Fighting Toxicity Through Positive and Preventative Intervention

Abstract

Toxicity is a constantly present issue in online games. Players of these games experience harassment, flaming, and hate speech. Intervention systems have been used in practice and studied in academia, but have not yet succeeded in controlling toxic behavior. Traditionally, intervention systems rely on negative reinforcement like sanctioning to fight undesired behavior, which is often done after an incident has already occurred. As part of my submission to the doctoral consortium, I will outline my research direction and present my current findings on intervention systems and future plans to create and evaluate preventative intervention systems.