Three researchers from the Universities of Miami and Toronto has just conducted a fake study on crypto owners while trying to hastily link crypto with psychopathy. It was a pure abomination that the paper was even published online, given how many of its claims on the correlation that the researchers drew between crypto ownership and certain social behaviour were biased and untrue. Worst of all, the research committing the greatest vile in research history, which is generalisation. (basing the general behaviour of a small group and using them to generalise the whole community) Because the conclusions they are making is just not true!
Study of a small group of crypto owners
The study was conducted over 2001 respondents, one third of whom owns crypto. Of this population that owns crypto, the researchers claim to find a higher likeliness of dark personality such as psychopathy, narcissism, sadism,and machiavellianism. The researchers also claim that these crypto owners showed a higher tendency for the need for chaos, paranoia, dogmatism, victimhood mentality and psychological reactance. The researchers drew the conclusion that the crypto owners tend to be more individualistic, putting their own success and achievement over communal goals in which everyone benefits but at a smaller scale.
This conclusion is obviously generalisation. The crypto owners in the research are a small sample size of a much bigger community, and they are not representative of the wider community. Thus drawing such conclusions based on such a small sample side is just ridiculous.
Crypto is often associated with negative traits
This isn't the first time crypto owners have been associated with negative personality traits. Some academics have previously called crypto an "addiction" that leads to destructive behaviour, while pointed out that crypto owners tend to be lone wolves, preferring solitude and distancing themselves from others. Because of these stereotypes that are placed on them, there are even rehabilitation centres that were built specially for crypto owners to heal their "sickness".
Although I do agree on the point that dapping in crypto is akin to gambling due to the risk of crypto trading, calling them the same thing is simply ridiculous. This is because gambling is often based on luck, but crypto trading is based on skills, analysis, and a little bit of luck. There is also no concrete evidence that shows that those who dabbling into crypto trading have the same gambling mentality as those who spend their time in the casino. So equating the two is a bit of a stretch.
Is there a relation between fringe media and intellect
The study is taking it up a notch by implying that those who buy crypto are not as intelligent as the rest of the society, describing them as having "lower levels of factors associated with analytical thinking." This claim is based on the proclivity of the crypto-owners in the study to use fringe social media applications. The study also drew the contrast that people who were most active on Facebook were guaranteed to not be crypto owners. The researchers argue that while fringe social media platforms allow for greater freedom of speech, it also creates a breeding room for conspiracy theories, hatred, racism and anti-government stance.
Again, there is no correlation between fringe social media and a person's intellect. I feel that it is also untrue to say that fake news, conspiracy theories and racism only occur in fringe media. If you don't believe me, you can check your own Facebook account or Instagram account and you will get what I mean.
Crypto fans are coming forward to rebuttal the study
Since the publishing of this research paper, cryptocurrency fans have come forward to criticizing the study, calling it bias and led by a narrative.Some also pointed out the study's association with the National Science foundation, which is an anti crypto establishment led by Ex-President Biden. All in all, I think we should take this study with a grain of salt and just read it as an entertainment piece rather than something factual, because we obviously know that it is not.