Why are trolls online so mean?

[Toxigen]

because fuck you thats why

[Ooloo]

Trolling gives people thick skin, it allows them to experience the cruelty of the world in a way that doesn't physically harm them. It's just words.

Having used the internet since the mid 90's, I no longer even remotely care what anyone online calls me or says to me. It was scary at first, but now I don't give a fuckin shit at all you fuckmen can all suck my dick

Sorry... still occasional outbursts.

[Cecily]

That benefit works IRL too. Words are words, whatever the medium. Having someone yell "faggot" at me as they drive by would have crushed me at one point. But the shit I've been called here really desensitized me to verbal assault.

[Sadre Spinegnawer]

Originally Posted by Jimjam [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

There is a divergent discussion forming in the tank subforums exploring what encourages trolling. Rather that posting this information I have cobbled together there I’ll post it here.

 

The “online disinhibition effect” refers to the phenomenon of acting differently in online environments compared to face-to-face interactions. On the one hand, it may involve unusual acts of generosity and kindness or of sharing very personal things (e.g., secret fears, wishes, etc.) something called benign disinhibition. On the other hand, it may also involve visits to places that would never being explored in the real world (e.g., places of violence, crime, pornography, etc.) or acts of anger, harsh criticisms, rude language, hatred, or even threats (toxic disinhibition).

According to Suler (2004), at least six factors are involved in online disinhibition (whether benign or toxic) that intersect and interact with each other:

 

Dissociative anonymity (e.g., in online environment people can hide some or all of their identity so they may feel free to do or say whatever they want)
Invisibility (e.g., people cannot see each other, other people may not even know they are present at all, people do not have to worry about how others look or sound in response to what they say, etc.)
Asynchronicity (e.g., communication is asynchronous, people may experience this type of communication as “running away” after posting a hostile message, say mean things and not really worry about the consequences)
Solipsistic introjection (e.g., people feel the reading of posts or messages as a voice within their head)
Dissociative imagination (e.g., people may view online life as a kind of game with rules and norms that don’t apply to everyday life)
Minimization of status & authority (e.g., in online environments, everyone has an equal opportunity to voice him or herself, regardless of gender, race, wealth, or status so, people may be more willing to speak out or misbehave)

Of course, “the disinhibition effect” is not the only factor implicated in how people will behave in online environments. Individual differences and predispositions play important role. For example, personality traits or intensity of personal needs and feelings may play important role on how much an individual is susceptible to disinhibition.

Lowry et al (2016) reference various studies that state moral disengagement caused by online disinhibition results in a disregard for social morals. Indeed Liu et al (2022) refer to studies that show the link between online disinhibition and online antisocial behaviour.
Individuals who display callous and unemotional traits are also more at risk of becoming disinhibited online, leading to cyberbullying behaviour (Wright et al., 2019). Interestingly, those who experience trolling are more likely to engage in it themselves (March and Marrington, 2019, as cited in Liu et al., 2022).

There certainly is a cost benefit argument for engaging in online activity. The 'Be Kind' hashtag was widely shared by the same individuals who then continued to troll others. Perhaps there's a form of addiction / specific problematic internet use (David, 2001) to consider here?

The insight is that maybe those who have experienced trolling have contextualised it as part of 'the game' behind online interactions. As well as being a component of bullying, teasing can be a component of play. If interpreted as non-hostile in intent the teasing may be mutually enjoyable for both teaser and recipient (various studies cited by Eckert et al., 2020). This would explain why some people exposed to trolling online go on to be trolls themselves - they enjoyed being trolled, enjoy trolling and believe others will enjoy their trolling too. They may fail to perceive the trolling as being mean as they believe it a non-hostile joke.





References

Davis, R. A. (2001). A cognitive–behavioral model of pathological Internet use. Computers in Human Behavior, 17(2), 187–195. https://doi.org/10.1016/S0747-5632(00)00041-8

Eckert, J., Winkler, S. L., & Cartmill, E. A. (2020). Just kidding: the evolutionary roots of playful teasing. Biology Letters, 16(9), 20200370. https://10.1098/rsbl.2020.0370

Liu, M., Wu, B., Li, F., Wang, X., & Geng, F. (2022). Does mindfulness reduce trolling? The relationship between trait mindfulness and online trolling: The mediating role of anger rumination and the moderating role of online disinhibition. Journal of Affective Disorders, 301, 36-43. https://10.1016/j.jad.2022.01.023

Lowry, P. B., Zhang, J., Wang, C., & Siponen, M. (2016). Why Do Adults Engage in Cyberbullying on Social Media? An Integration of Online Disinhibition and Deindividuation Effects with the Social Structure and Social Learning Model. Information Systems Research, 27(4), 962-986. https://10.1287/isre.2016.0671

Suler, J. (2004). The online disinhibition effect. Cyberpsychology & Behavior, 7(3), 321-326.

Wright, M. F., Harper, B. D., & Wachs, S. (2019). The associations between cyberbullying and callous-unemotional traits among adolescents: The moderating effect of online disinhibition. Personality and Individual Differences, 140, 41-45. https://10.1016/j.paid.2018.04.001

TLDR trolling is all seen as a bit of a game by most involved as they aren’t able to perceive or empathise how they may be hurting others.

That was a solid read.

There were economists studying mmo in-game economies back in the 2000's, mostly for fun. You can dig up the various Masters theses that actually worked it out on the record, no doubt. It's 2023!

And the psychological thing is really fascinating. For starters, the mmo world (and its close cousin various kinds of forum questing, where the trolling happens) functions like a Skinner box more or less. So it needs constant feedback systems.

Remember when eq added the thin green exp line under the normal purple exp line? That was pure Skinner. You have to make the feedback system pronounced but not calculable (no number counters). So the thin green line sometimes you can see it move! That's stimulus-response mechanism. Your reward circuit is now a slave to that bar.

But the psychological and behavioral mechanisms of both online and forum freaks is well-studied, and since I am a technological determinist these studies make me very happy. Humans are tools for their tools, baby.

Quality post. Does not belong here. Our current demo trends meth damaged.

I'd rather be a fool for a Skinner box than a junkie. Fact.

[magnetaress]

i think psychotic ppl pool and congregate online better because if you shoved them all into a little closet irl they'd be less functional and communicative butt online they can just scream into the void endlesssly without feeling any direct repercusions immediately so there is zero fear keeping them in check

psychpaths don't really fear butt u can control them by training them that if they do certain behaviors they will have outcomes they don't want so while they aren't feeling strongly one way they are constantly motivated to have freedom and shit

i don't know if pain is effective in controlling psychopaths like can u shock collar somebody who doesn't feel emotions butt cuz enough pain to trigger a response and then motivate said person?

i strongly disbelieve that someone doesn't feel anything at all at best they feel very little in that case they can be controlled by just amping up the stimulus

i don't believe that ppl should be constitutionally protected from being controlled in this manner

brain chip every chimp i say

[Sadre Spinegnawer]

So, to get back to the science, we got three problems.

1. Anonymity
2. Disinhibition
3. Dissociation

Anonymity ---> disinhibition. But where and how does dissociation come in?

Solving for the Dissociation factor is crucial, because that is where a lot of the mutated but often pointless malice comes from.

In real life, we are kept in check (inhibited) by the fact people can see us, hear us, identify us.

Real life also -- let's assume -- favors stable identity. This is why aberrant personality or cognitive types are aberrant. The normal condition is a more or less "stable self." By "normal" I mean all the drama.

But not psychosis!

Dissociation is not a dramatic person. Dissociation is a psychosis process.

That the online world would create dissociated selves or push already fragile selves over an edge, in quantity, is so predictable it isn't even funny. It's ridiculously predictable.

But so is most of what happens, if you are a technological determinist like all the cool kids are.

[Sadre Spinegnawer]

I can't play alts for this reason.

Shit's real classic. EQ and then WoW created a lot of damaged brains ya know. I would love to meet the babies that were being "tended to" for hours on end during raids during afk's.

Evercrack babies.

[unsunghero]

Originally Posted by Sadre Spinegnawer [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

Real life also -- let's assume -- favors stable identity. This is why aberrant personality or cognitive types are aberrant. The normal condition is a more or less "stable self." By "normal" I mean all the drama.

But not psychosis!

Dissociation is not a dramatic person. Dissociation is a psychosis process.

Stick with aberrant personality types rather than psychosis. I personally don’t like diagnosing based on reading someone’s chat log or online postings, mostly because I’m not credentialed to do it and that’s not the correct way to….but I think it’s a safe assumption that the worst of the worst “trolls” in the world (the ones that go out of their way to torture innocent people online) most likely have some kind of personality disorder

Psychosis just isn’t as reasonable of a guess. Someone actually psychotic may not even be able to manage keeping a computer in working order. Because stimuli in a psychotic person’s brain is constantly being twisted and misinterpreted, often in a paranoid manner, simple mundane computer messages all of a sudden can be seen as “patterns” or “signals” usually resulting in the psychotic person taking their computer apart, screwing up the basic software that runs it, or just refusing to use it. A truly psychotic person would NOT make an effective online troll, IMO

[Sadre Spinegnawer]

Originally Posted by unsunghero [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

Stick with aberrant personality types rather than psychosis. I personally don’t like diagnosing based on reading someone’s chat log or online postings, mostly because I’m not credentialed to do it and that’s not the correct way to….but I think it’s a safe assumption that the worst of the worst “trolls” in the world (the ones that go out of their way to torture innocent people online) most likely have some kind of personality disorder

Psychosis just isn’t as reasonable of a guess. Someone actually psychotic may not even be able to manage keeping a computer in working order. Because stimuli in a psychotic person’s brain is constantly being twisted and misinterpreted, often in a paranoid manner, simple mundane computer messages all of a sudden can be seen as “patterns” or “signals” usually resulting in the psychotic person taking their computer apart, screwing up the basic software that runs it, or just refusing to use it. A truly psychotic person would NOT make an effective online troll, IMO

Agree on thinking you can't diagnose a particular individual case w/o having an M.D. b/c this is psychiatric, not just psychological trouble we are talking about here, correct?

Actually rewiring the brain.

I still want to talk about dissociation b/c the structural parameters are there. People undergo or experience highly disordered states all the time but do not notice them as such, b/c they return back to normal, or otherwise are functionally identical.

This is a good point to clarify the idea that people talk about when they talk about "structural" vs. actual. It's the same as the distinction between potential vs actual, but structure in this context, means the more or less closed system in question and what it does or does not incentivize or introduce.

Games like Everquest were and still are potentiator machines, structures, that might very well create or reward "aberrant" behavior and personality.

But I would go one step further and say, the nature of the activity itself likely creates transient psychotic events in otherwise normal people.

Temporary psychotic episodes that can be quite severe due to the trio of bad factors (anonymity, disinhibition, dissociation) at play, can get pretty intense in the internets era. And at scale!

[magnetaress]

Originally Posted by Sadre Spinegnawer [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

So, to get back to the science, we got three problems.

1. Anonymity
2. Disinhibition
3. Dissociation

Anonymity ---> disinhibition. But where and how does dissociation come in?

Solving for the Dissociation factor is crucial, because that is where a lot of the mutated but often pointless malice comes from.

In real life, we are kept in check (inhibited) by the fact people can see us, hear us, identify us.

Real life also -- let's assume -- favors stable identity. This is why aberrant personality or cognitive types are aberrant. The normal condition is a more or less "stable self." By "normal" I mean all the drama.

But not psychosis!

Dissociation is not a dramatic person. Dissociation is a psychosis process.

That the online world would create dissociated selves or push already fragile selves over an edge, in quantity, is so predictable it isn't even funny. It's ridiculously predictable.

But so is most of what happens, if you are a technological determinist like all the cool kids are.

Tru

Originally Posted by unsunghero [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

Stick with aberrant personality types rather than psychosis. I personally don’t like diagnosing based on reading someone’s chat log or online postings, mostly because I’m not credentialed to do it and that’s not the correct way to….but I think it’s a safe assumption that the worst of the worst “trolls” in the world (the ones that go out of their way to torture innocent people online) most likely have some kind of personality disorder

Psychosis just isn’t as reasonable of a guess. Someone actually psychotic may not even be able to manage keeping a computer in working order. Because stimuli in a psychotic person’s brain is constantly being twisted and misinterpreted, often in a paranoid manner, simple mundane computer messages all of a sudden can be seen as “patterns” or “signals” usually resulting in the psychotic person taking their computer apart, screwing up the basic software that runs it, or just refusing to use it. A truly psychotic person would NOT make an effective online troll, IMO

If you can't be a good person online you are basically incapable of being truly moral.

Most of these ppl are just sinners destined for the lake if fire. It's silly to separate online personas from irl ones.

Let em burn.