What’s Behind Our Bad Behavior and Lack of Empathy Online?

Last week, we discussed cyber bullying and how a lack of empathy can lead to us being “mean behind the screen.” Today, we’re going to look at why we behave differently online. What are some of the sociological and psychological theories that explain the worst behaviors we see in the online world, behaviors often exhibited by people who would never act this way in face to face interactions? The main concept we want to look at is the Online Disinhibition Effect of psychologist John Suler, PhD., but first we’ll look into a bit of background.