The Internet Hijacked Your Dopamine, Your Rage, and Your Soul

About this episode

This episode explores how the internet manipulates our brains, affecting our emotions and behaviors.

YOUR BRAIN IS NOT YOURS ANYMOREYou scrolled today. You know you did. Before you even got out of bed, you were 47 posts deep into someone else's drama — and you know more about a TikTok beef between two strangers than you know about your own blood pressure.Here's what nobody's telling you: that's not a personality flaw. That's a calculated, peer-reviewed, neuroscience-backed exploit running on your brain in real time.In this episode, I'm reverse-engineering all of it.WHAT WE COVER:→ The "Dark Tetrad" — the 4 personality traits that define the chronic troll (Buckels et al., 2014, University of Manitoba)→ Why YOU might already be a troll and not know it — Stanford & Cornell research on situational trolling (Cheng et al., 2017)→ The Online Disinhibition Effect — why the internet strips your psychological brakes (Suler, 2004)→ Why anger spreads faster than joy online — and what that does to society (Fan et al., 2014, Beihang University, 70M+ posts analyzed)→ The Amygdala Hijack — how rage bait makes you physically unable to scroll past→ Moral outrage as a dopamine loop — and why it's making you lazy (Crockett, 2017, Yale)→ Slacktivism: why online rage REPLACES real…

People in this episode

Host: Mike

Topics covered

• internet psychology
• dopamine
• trolling behavior
• online disinhibition
• social media impact
• moral outrage
• attention span

Keywords

• dopamine
• trolling
• online behavior
• social media
• attention span
• moral outrage
• disinhibition

Mentioned in this episode

Organizations: University of Manitoba, Stanford, Cornell, Beihang University, Yale, UCLA

More episodes of Planting Thoughts

• One in Four Young Adults Haven't Had Sex in Years—Here's Why · June 12, 2026 · 38 min
• Trauma Bonding Isn't Weakness—It's a Nervous System Hack · June 6, 2026 · 27 min
• Game Theory, Psychology, and the Architecture of Your Manufactured Choices · May 17, 2026 · 36 min
• The Male Loneliness Epidemic: Why Young Men Are Checking Out · April 29, 2026 · 30 min
• How to Win Arguments Without Losing Your Mind The Science of Persuasion, Power, and Debate · April 10, 2026 · 26 min
• THE EGO-PARASITE: WHY NARCISSISTS EXIST · April 7, 2026 · 24 min