Skip to main content
Home Whitman College Penrose Library | Arminda Collections

Main menu

  • Home
  • Browse Collections
  • About
  • Login
  1. Home
  2. Honors Theses
  3. Psychopathy and online trolling : examining the mediating effect of relationship quality
Title

Psychopathy and online trolling : examining the mediating effect of relationship quality

    Item Description
    Limited Access
    The author(s) chose to restrict access to this thesis to current Whitman students, faculty, and staff. Please log in to view it.
    Linked Agent
    Creator (cre): Hager, Elsa Ann
    Creator (cre): Myers, Sarah Elizabeth
    Creator (cre): Edwards, Cole Michael
    Advisor (adv): Blagov, Pavel
    Department (dpt): Whitman College. Psychology Department
    Date
    May 8, 2019
    Graduation Year
    2019
    Abstract

    Online trolling is a disruptive, antisocial behavior that occurs on the Internet. It is crucial to better understand this phenomenon, because individuals who are victims of trolling may experience emotional distress. Researchers have established a link between online trolling and psychopathy, but how the two are related has not been studied extensively. The social compensation hypothesis suggests that individuals may turn to excessive use of social media to compensate for poor offline relationships. We collected data from 247 participants via an online survey to measure the associations between online trolling behavior, relationship quality, and trait psychopathy. We predicted a positive correlation between trait psychopathy and online trolling. We also predicted negative correlations between relationship quality and online trolling, and between psychopathy and relationship quality. We further predicted that relationship quality would partially mediate the association between psychopathy and online trolling. As expected, we found a significant, positive correlation between trait psychopathy and online trolling and a negative correlation between trait psychopathy and relationship quality. Contrary to our expectations, we did not find a significant correlation between online trolling and relationship quality. We also did not find support for the mediational hypothesis. The results are inconclusive with regard to whether individuals high on psychopathy engage in trolling behavior to compensate for poor relationship quality. Our exploratory results suggest that trolling behavior is instead simply reflective of high levels of meanness associated with psychopathy.

    Subject
    Psychopathy
    Online trolling
    Social media
    Interpersonal relations
    Relationship quality
    Compensation (Defense Mechanism)
    Behavioral Disinhibition
    Social sciences
    Academic theses
    Whitman College 2019 -- Dissertation collection -- Psychology Department
    Genre
    Theses
    Extent
    32 pages
    Permanent URL
    http://works.whitman.edu/2019053
    Rights
    http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/
    Contact Us

    If you have questions about permitted uses of this content, please contact the Arminda administrator: http://works.whitman.edu/contact-arminda

    THESIS_2019_1102362508_001
    Home Whitman College Penrose Library | Arminda Collections

    Footer menu

    • About
    • Author FAQ
    • Contact Us
    • List of Collections
    • Policies
    • Terms of Use