From an article you may have already seen at Slate magazine by Chris Mooney:
Internet Trolls Really Are Horrible People — Narcissistic, Machiavellian, psychopathic, and sadistic.
Last year, for instance, we learned that by hurling insults and inciting discord in online comment sections, so-called Internet trolls (who are frequently anonymous) have a polarizing effect on audiences, leading to politicization, rather than deeper understanding of scientific topics.
That’s bad, but it’s nothing compared with what a new psychology paper has to say about the personalities of trolls themselves. The research […] sought to directly investigate whether people who engage in trolling are characterized by personality traits that fall in the so-called Dark Tetrad: Machiavellianism (willingness to manipulate and deceive others), narcissism (egotism and self-obsession), psychopathy (the lack of remorse and empathy), and sadism (pleasure in the suffering of others).
It is hard to underplay the results: The study found correlations, sometimes quite significant, between these traits and trolling behavior. What’s more, it also found a relationship between all Dark Tetrad traits (except for narcissism) and the overall time that an individual spent, per day, commenting on the Internet.
In my observation, people whose peak of personal expression and identity is based on social media ‘combat’ — like hate bloggers and comment trolls — will frequently be slanderers, liars, bullies and deceivers.
They can be fixated and egotistical, lacking normal human empathy, apparently delighting in abuse of their ‘enemies’, and seemingly relish hurting others. Their activities: abusing, mocking and denigrating (say) road accident victims or people on a different ‘side’ of political debate to themselves or their ‘tribe’ reveal their character. Continue reading →
