Chris Mooney reports at Slate that research conducted by Erin Buckels of the University of Manitoba confirmed that people who engage in internet 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).
In the study, trolls were identified in a variety of ways. One was by
simply asking survey participants what they 'enjoyed doing most' when on
online comment sites, offering five options: 'debating issues that are
important to you,' 'chatting with others,' 'making new friends,'
'trolling others,' and 'other.' The study recruited participants from
Amazon's Mechanical Turk website and two measures of sadistic personality were administered
(PDF): the Short Sadistic Impulse Scale and the Varieties of Sadistic
Tendencies Scale. Only 5.6 percent of survey respondents actually
specified that they enjoyed 'trolling.' By contrast, 41.3 percent of
Internet users were 'non-commenters,' meaning they didn't like engaging
online at all. So trolls are, as has often been suspected, a minority of
online commenters, and an even smaller minority of overall Internet
users. Overall, the authors found that the relationship between sadism and trolling was the strongest,
and that indeed, sadists appear to troll because they find it
pleasurable. 'Both trolls and sadists feel sadistic glee at the distress
of others. Sadists just want to have fun ... and the Internet is their
playground!' The study comes as websites are increasingly weighing steps to rein in trollish behavior
but the study authors aren't sure that fix is a realistic one.
'Because the behaviors are intrinsically motivating for sadists, comment
moderators will likely have a difficult time curbing trolling with
punishments (e.g., banning users),' says Buckels. 'Ultimately, the
allure of trolling may be too strong for sadists, who presumably have
limited opportunities to express their sadistic interests in a
socially-desirable manner.' Perhaps posting rights should only be unlocked if you pass a test.
