other" fill-able choice. This information would be provided with the notification of the actual downvote itself - constructive criticism. That way, people will have an idea of what they can do to improve their questions or answers rather than getting frustrated or fed up with purely negative feedback.

Thanks!

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  • There already is the ability to comment.
    – Double AA Mod
    Commented Feb 17, 2015 at 14:06
  • Yes, but people don't do so when they downvote, making it difficult to figure out how to improve to avoid future problems among those who DO NOT comment.
    – Isaac Kotlicky
    Commented Feb 17, 2015 at 14:57
  • 2
    Many people do comment. And even your system people could write junk. You can't force people to write anything constructive.
    – Double AA Mod
    Commented Feb 17, 2015 at 16:36
  • That is entirely true, but we can structure it so that the default is constructive, and that people have to intentionally MAKE IT junky.
    – Isaac Kotlicky
    Commented Feb 17, 2015 at 16:57
  • People can comment, but comments are not anonymous. I can see utility in an optional "choose one of these standard DV reasons" choice as a way of providing quick feedback. The real question is what those options would have to be in order to be useful. For UX reasons there probably can't be more than about half a dozen; what should they say?
    – Monica Cellio
    Commented Feb 17, 2015 at 22:05
  • Possible options for a q: "Question has been previously answered" "too vague" "wrong forum for question" "other" options for an answer: "does not address the question" "not properly sourced" "opinion based answer" "vague answer" "contradicting sources/tradition/mesorah" "other"?
    – Isaac Kotlicky
    Commented Feb 18, 2015 at 1:46
  • @IsaacKotlicky all of the question-downvote reasons you suggest map to our close reasons, which operate pretty much exactly the way you suggest, except that they're for voting to close questions (which one needs 3000 rep points for), or for flagging questions for closure, which you only need 15 for. I'd encourage you to incorporate your suggested answer-downvote menu into your question.
    – Isaac Moses Mod
    Commented Feb 18, 2015 at 15:04

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