Toxic Content and User Engagement on Social Media: Evidence from a Field Experiment

741/2025 George Beknazar-Yuzbashev, Rafael Jiménez-Durán, Jesse McCrosky, Mateusz Stalinski

Most social media users have encountered toxic content online, but there is scarce evidence of how it impacts engagement. In a pre-registered browser extension field experiment, we randomly hid toxic content on Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube for six weeks. Lowering exposure to toxicity (i) reduced time spent, content consumption, advertising impressions; (ii) reduced the toxicity of user-generated content; and (iii) led to substitution to non treated social media platforms. A complementary survey experiment shows toxic content triggers users’ curiosity, increasing engagement. Taken together, our results suggest that platforms face a trade-off between curbing toxicity and increasing engagement. (Revised June 2026)

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