Haters gonna hate.
In terms of spreading toxicity online, trolls aren’t keen to simply rest on their viral laurels, in accordance with a study by Cornell University, which found that the more “likes” a negative post receives, the likelier the writer is to publish a good more hateful message next.
The findings suggest that online hate is primarily fueled by “the pursuit of social approval” — and not, one might expect, the intent to cause emotional harm to the person or people targeted.
Researchers Julie Jiang, Luca Luceri and Emilio Ferrara reviewed posts on X (formerly Twitter), analyzing what happened when users met with approval for potential hurtful messages.
They found that when a toxic tweet got a lot of “likes,” the writer’s next post can be more inflammatory.
This comes as watchdogs proceed to warn concerning the rise of hate speech, especially on social media.
“It now appears that the identical dynamics that could make some online relationships intensely positive also can fuel friendly feelings amongst those that join together online in expressing enmity toward identity groups and individual targets,” Joseph B. Walther, a visiting scholar at Harvard University, explained on Phsy.org in response to the study.
![Young woman using smart phone](https://nypost.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/12/young-woman-using-smart-phone-73247836.jpg?w=1024)
He claimed that these social media users are driven to put in writing hateful messages to impress “like-minded” others.
The scholar noted that white supremacists and neo-Nazis often use codes and symbols only understood by one another, demonstrating their investment in eliciting in-group approval, versus spreading their message of hate to others outside the group.
Furthermore, many hate groups have turned away from popular social media platforms to hitch smaller fringe sites — places where the targets of their ire would never see or be victimized by their hurtful messages.
The findings support previous research showing that the more “heavy users” of social media engage with one another, the more knee-jerk and thoughtless their online posts turn out to be.
Over time, they turn out to be desensitized to positive feedback — “likes,” shares and comments — causing them to lose sight of accuracy and clarity, in favor of easy gratification.
![Single sad teen holding a mobile phone](https://nypost.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/12/single-sad-teen-holding-mobile-73247997.jpg?w=1024)
While opinion stays divided on the way to best manage hate speech without encroaching on the First Amendment, its rise online has paralleled an uptick in hate crime in the US.
In keeping with probably the most recent data from the Federal Bureau of Investigation, hate crimes reported within the US increased nearly 12% in 2021 over the previous 12 months.
Experts hope that understanding the psychology behind hate speech will allow agencies to higher monitor and shut it down before these jabs make it out of the group chat and onto the streets.