Everything You Never Wanted to Know about Trolls:An Interdisplinary Exploration of the Who's, What's, and Why's of Trolling in Online Games

Summary Within the world of online gaming, trolling has become a regular menace. While gamers try to connect and socialize with one another, or even simply play the game, there are other gamers – trolls – on the prowl for an entirely different kind of good time, one in which they are enjoying themselves at the expense of everyone else (Chapters 2 and 3). Although trolling is common, and mass-media has latched onto it as a hot topic, it is only recently that the academic community has begun to take a serious look at how trolling occurs in and affects the gaming community at large. However, a lot of this literature is either descriptive in nature (see Thacker & Griffiths, 2012), or jumps ahead to prevention (see Cheng et al., 2017) without taking a deeper look at more than a single underlying motivation at a time. In short, there is a complex and prolific phenomenon happening online, but the research on it is only emerging. This dissertation’s goal is to take a deeper look at trolling as a phenomenon, beyond what has been done so far. More specifically, I aim to figure out a) what trolling is, b) why people do it, and c) who helps and who hinders trolling in online games. To do this, I took four different perspectives: the troll’s (Chapter 2), the researcher’s (Chapter 3), the victim’s (Chapter 4), and the bystander’s (Chapter 5). The purpose of Chapter 2 is to give the troll’s perspective on trolling, something that researchers had yet to do at the time. To do this, I interviewed 22 people who said that they had a history of trolling in online games. More specifically, I asked them about times they witnessed, were victims of, or perpetrated trolling, as well as what they thought about how the gaming community dealt with and felt about trolls and trolling. My goal with these interviews was threefold: I wanted to figure out a) what trolls consider trolling, b) what motivates them to do it, and c) the role of everyone else in game when it comes to encouraging or discouraging more trolling. What I found was that although trolling was almost universally considered a negative part of online gaming culture, and all the trolls in our group of participants started as victims of trolls before becoming trolls themselves, the online community neither encourages nor discourages it, making it an asocial activity. The next chapter allowed me to look at an archive of trolling incidents to find patterns in the way that different people involved in real-life trolling incidents communicate with one another. This public online archive consisted of 10,000 reported incidents of trolling in the popular online game League of Legends, and it included game data like player statistics, as well as everything all the players involved said during the game. Once the data was properly cleaned and prepared, myself and my co-author, Dr. Rianne Conijn, analysed the chat logs in two different ways: structural topic modelling (STM), and a traditional dictionary-based content analysis. In this way, we were able to see what characterized all the different actors – the troll, their victim(s), and the bystanders – and what was similar when it came to their messages. All this information was then compared to what existed already in literature used to describe trolls and trolling and complement what I had learned about trolls from Chapter 2. The key finding was that trolls and their teammates actually share a lot of the negative speech patterns (e.g., profanity, negative emotional content) normally associated with only trolls. Practically, this means that we have to be extremely careful as researchers when labelling trolls for the purpose of study, as we could very easily be falsely labelling victims. After speaking to trolls and looking at trolling interactions broadly, Chapter 4 focuses intently on the victim and their personal experience in a trolling simulation, taking into account their cultural background and values. It is also the first study to directly compare and contrast two different types of trolling: verbal (flaming) and behavioural (ostracism). They are both really common online occurrences, so the participants could easily relate, but they are extremely different in how they are executed, with flaming being vicious insults and ostracism being totally ignoring a person. Our participants were either Dutch, Pakistani, or Taiwanese, so that we could also look at how people from vastly different cultural backgrounds would react to – behaviourally and emotionally – the different kinds of trolling in the study. We simulated a trolling experience by putting our participants in a virtual game of catch with two computerized co-players, who they were led to believe were real people of either the same nationality or a minority member (e.g., a Moroccan immigrant in the Netherlands), who I had programmed to either troll them or silently watch the trolling happen. We found that there are indeed cultural differences when it comes to reactions, as well as differences between reactions to the two trolling types, but the core take-away is that future trolling interventions have to take into account the cultures of the target population as well as the specific type of trolling they are trying to fix or prevent in order to be effective. In the penultimate chapter, I shift the focus one last time to bystanders by putting participants in a game of League of Legends with two confederates who would troll one another throughout the game. This study’s goal was to see what motivated gamers to report trolls to an authority figure (the game developer) using the game’s built-in reporting functions, as the results of Chapter 2’s study suggested that this was an effective trolling deterrent. It is also, according to the results of the same study, the least-used recourse by bystanders faced with trolls in the proverbial wild. We found that how warm and friendly the troll was perceived to be and how competent the victim was perceived to be were what determined whether the participant reported our fake troll or not. A more competent victim and a less warm troll lead to more reports. To conclude, there is still a lot more to learn about trolls and trolling, but the field is farther along now than when this project started in 2015. There is a broad definition developed that encompasses most of the descriptive literature on trolling in games thus far. We also now know that there is the indication of a trolling cycle that requires further exploration. This is particularly important to know when it comes to the world of game development, as knowing the cycle exists allows for multiple points of intervention in order to protect their customers. Finally, this dissertation has shown the complexity of not just trolls – who are often portrayed in the media as one-dimensional antagonists – but also of everyone else involved in trolling interactions. Trolls, victims, and bystanders are all multi-faceted humans, and trolling, like all interactions, is an intricate social dance that deserves to be studied in even further depth in the future than what I have done here

Statistical assessment of business intelligence system adoption model for sustainable textile and apparel industry

The textile and apparel industry is one of the biggest competitive industries in the world. Nowadays, industry 4.0 concepts put pressures on textile and apparel companies to integrate advanced technologies. Consequently, Business Intelligence (BI) systems are diffusing rapidly to process large data sets to harness the true value of smart technologies. Regardless of its potentials, most textile and apparel companies are lagging and hesitating to adopt this credible innovation in the presence of a high failure rate (70%-80%) especially in developing countries. To achieve the successful adoption of BI systems, statistical assessment is required to better understand this complex phenomenon. Therefore, a BI system model based on Technology-Organization-Environment (TOE) is developed to evaluate the role of potential determinants pertaining to the users, technology, organization, and environment. Data were collected using a survey with self-administered questionnaires from decision-makers with authoritative designations in the textile and apparel industry, academia, and software companies. Influential relationships among critical determinants were assessed and validated by using Decision-Making Trial and Evaluation Laboratory (DEMATEL) approach. The results of this study would contribute to the success of costly BI system projects and will motivate the industry experts to potentially assign investments for the BI projects in the developing countries to sustain in the competitive markets

The Impact of the University Environment on the Students’ Entrepreneurial Intentions: Evidence from Khyber Pukhtunkhwa-Pakistan

Abstract Entrepreneurship is considered a fundamental element of social and economic development. Due to its growing importance, universities around the world are using instruments like entrepreneurship support programmes, entrepreneurship development centres and business incubators for fostering entrepreneurial intentions among students. However, the empirical research focusing on investigating the impact of the university environment including entrepreneurial offerings and contextual factors on the students’ entrepreneurial intentions (SEIs) remains inconclusive and has contradictory findings. In addition, a consolidated framework that outlines both the internal and external university environmental factors remains elusive. To fill this gap, this research aims to investigate the impact of the university environment on SEIs. The main objective of this research is to identify the factors from both the internal and external environments of the universities and their impact on SEIs, with a specific focus on the Khyber Pukhtunkhwa (KP) region of Pakistan. A review of the literature led to the development of a preliminary conceptual framework based on a robust Luthje and Franke Model (LFM) developed by Luthje and Franke (2003), which provided a basis for further empirical research. The data was collected in two phases: (1) quantitative data was collected in the first phase by distributing a survey questionnaire (490 Masters-Level Students); and (2) qualitative data was gathered in the second phase via semi-structured interviews (six Directors/Heads of the Business Department in universities) and through public documents. This exercise, employing triangulation, enabled wider and deeper understanding of the research phenomenon; thus, it increased the validity of evaluation and research findings. Quantitative data was analysed using descriptive statistics and factor analysis using statistical software, followed by structural equation modelling to assess the model fit and perform theory testing. Similarly, NVivo software was used to analyse the collected qualitative data. Subsequently, linkages were made within and across the two research phases to obtain a deeper understanding of the research phenomena. Results from the quantitative data showed that eight independent variables (Entrepreneurial Networking and Support, Entrepreneurship Clubs, University’s Linkages with Society, Capital Availability, Economic Environment, Regulatory Environment, Structural Support and Workforce Availability) were positively and significantly related to the dependent variable, i.e., SEIs. However, four variables (Entrepreneurship Education, Supportive Faculty, Entrepreneurial Resources and Government Policies) were not significantly related to SEIs. The qualitative data also confirmed these results. Primary data from interviews and surveys and secondary data also highlighted two more factors, i.e., Triple Helix (University-Industry-Government Collaboration) and Law and Order Situation, to be affecting SEIs. Overall, the results of the current study show that the proposed model has a good explanatory power and is therefore robust in predicting the impact of the university environment on SEIs in Pakistan. This study will enrich the existing body of literature and may provide guidelines to policy makers for assessing, designing, initiating, and implementing entrepreneurship support programmes successfully. Moreover, this research contributes to the knowledge through examining the factors that might encourage or impede the SEIs among Pakistani students

Model of eco-socially conscious consumer behaviour related to choice and use of personal cars: evidence from an emerging economy

This thesis focuses on developing a model of eco-socially conscious consumer behaviour related to choice and use of personal cars. It presents empirical evidence relating to the factors that must be considered when promoting environmentally friendly cars (noted as alternative fuel vehicles (AFVs) throughout the thesis), especially in an emerging economy such as Pakistan. The rationale and motivation behind this project is that there is an increasing rate of environmental problems such as air pollution and CO₂ in emerging economies and relatively lower competence in developing strategies aimed at improving climate change resilience. Together with changing the climate, anti-environmental anthropogenic activities make it more difficult for affected communities to prosper. To curb these environmental problems, studies reported in the academic literature have suggested taking measures to reduce the impact of human activities on the environment and regulating consumption of environmentally harmful products. In response to these emerging demands, marketers have invested heavily, regarding both product development and promotion of pro-environmental behaviours, in various domains of commercial interest. One such area is the use of personal cars, a sector that is proliferating and, given that CO₂ emissions from cars are one of the most significant sources of environmental problems (particularly global warming), there is a need to promote alternative fuel vehicles (AFVs) and eco-social behaviours in the use of personal cars. This thesis reports on two major studies to answer three underlying research questions. The first study focuses on two research questions. The first research question, RQ1, explores how automobile industry consumers (those in the personal cars segment) define eco-socially conscious behaviour (ESCCB) related to the choice and use of personal cars in Pakistan. The second research question, RQ2, attempts to identify the profiles of different customer segments based ESCCB defined in RQ1. The second study is focused on the theoretical explanation of factors that are suggested in the literature to affect ESCCB related to the choice and use of personal cars. The Theory of Planned Behaviour (TPB) and Value-Beliefs-Norms Theory (VBN) have been converged to provide a holistic explanation of ESCCB. Based on scientific methodologies recommended for new scale development, the results reported in this thesis suggest that ESCCB related to choice and use of personal cars is a latent construct manifested in three underlying dimensions: eco-social use, eco-social purchase and eco-social conservation. A market segmentation approach using cluster and discriminant analysis suggests that three consumer segments exist in the Pakistani automobile market based on response towards eco-social behaviour and inclination towards choosing AFVs. The first segment, the conservatives, are not concerned about the environmental issues, prefer conventional cars, and are least sensitive to the eco-social use of personal cars. The second segment, the indifferents, are unsure whether they should buy AFVs and whether this will positively affect the environment. The third segment, and the largest one (51%), the enthusiasts, are highly inclined towards purchasing AFVs and eco-social use of personal cars to reduce the impact of the use of personal cars on the environment. The findings of Study 1 hold significant implications for marketing practitioners and policymakers. Some conceptual and methodological limitations are highlighted. The results of Study 2 suggest that the Theory of Planned Behaviour (TPB), Value- Belief-Norm (VBN) Theory and the integrated model, were all found to be very strong in explaining not only ESCCB intentions but also actual behaviour, related to purchase of environmentally friendly cars and conservation of fuel. Results showed that the integrated model based on TPB and VBN was stronger in predicting ESCCB-conservation (49.7 per cent variance) than TPB (46.7 per cent variance) and VBN (26.7 per cent variance). A similar pattern of results was evident for ESCCB-purchases (integrated model: 14.8 per cent variance, TPB: 12.5 per cent variance, VBN: 10.8 per cent variance). However, the predictive power of the three models for actual eco-socially conscious consumer behaviour (ESCCB) had slightly different results. TPB was found stronger to predict actual ESCCB (33.4 per cent variance), followed by the integrated model based on TPB and VBN (31.9 per cent variance) and VBN (15.7 per cent variance). This study contributes to both theoretical and practical aspects linked with ecosocially conscious consumer behaviour related to choice and use of personal cars. These contributions extend the theoretical literature related to eco-social behaviours and provides policy measures for marketing practitioners and public policy makers. The study findings not only provide guidelines for automobile related behaviours but can also be generalised in other areas

Assessing Cross-National Invariance of the Three-Component Model of Organizational Commitment: A Cross-Country Study of University Faculty

Purpose: This study examines affective commitment, normative commitment, and continuance commitment in a cross-national context to identify if the effect of country-specific cultural orientation on organizational commitment of faculty in higher education functions invariably in different countries. Methodology: The work expands on Meyer and Allen's (1991) three-component model of organizational commitment. It includes a review of relevant literature on 10 countries and the results of a survey of university faculty members in 8 of these countries, assessing their institutions' human resources practices and their effect on organizational commitment. Findings: Though certain differences may exist between different countries and cultures with respect to the three-component model of organizational commitment, there is strong evidence of the existence of invariance and thus generalizability of the model across cultures. Research: Cultural studies have focused on differences in organizational commitment at national levels. Further attempts to identify the universality of factors leading to organizational commitment should account for culture in the study of employee-related globalization issues in higher education institutes. Knowledge of cultural impact is also useful from a managerial perspective, and for the design of relevant strategies. Practical Implications: National context plays a major role in shaping the nature of educational institutions. This study brings out the need for a deeper understanding of invariance in organizational commitment (inter alia, through the three-component model). Originality/Value: This study contributes to a better understanding of the relationship between organizational commitment and its various antecedents, including human resources management practices, for faculty in higher education institutes.div_BaM13pub5248pub