An Exploratory Study of Psychosocial Factors that are Related to Trolling Behaviors on Social Media
Date
2018-08
Authors
Critz, Kirstin Leigh
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Abstract
The purpose of this study was to explore the demographic factors, social media
behaviors, and psychosocial factors most associated with trolling behaviors on social
media. Although minimal research has been done on trolling behaviors, previous
literature on bullying and other malicious online behaviors has shown several social
media and psychosocial factors associated with the behaviors. Methods: A total of 504
psychology and mass communication students from Texas State University were
recruited for the study. Participants were asked to complete a survey in which they
responded to questions about demographics and social media, as well as tendencies, and questions from a set of validated personality and psychosocial instruments. Based on their responses to three specific social media behavior questions, the participants were
then placed into two groups: those who exhibit trolling behaviors (ETB) and those who
do not exhibit trolling behaviors (NETB). Results: Based on the final regression model,
males were more likely to exhibit trolling behaviors. For social media behaviors, both
greater need for social media and greater likelihood to make downward comparisons
were found to be significant predictors of trolling behaviors. Lack of perspective taking, a
subscale of the empathy measure, was also found to be a significant indicator of trolling
behaviors. Conclusions: Results from this study suggest further research should be done
in examining predictors of trolling behaviors on social media in order to gain a better
understanding of the emerging malicious online behavior.
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Keywords
Social media, Trolling
Citation
Critz, K. L. (2018). <i>An exploratory study of psychosocial factors that are related to trolling behaviors on social media</i> (Unpublished thesis). Texas State University, San Marcos, Texas.