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I noticed an increase in my reputation today further to an upvote to one of my answers. Surprisingly, the increase is 6 units, not 10. I'm aware of the ways one can gain/lose reputation (also saw this closely related question), and based on my recent actions I guess I got 2 down votes to some of my questions/answers. I don't mind the "loss" of these 4 units, but I would like to see where/how I lost them to potentially address issues in my questions/answers.

However, I can't find a trace of the 4-unit loss when checking the \reputation tab on my profile page. The only item I see for today is the upvote. I also noticed similar inexplicable small reputations losses 2-3 times last summer.

How could I find out where I lost reputation? Is there a bug? Would it make sense to add a "type" display filter for reputation (alongside the existing "post", "time", "graph" displays) that would allow to see reputation changes grouped by categories, possibly corresponding to the cases listed here.

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  • $\begingroup$ Details in terms of +10, -4 or whatever tend to be visible briefly (for the order of a day?). I can't say it's not a bug, but I'd bet this is no more and no less than the occasional downvote. $\endgroup$
    – Nick Cox
    Commented Apr 24, 2014 at 17:12
  • $\begingroup$ @Nick I believe you can recover the entire history of such details by clicking on individual bars of the reputation graph available through your user profile. $\endgroup$
    – whuber Mod
    Commented Apr 24, 2014 at 17:32

2 Answers 2

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When (certain low-rep) users are removed from the site, all their votes are reversed. (This is a matter of ongoing debate, so please do not discuss it here: visit the main meta site.) The SE team also occasionally reverses votes it deems were applied in bad faith.

Your reputation summary, available by linking through your user profile, shows that you lost two +2 votes from the removal of a user. (I am not sure whether these specific entries are visible to just the mods, to you and the mods, or to all viewers.)

There is almost never anything to be learned about your site interaction when reputation changes in this manner. The (rare) exception is when votes were reversed due to some gaming of the system, such as when rings of voters are detected. (It is possible to be the unwitting target of such votes, so there are no negative implications for you.)

Many details of the voting system are usually not revealed, to protect the innocent and the guilty as well as to make it harder for people to misuse their votes. Even the information available to moderators is limited.

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    $\begingroup$ I'd forgotten about user removal. Occasionally I've noticed a small flurry of downvotes: instead of thinking "Someone is annoyed with me!" I should think "A fan has died". $\endgroup$
    – Nick Cox
    Commented Apr 24, 2014 at 17:48
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    $\begingroup$ The two entires you mentioned are not visible to me, I guess only mods can see them. Good to know that it's not a bug but just unrevealed items. Do you have any thoughts on the suggested additional display option (reputation changes by category)? $\endgroup$
    – QuantIbex
    Commented Apr 24, 2014 at 18:29
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    $\begingroup$ Rectification: the two entries are visible when I select "show removed posts" (located at the very bottom of the page) as suggested by @Nick Stauner. $\endgroup$
    – QuantIbex
    Commented Apr 25, 2014 at 12:49
  • $\begingroup$ You used the term "low-rep", but all types of users (low, average and high) have their casted votes removed, except "very high-rep" users (see reference on Jeremy Banks answer, here). $\endgroup$
    – Andre Silva
    Commented May 2, 2014 at 14:11
  • $\begingroup$ It sounds like you're saying the same thing I did, Andre. I didn't want to get into the details of how the system and the SE team chooses whether to reverse votes--it's not especially relevant to this thread. $\endgroup$
    – whuber Mod
    Commented May 2, 2014 at 14:48
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For future reference, we can rule out downvotes, because those show up in your reputation score history ordinarily. The -4 you noticed does not appear when I look at your rep score history, but I can usually see a -2 on my own history when a user or post was removed. This is a loss of +2 rep that you originally gained by suggesting an accepted edit. It hurts much more when a user gets removed who had upvoted several of your posts, or when serial upvoting is automatically reversed: then you lose +5 per question upvote and +10 per answer upvote! See the relevant meta-controversy:
"Don't throw away all votes when a user is deleted." (The SO user formerly known as Yoda once lost 1685 rep!)

My guess as to why you're unable to see the two entries on your own rep score history is that you haven't checked the box on the bottom left that shows these (see inside obligatory freehand circle):

Stack Exchange loves some freehand circles...

BTW, losses also occur when a post gets migrated, but you gain your vote reputation back at the destination site. Sadly, the same is not true of suggested edit reputation gains (else I'd be rich on SO). Then again, one meta-post (Points for answer migrated with question, points for edit not migrated) suggests something I can't explain: he kept his suggested edit gains on Server Fault post-migration. This has not been the case for my suggested edits to questions asked here on CV that got migrated.

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