The Underlying Mechanisms of Online Political Aggression

The purpose of this study is to examine what factors motivate individuals to engage in online aggressive behavior towards members of the opposite political party. We hypothesize that individuals exhibit this behavior in an effort to gain approval from members of their own political party. Therefore, participants who are high in the motivation to politically aggress in order to gain approval from their ingroup members are expected to be more likely to share a meme that is aggressive toward the other political side than those less motivated to gain ingroup approval.