“Data pointed to online interactions largely mirroring offline behaviour, with people predisposed to aggressive, status-seeking behaviour just as unpleasant in person as behind a veil of online anonymity.”
– Writer
Tom McKay, on a new study of online toxicity published in the
American Political Science Review. Analysing representative surveys and behavioral studies, Aarhus University researchers were able to debunk the “mismatch hypothesis”—the common assumption that Internet anonymity encourages hostility.
