Emotional Mechanisms
Increased stress levels
Stress is our body's reaction to external challenges by releasing hormones (eg. adrenaline, cortisol) in order to provide increased powers for body and mind. This worked well in "fight or flight" situations, helping our ancestors to survive - and still works if you are eg. a football player or need to take off to prevent getting mugged.
But most of today's stress situations hardly require any physical action, which would then normalize hormone levels.
Instead, we are left with a (latent) physiological readiness to fight of flight, also called tension or even aggression.
The best way to deal with these unwanted (and unhealthy) hormone levels would be physical activity (namely sports), decent social interaction (try laughing with friends) or sex as a 3-in-1 solution. But we all know how hard it is to "get your ass off the couch" and take action after we "had a tough day". Or maybe you remember catching yourself taking a deep breath - and realizing you should have done that much earlier and much more often (you should!).
If not taken care of, stress induced aggression can make us momentarily lose control, eg. by yelling at our boss or slapping a kid, which both aren't very reasonable actions. Continued stress makes us feel irritable, helpless, aggressive, dissatisfied, lethargic, restless, aggressive, hateful, nervous, unfocused, aggressive... you name it.
Empathy loss
“The biggest deficit that we have in our society and in the world right now is an empathy deficit. We are in great need of people being able to stand in somebody else’s shoes and see the world through their eyes.”
(Barack Obama)
The decrease of real life social interaction combined with increased digital communication constantly erodes our social and empathetic skills.
The distant, impersonal nature of online communication clearly lowers inhibitions for aggressive or disrespectful behavior:
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Facebook: "B*tch!"
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Tinder: "F*ck?"
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Amazon seller feedback: "Thieves!"
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WhatsApp: " " (Ever heard of ghosting? That's terminating communication without notice.)
At the same time, the lack of (emotionally relevant) feedback such as facial expression, body language or tone of voice also corrupts our standards on what is appropriate or not. A straight look in the eye can teach the right lesson, crying and tears might stop an attack - a dislike just won't do the job.
"... the point when one starts to treat someone as an object is when they can become capable of cruelty. We can explain human cruelty with the erosion of empathy."
(Christie Smith, "The Loss of Empathy in Society Today", chcp.edu 2012)