ONLINE TROLLING PERTAINING TO AGE

Media Censorship: Online Trolling Pertaining to Age

Group D:

Austin Kent, Shea Kondratowizc, Benjamin Lopez, Ryan Massa, Michelle Mei

Department of Communication, Bryant University

COM 390 A: Communication Research Methods

Professor Chris Morse

November 24, 2020

Abstract

In this paper, we will be discussing internet trolling, defining what an internet troll is, and

where users troll primarily by their age. An internet troll is someone who starts quarrels in

internet discussions and on social media. Depending on their age, we have found that they

primarily use either Instagram, Facebook, or TikTok. These social media websites are the most

relevant to what people use today. We will compare how older and younger people view trolling

both previously and in the present tense. The results will show whether or not people either

report trolling and do nothing or the various levels of trolling they see. They will also show what
ONLINE TROLLING PERTAINING TO AGE 1

social media websites are being trolled on the most. Finally, we will look at the results to see

what social media websites do if trolling is being reported and how they go about dealing with it.

Keywords: Trolling, Social Media, Internet, Age, Gender, Media Censorship, Facebook, and

Instagram

Media Censorship: Online Trolling Pertaining to Age

This article seeks to bring greater awareness of research on trolling and the difference

between how the youth and adults understand it. Specifically, this article will examine the

perceptions of online trolling among people in North America. There are differences between

how one person may define internet trolling compared to the perspective of how others do.

Originally before the use of social media, a troll would be defined as “an ugly dwarf or giant” that

dates back to 1610 and comes from the Old Norse word “troll” meaning giant or demon. Trolls

have existed in fantasy literature or ole folklore for centuries. However, the idea of internet

trolling has been around since the internet started in 1991 (Vicente 2020). With the creation of

the internet, it gave people the opportunity to belittle people online. What comes to mind when

you hear the world trolling, do you picture keyboard warriors behind a screen or giants causing

havoc on the townspeople? In today’s day and age, trolling is defined as “creating discord on

the Internet by starting quarrels or upsetting people by posting inflammatory or off-topic

messages in an online community. Basically, a social media troll is someone who purposefully

says something controversial in order to get a rise out of other users” (Hanson 2019).

Although not all trolls are trying to harm people, the majority of it stays the same. Most

users online who are defined as trolls are often stigmatized as the bad guy. For example, in

2013 when the Boston bombing happened, millions of tweets were sent out and a majority of

them were either misinformation or someone's opinion. In a time of need, some people either

tried helping others by giving information while others flooded the timeline with fake information

stopping anything beneficial from going on. The disconnect of whether or not people know they
ONLINE TROLLING PERTAINING TO AGE 2

are trolling is a fine line. Spreading news even if you think it is true, and it turns out not to be

true, is still trolling. While not intentional, it does the same thing. During the bombing, there were

hundreds, if not thousands of news outlets all around the world that would try to be first with

breaking news. Whether they know it or not, every person that “retweeted” or “liked” the tweets

that did not have factual information, could be considered trolling. Furthermore, the idea of

intentional trolling during this crisis, should not go unnoticed. When the FBI sought the public’s

help, they received over 10,000 emails in under 2 minutes. While some of these emails were

real news, the majority of them were to seek attention or cause more controversy. Only 20% of

over 8 million tweets about the Boston Marathon Bombing were found to be accurate. Another

29% of all tweets about this were 100% fake rumors and information and the final 50% were just

people’s opinions, which still could be misleading if not worded correctly (Schultz 2013).

With the internet, it gives people a space to share their specific views, ideas, and

discussions. In the past few years, people’s differing opinions and ideas have led to discord and

hostility. Recently, people ran to social media to share their views and opinions about the

Presidential election. The two opposing sides have led to many online disputes. Someone who

supports Biden and someone who supports Trump can disagree but at the same time have a

conversation without trolling one another online. However, if one of the two parties is only

engaged to make snide comments and enrage the other party, it would be considered as

trolling. If one person goes into the discussion deliberately choosing not to listen to the other

side at all, and their only goal is to anger the other person then that can be considered trolling.

Disagreements and deliberations happen abundantly on social media sites like Facebook,

Twitter, Instagram, and more. However, it should be distinguished that because there is an

argument, it does not mean that online trolling occurred. Trolling is not someone who argues a

point, rather it is someone making an unwarranted and wild comment (March 2019).

This is a topic of importance because the people who are the most involved in trolling

are the ones who are also affected by it. The perceptions of trolling have changed over time as
ONLINE TROLLING PERTAINING TO AGE 3

stated previously going from an ugly giant to someone harassing others behind a computer

screen. This research can help give more insight into the relationship between how old

someone is and how they perceive trolling. What are college students’ experience with trolling in

comparison to someone who is older and has been in the work field for years? Do the people

being trolled even know that they are actively being trolled? People are active on social media

for hours on end and do not know the difference between what one may consider trolling and

another may think is just a regular conversation. With the definitions of trolling changing so

frequently, a study is needed to better understand how people perceive trolling today. With easy

access to the internet and becoming viral, many people are subject to posting something

inappropriate which then leads to cancel culture. With some people being more sensitive than

others, it can lead to a larger platform for trolls to cling to. Platforms such as TikTok and

YouTube make it easy for people to post what they believe in which not everyone agrees with.

This can be considered a positive to stop the trolls by canceling them before they continue to

spread misinformation. But a negative of this is mob mentality on people who may not have all

the information. This was the case with the Boston Bombing example when tons of people just

retweeted and continued the spread of rumors. One post can gain millions of views which then

can lead to those people sharing it with others. If one of these influencers decided to post wrong

information it can be spread by word of mouth within hours.

Thesis

“Users who are older are more likely to troll on Facebook while younger users are more

likely to troll on Instagram”.

Preview

To understand why internet trolling happens along with why older users are more likely

to troll on Facebook while younger users are more likely to troll on Instagram. It will analyze the

difference between how younger people interpret trolling compared to older adults. Following

that will be research questions and survey results.

ONLINE TROLLING PERTAINING TO AGE 4

Literature Review

Vocabulary

In our research paper, we used certain keywords that may be confusing to the reader

which will be defined in this section. One example would be inflammatory which is a word we

used in our introduction which is defined as “intended or likely to cause anger and hate”

(Cambridge Dictionary, 2020). We used inflammatory to describe comments that trolls online

can make and how it can anger people. The next word is stigmatization which is “the act of

treating someone or something unfairly by publicly disapproving of him, her” (Cambridge

Dictionary, 2020).

This is a word that is prevalent in the trolling community because of the frequency of it

being used. Most people who are called a troll have a negative connotation because of the bad

things that they do to people online. Another word that is negative in the social media world is

snide. To be snide or to make a snide comment means “containing unpleasant criticism that is

not clearly stated“ (Cambridge Dictionary, 2020). In the context of making a snide comment, it

would be on a website like Facebook when talking about politics. This was explained in our

introduction when talking about how two people get engaged and one normally makes a snide

comment about the other.

Another topic that may be confusing is a random convenience sample (Wrench &

Thomas-Maddoz & Richmond & McCroskey, 2019, p.317). This is a sample that involves the

selection of participants for the sample based on availability. Other samples include things such

as volunteer purposive, and non-probability sampling none of which were used when collecting

our samples because they either were not random or not the sample we were looking for. Any

type of survey can be considered a random convenience sampling because you never know

who is taking it, and it is the easiest way to get the data. Our main source to do this was posting

our survey on Facebook and getting the results from them.

ONLINE TROLLING PERTAINING TO AGE 5

We also discussed the standard deviation (SD) and how in our study we had to use the

standard deviation to show the deviation of the group as a whole (Wrench & Thomas-Maddoz &

Richmond & McCroskey, 2019, p.112). The standard deviation is used so that we can

summarize the group under one number. We used a standard deviation in our findings under

trolling apprehension.

Nominal variables are also discussed in our research which can be defined as mutually

exclusive, equivalency, or ratio (Wrench & Thomas-Maddoz & Richmond & McCroskey, 2019,

p.135). Mutually exclusive is qualifying for one category or another example in our study of a

mutually exclusive nominal variable is gender (Wrench & Thomas-Maddoz & Richmond &

McCroskey, 2019, p.286). Equivalency is just categories, with no value assigned to the

categories (Wrench & Thomas-Maddoz & Richmond & McCroskey, 2019, p.244). Exhaustive is

if everything is in categories you must see themselves in a list.

This all was used in our study when we conducted a one-way ANOVA (Analysis of

Covariance) in SPSS. SPSS stands for Statistical Package for Social Sciences (Wrench &

Thomas-Maddoz & Richmond & McCroskey, 2019, p.199). It is typically used to analyze

quantitative data. SPSS Statistics is a software package used for statistical analysis by IBM

(International Business Machines Corporation). We used SPSS in our study to gather

information and to run our tests. We ran an ANOVA. An ANOVA is a one-way analysis of

variance, used to determine whether there are any statistically significant differences between

the means of three or more independent groups. Independent variables are defined as a

number or amount whose value does not depend on the value of another element in the same

mathematical expression (Wrench & Thomas-Maddoz & Richmond & McCroskey, 2019, p.36).

Whereas a dependent variable is a number or amount whose value depends on the value of

another element in the same mathematical expression (Wrench & Thomas-Maddoz & Richmond

& McCroskey, 2019, p.542). By running an ANOVA in SPSS, we were able to find the

significance and see the relevance in our study.

ONLINE TROLLING PERTAINING TO AGE 6

A scale was an extremely important part of our survey. A scale can be defined as the

different ways in which variables are defined and grouped into different categories (Wrench &

Thomas-Maddoz & Richmond & McCroskey, 2019, p.48). These scales will define the level of

values assigned to each variable in a data set. It was extremely important for us to have a scale

that was easy to understand so we could interpret and then further explain the data once the

survey was concluded.

A ratio scale is a scale that can be ordered or measured with numbers. This could be

age, weight, height, etc. (Wrench & Thomas-Maddoz & Richmond & McCroskey, 2019, p.109).

Throughout our survey, we used a ratio scale to tell us the age of the participants. This was

extremely important because our hypothesis was based on age and the level of trolling that

people see and on which social media platforms.

An ordinal scale was used in our survey with the level of trolling that people see and how

likely they are to report it (Wrench & Thomas-Maddoz & Richmond & McCroskey, 2019, p.167).

This is different from a ratio scale because it is not measured with exact numbers. It can still be

listed in order, however.

Previous Research

In this article about trolling and its impact on social media, it is going to review social

media trolling, what it is and isn’t defined by, handling criticism, examples of brand

management, how social media impacts brand management, and examples of how brands and

companies deal with internet trolls. Trolling is defined as creating discord on the internet by

starting fights or upsetting people by posting confrontational words or speaking about

inflammatory topics in a disheartening way. Basically, a social media troll is somebody who

purposely says something controversial in order to get a rise out of other internet users. This
ONLINE TROLLING PERTAINING TO AGE 7

article then goes on to talk about the author's teenage years and how he has witnessed on

numerous occasions has seen internet trolling first hand. It points out how people can be easily

triggered on social media because there is no face to face interactions so people are more

willing to offer their opinions without any fear of repercussion. This article then goes on to how

to respond to internet trolls, talking about how you can respond to trolls in funny ways so as to

keep the joke going. Lastly, this article says the internet should be a good place, as it is a very

helpful tool for society to use freely.

Explanation and Rationalization for Variables

We chose to do age and level of trolling for our two variables because they directly affect

each other. Our hypothesis talked about how older users are more likely to be trolled on

Facebook while younger users are more likely to be trolled on Instagram. This is saying that

older people tend to be more active on Facebook and susceptible to potentially being trolled

more on Facebook than Instagram. This is the opposite for younger users that tend to be more

active on Instagram (ie. seeing more posts, more comments, more stories, etc).

Methods

Participants

To maximize our sample in both speed and accuracy we decided to use a random

convenience sample to get our data. While we would have liked to see a more equal sample of

gender the majority of the participants were female. This portion included 37 males (36.06%)

and 105 females (73.94%) giving a total of 142 participants.

Some participants were in the older age range which was fifty-one and older while the

rest of the participants were the majority in our lower boundary which was 18-24. The lower
ONLINE TROLLING PERTAINING TO AGE 8

range of data was 18-24 with 65 people (45.77%), then it was 25-34 which had 9 participants

(6.43%), the third limit was 35-44 which was 10 people (7.04%) and the last boundary was 51+

with 45 (31.69%). The mean is 2.8 which means the average age was between 25-44 and the

SD was 1.79.
ONLINE TROLLING PERTAINING TO AGE 9

Age and sex are two of the most important demographics which is why we decided to

ask our participants these questions. The primary reason why we decided to explore age was to

see the differences between them and how they responded to different types of trolling. While

we do not know exactly where the participants are from but it can be assumed that the majority

are from the New England area. Our group decided to do a convenience survey on Facebook

where we got most of our results from the 51 and older age group.

Our focus was to try and compare the difference between older individuals on social

media and younger individuals. Both age groups experience trolling differently on different

platforms so the participants needed to be on both sides of the spectrum. While a good majority

of the participants were college students the rest were people above the age of 51.
ONLINE TROLLING PERTAINING TO AGE 10

Apparatus

An apparatus is defined as any special equipment or materials used throughout the

study (Wrench & Thomas-Maddoz & Richmond & McCroskey, 2019, p.112). This does not

include things like standard laboratory equipment furniture, stopwatches, screens, pencils,

paper, scantrons, and so on need not be mentioned. However, we did not have any of the

objects listed above and the survey we sent out would be the only apparatus that we used

throughout the process.

Procedure

We gave a survey to our participants with a focus on the level of trolling that different

people saw based on their age and which social media platforms they use. Our survey

consisted of 18 questions ranging from nominal, to scales, to ratio and ordinal.

The first questions we asked were about demographics such as age and sex which was

already mentioned above. We then asked a variety of questions regarding the reason as to why

people think trolls harass people on the internet. Our scale that was asked regarding trolling

was a 5 item measure with a 10 point response scale. The responses were rated from 1 being

the lowest to 10 being the highest. This measurement was used to determine some of the

tendencies that were seen in trolls. Next, we asked participants to list which social media

platforms they frequent (ie. Instagram, Snapchat, Tik Tok, Twitter, etc.) Data collection stopped

when we reached over 140 participants and no longer wanted more results.

Instrumentation

The behaviors that were asked were thought to be some of the main reasons people troll

such as amusement, insecurity, seeking conflict, viciousness, or uneducated. We then put them

together as a scale to try and measure the participants trolling apprehension. This would be how

they understand and grasp the concept of trolling and what they define it as. Our next set of

questions regarded how frequent people are on social media, what age do they see trolling on,
ONLINE TROLLING PERTAINING TO AGE 11

and how likely that they are to report it. Although we did not scale these questions together we

used similar Likert scales. With the frequency, we asked a range of hours spent per day on

social media. When asking about things like what age range we used similar ranges for our age

question and for the likelihood of reporting it was a 5 point scale starting from very unlikely to

very likely. Even when they found that it was bothersome they were still unlikely to go and report

it.

Results

Hypothesis

For our study, we focused on one hypothesis which is: “Users who are older are more

likely to troll on Facebook while younger users are more likely to troll on Instagram”. We tested

this hypothesis by running a one-way ANOVA on SPSS, given we had age as our independent

variable and the trolling apprehension as the dependent variable. The results indicated that

F(.057)=, p > 0.05.

Our dependent variable measures why people think others are trolling online. Based on

our dependent variables, we ran a reliability test to ensure the dependent variables are related.

Our reliability statistic was .731 meaning the variables measuring the perceptions of trolling

work with each of the other variables.

Given our dependent variable, we assess why [the participants] think people troll online.

A one-way ANOVA was conducted with the following dependent variables: seeking conflict

attention, low self-confidence and insecurity, viciousness-nastiness, uneducated, and

amusement. Looking at the results, the mean was 7.15 based on a 10 point scale. In addition,

we ran an LSD to find the significance level of 0.994.

As you can see below, a lot of our hypothesis was not supported by the significance of

the ANOVA. For something to be statistically significant, we have to have a significance of

below .5, and our results did not align with that. This may be because we have such a wide
ONLINE TROLLING PERTAINING TO AGE 12

variety of ages, sex, etc. in our trolling apprehension. Our findings did not back up our

hypothesis because of the significance level.

Conclusion

In conclusion, after running a one way ANOVA in SPSS and categorizing demographics

under Trolling apprehension, we found that our results were not statistically significant and they

did not back up our hypothesis of “Users who are older are more likely to troll on Facebook

while younger users are more likely to troll on Instagram”. In the future, to make our survey

statistically significant we could try to diversify the sample size and the location of our study.

Some of our limitations included that a lot of people sent this from similar backgrounds and

views, which is called snowballing. We could also change our hypothesis to focus more on the

social media outlets where trolling may occur more such as a newer social media outlet like Tik

Tok. Instagram and Facebook are also both owned and operated by Facebook which may make

sense as to why there is no significant statistics because a lot of Facebook users may have

Instagrams and vice versa.

References
ONLINE TROLLING PERTAINING TO AGE 13

Al, R. A. (2015). Online reactions to the Muhammad cartoons: YouTube and the virtual

ummah. Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion, 54(2), 261–276. https://doi-

org.bryant.idm.oclc.org/10.1111/jssr.12191

Cambridge Dictionary (2020). INDEPENDENT VARIABLE: Definition in the Cambridge

English Dictionary. (n.d.). Cambridge University Press,

https://dictionary.cambridge.org/us/dictionary/english/independent-variable

Cambridge Dictionary (2020). INFLAMMATORY: Definition in the Cambridge English

Dictionary. (n.d.). Cambridge University Press,

https://dictionary.cambridge.org/us/dictionary/english/inflammatory

Cambridge Dictionary (2020). SNIDE: Definition in the Cambridge English Dictionary.

(n.d.). Cambridge University Press,

https://dictionary.cambridge.org/us/dictionary/english/snide

Cambridge Dictionary (2020). STIGMATIZATION: Definition in the Cambridge English

Dictionary. (n.d.). Cambridge University Press,

Presshttps://dictionary.cambridge.org/us/dictionary/english/stigmatization

Casilli, A. A., & Tubaro, P. (2012). Social media censorship in times of political unrest - a

social simulation experiment with the UK riots. Bms Bulletin of Sociological

Methodology/ Bulletin De Methodologie Sociologique, 115(1), 5–20.

https://doi.org/10.1177/0759106312445697

Chia, S. C., Lu, K.-H., & McLeod, D. M. (2004). Sex, Lies, and Video Compact Disc: A

Case Study on Third-Person Perception and Motivations for Media Censorship.

Communication Research, 31(1), 109–130. https://doi-

org.bryant.idm.oclc.org/10.1177/0093650203260204
ONLINE TROLLING PERTAINING TO AGE 14

Dohle, M., & Bernhard, U. (2014). Presumed online media influence and support for

censorship: Results from a survey among German parliamentarians. International

Journal of Public Opinion Research, 26(2), 256–268. https://doi-

org.bryant.idm.oclc.org/10.1093/ijpor/edt027

Duggan, M. (2019, December 31). Americans' online harassment experiences. Pew

Research Center, Washington, D.C.

https://www.pewresearch.org/internet/2017/07/11/experiencing-online-harassment/

Hayes, A. F., & Reineke, J. B. (2007). The effects of government censorship of war-

related news coverage on interest in the censored coverage: A test of competing

theories. Mass Communication & Society, 10(4), 423–438. https://doi-

org.bryant.idm.oclc.org/10.1080/15205430701580581

Hoffner, C., & Buchanan, M. (2002). Parents’ responses to television violence: The third-

person perception, parental mediation and support for censorship. Media Psychology,

4(3), 231–252. https://doi-org.bryant.idm.oclc.org/10.1207/S1532785XMEP0403_02

Howard, K., Zolnierek, K. H., Critz, K., Dailey, S., & Ceballos, N. (2019). An examination

of psychosocial factors associated with malicious online trolling behaviors. Personality

and Individual Differences, 149, 309–314. https://doi-

org.bryant.idm.oclc.org/10.1016/j.paid.2019.06.020

Jin, C.-H. (2018). Self-concepts in cyber censorship awareness and privacy risk

perceptions: What do cyber asylum-seekers have? Computers in Human Behavior, 80,

379–389. https://doi-org.bryant.idm.oclc.org/10.1016/j.chb.2017.11.028
ONLINE TROLLING PERTAINING TO AGE 15

Jinguang, Z. (2017). Is Support of Censoring Controversial Media Content for the Good

of Others? Sexual Strategies and Support of Censoring Pro-Alcohol Advertising.

Evolutionary Psychology, (2017). https://doi.org/10.1177/1474704917742808

Kwon, K. H., Moon, S.-I., & Stefanone, M. A. (2015). Unspeaking on Facebook? Testing

network effects on self-censorship of political expressions in social network sites. Quality

& Quantity: International Journal of Methodology, 49(4), 1417–1435. https://doi-

org.bryant.idm.oclc.org/10.1007/s11135-014-0078-8

Maltby, J., Day, L., Hatcher, R. M., Tazzyman, S., Flowe, H. D., Palmer, E. J., Frosch, C.

A., O’Reilly, M., Jones, C., Buckley, C., Knieps, M., & Cutts, K. (2016). Implicit theories

of online trolling: Evidence that attention-seeking conceptions are associated with

increased psychological resilience. British Journal of Psychology, 107(3), 448–466.

https://doi-org.bryant.idm.oclc.org/10.1111/bjop.12154

March, E. (2019, February 04). Online trolling used to be funny, but now the term refers

to something far more sinister. https://phys.org/news/2019-02-online-trolling-funny-term-

sinister.html

McCombes, S. (2020, November 23). The Literature Review: A Complete Step-by-Step

Guide. https://www.scribbr.com/dissertation/literature-review/

Myers West, S. (2018). Censored, suspended, shadowbanned: User interpretations of

content moderation on social media platforms. New Media & Society, 20(11), 4366–

4383. https://doi-org.bryant.idm.oclc.org/10.1177/1461444818773059

Nathanson, A. I., Eveland, W. P., Jr., Park, H.-S., & Paul, B. (2002). Perceived media

influence and efficacy as predictors of caregivers’ protective behaviors. Journal of

ONLINE TROLLING PERTAINING TO AGE 16

Broadcasting & Electronic Media, 46(3), 385–410. https://doi-

org.bryant.idm.oclc.org/10.1207/s15506878jobem4603_5

Sanfilippo, M. R., Fichman, P., & Yang, S. (2018). Multidimensionality of online trolling

behaviors. Information Society, 34(1), 27–39. https://doi-

org.bryant.idm.oclc.org/10.1080/01972243.2017.1391911

Schneider, C. J. (2011). Culture, rap music, “bitch,” and the development of the

censorship frame. American Behavioral Scientist, 55(1), 36–56. https://doi-

org.bryant.idm.oclc.org/10.1177/0002764210381728

Schultz, C. (2013, October 24). In the Wake of the Boston Marathon Bombing, Twitter

Was Full of Lies. Smithsonian Magazine, https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-

news/in-the-wake-of-the-boston-marathon-bombing-twitter-was-full-of-lies-5294419/

Solis, J. A., & Antenangeli, L. (2017). Corruption is bad news for a free press:

Reassessing the relationship between media freedom and corruption. Social Science

Quarterly, 98(3), 1112–1137. https://doi-org.bryant.idm.oclc.org/10.1111/ssqu.12438

Spies, S. Z. (2018). Reporting truth: Online journalism, censorship, and the creation of

knowledge in Jordan [ProQuest Information & Learning]. In Dissertation Abstracts

International Section A: Humanities and Social Sciences (Vol. 79, Issue 5–A(E)).

Stephanie. (2020, October 22). Nominal Ordinal Interval Ratio & Cardinal: Examples.

https://www.statisticshowto.com/nominal-ordinal-interval-ratio/

University of Nebraska-Lincoln | Web Developer Network, & Hanson, J. (n.d.). Trolls and

Their Impact on Social Media. University of Nebraska-Lincoln,

https://unlcms.unl.edu/engineering/james-hanson/trolls-and-their-impact-social-media
ONLINE TROLLING PERTAINING TO AGE 17

Vicente, V. (2020, January 22). What Is an Internet Troll? (and How to Handle Trolls).

https://www.howtogeek.com/465416/what-is-an-internet-troll-and-how-to-handle-trolls/

Wilkinson, W. W., & Berry, S. D. (2020). Together they are Troy and Chase: Who

supports demonetization of gay content on YouTube? Psychology of Popular Media,

9(2), 224–235. https://doi-org.bryant.idm.oclc.org/10.1037/ppm0000228

Wrench, J. S., Thomas-Maddox, C., Richmond, V. P., & McCroskey, J. C. (2019).

Quantitative research methods for communication: A hands-on approach. New York:

Oxford University Press.