Aggressive online behavior is becoming more common among teenagers in Russia and abroad. Cyberbullying is one of the most novel and dangerous risks facing modern teenagers in terms of consequences. The article analyzes the experience of Russian teenagers meeting episodes of bullying on the Internet as an aggressor, victim or witness: the frequency of such meetings, emotional and behavioral reactions to them, age and gender differences, and moral assessment. This study makes it possible to develop measures for the suppression and prevention of cyberbullying as part of psychological and pedagogical work, based on empirical data collected on a Russian-language sample, which is extremely important for the effectiveness of the programs being developed. The prospects of applied work in the field of adolescent Internet security, in particular, raising their awareness and developing a responsible user position, as well as psychotherapeutic work with adolescents in the context of the problem of cyberbullying, are discussed.
Source: Digital magazine “Psychology and Law” 2019, Volume 9, No. 2. P. 276-295.
The Internet has become a part of people's daily lives, providing space for almost all human activities to continue. While some time ago it was possible to clearly divide the environment into “virtual” and “real”, now this distinction does not seem appropriate: smartphones, public information systems, online educational platforms, negotiations using voice and video Internet services, online stores, etc. make it possible to constantly combine online and offline activities in everyday activities. As early as 2013, it was noted that 89% of Russian teenagers used the Internet daily, 37% of teenagers spent 3 to 8 hours on the Internet on weekdays, and 47% on weekends chatting via chat rooms, messengers and social networks [5]. According to a joint study by Google and Ipsos1 (2017), 65% of Russians use the Internet every day, and 98% of people in the 13-24 age group use the Internet daily, with the most visited resources being social media pages and applications, games and online games, as well as video content posted on the Internet. According to their report, “27% of Russians aged 13-24 spend more than 5 hours a day on social media, and a quarter of them check for updates every 30 minutes.” Teens connect to the Internet using mobile devices to do homework, stay in touch with friends, play, read celebrity news, share their creativity, and more.
1 Think with Google. A New Generation of Internet Users: A Study of Russian Youth's Online Habits and Behavior.
A 24-hour online presence makes teenagers vulnerable to online victimization. One of the most serious online psychological risks is meeting with cyberbullying, which is defined as targeted and repeated harm caused by computers, smartphones and other electronic devices. These are usually situations where teenagers use modern technology to scare, harass, humiliate or otherwise disturb their peers by sending hurtful letters, spreading gossip, creating web pages, videos and social media profiles to make fun of, taking photos where people expect privacy and sharing them online, shooting and uploading videos without permission., using anonymous applications to humiliate and destroy players' achievements in gaming networks, etc. [12, 13]. If adults do nothing when teenagers do something like this, teenagers feel unpunished and don't stop themselves, knowing that they are difficult to identify and difficult to impose sanctions on them.
When discussing the similarities between bullying and cyberbullying, we should first of all note the systematic and purposeful nature of aggressive behavior, the inequality between the stalker and the victim (the aggressor may be anonymous, there may be many of them), as well as the structural combination of “aggressor-victim-witnesses” [14]. However, compared to “traditional” bullying, cyberbullying has a number of significant differences.
It may be illusory, but anonymity increases the aggressor's self-confidence and increases the helplessness of the victim, because, among other worries, he is captured by the question of who is his stalker. Anonymity is related to anonymity the phenomenon of disinhibition et moral detachment: People anonymously allow themselves to be more aggressive than in situations where they know they have been identified. As a rule, face-to-face bullying has a line defined by its initiator (for example, “bringing you to tears”), and in the absence of knowledge about the opponent's emotional state, this line is inaccessible: it is more difficult for the aggressor to stop himself when the person he is pursuing seems to be an abstraction, which increases the brutality of behavior.
Unlike localized bullying, for example, in a schoolyard, “traditional” bullying can be round-the-clock, and you can't avoid it by changing the route. The ability to re-read/watch degrading or threatening material, as well as users spontaneously re-posting old content, can help retraumatize someone who is a victim.
At the post on the Internet unlimited witnesses. The number of views, “likes”, and comments indicates scale, but for a victim, it is often unknown whether, for example, a humiliating video or published correspondence was seen by his close friends or parents. The stress of the unknown and the shame make it even more unbearable to worry about cyberbullying.
Offline independence and responsibility skills are important and can be partly extrapolated to the Internet, but it contains specific risks that children should, if possible, be warned about and taught how to respond constructively in the event of unsafe situations. It is not uncommon for children to consider the Internet a safe space until they are faced with situations that were not warned about. At the same time, online communication is so important for them that they prefer to keep unsafe situations a secret so as not to provoke parents to restrict access to gadgets or social networks, because such a restriction for teenagers is tantamount to social isolation.
Cyberbullying occurs mainly where teenagers gather online. In the early 2000s, many children spent time in chat rooms, which then became the most common place for harassment; young people are now actively involved in various social media (Instagram, Snapchat, Twitter, etc.) and video sharing sites (for example, YouTube), and accordingly, the number of cyberbullying episodes on these platforms is increasing; cyberbullying develops similarly in augmented and virtual reality games, on social game sites, and in a variety of rapidly changing popular applications [13].
The consequences of cyberbullying for someone who has been persecuted include many negative experiences — sadness, anger, frustration, depression, shame, embarrassment, fear; there is a connection between cyberbullying and the consequences of depression, self-harm, suicidal tendencies and attempts, poor academic performance and learning difficulties, aggressive behavior, difficulties in communicating with peers, and self-decline assessments, family problems, violence at school, unsafe sex and substance use [21; 11; 20; 16; 10; 4]. At the same time, studies of online bullying show that the negative consequences of bullying are faced not only by those who have been victims of bullying, but also by those who have been aggressors or witnesses. By analogy, we can assume that systematic observation of cyberbullying can lead to an increase in anxiety, a decrease in empathy, an unsafe environment and users' own helplessness, and the active use of cyberbullying as a behavioral strategy can also lead to a decrease in empathy, avoidance of responsibility, a tendency to transform any relationship into inequality, a preference for aggressive and socially unacceptable tactics for resolving difficult situations and coping with their own anxiety. and other negative experiences [1].
The bulk of cyberbullying research is devoted to assessing its prevalence, gender differences in comparison with “traditional” bullying, and the consequences of online victimization [9]. Due to the novelty of the phenomenon, the lack of its conventional understanding and the variety of manifestations [2] studies use a variety of inconsistent definitions, which leads to inconsistencies in the data. Sometimes individual episodes (for example, offensive speech in a chat room) are considered cyberbullying, although this may not mean systematic targeted harassment of someone. A number of researchers suggest considering the phenomenon of cyberbullying through the “Stalker-victim-observer” triad by analogy with ordinary bullying, identifying the leading role of observers, the largest group, in escalating or stopping cyberbullying, although this role has not yet been adequately studied [15; 8; 6].
When American students were asked about situations where someone “repeatedly makes fun of another person online, repeatedly annoys another person via email or text messages, or posts something online about another person that they don't like,” about 28% reported that they had been the victim of cyberbullying and about 16% admitted that they had studied themselves
cyberbullying. In a study involving 5,700 middle and high school students, 33.8% of respondents reported having been cyberbullied, and 16.9% this happened within the past 30 days. 11.5% of respondents admitted that they had been cyberbullying themselves, and 6% did so in the past 30 days [13]. In 2011, among US teenagers who used social media, 12% reported that they had often experienced someone being rude or cruel to another person on social media, 29% — sometimes and 47% — once [15].
According to a 2012 Microsoft study in Russia, 49% of children aged 8—17 reported being bullied or other forms of abuse online that had negative consequences (compared to the average for the other 25 countries surveyed was 37%), including 27% faced rude and unfriendly treatment, 20% were mocked or teased, 24%
have been called. 67% of children reported that they know about online bullying, 34% are concerned about this topic [17]. A 2013 report by the Russian Internet Development Foundation states that almost every third teenager faced communication risks during the year of using the Internet, including cyberbullying; every fourth teenager indicated that they had experienced insults, humiliation or harassment online [5]. According to UNESCO, 9 to 21% of children and adolescents from industrialized countries are cyberbullied, and girls are more likely to be at risk than boys [19]. The WHO report states that in the Russian Federation, among 11-year-olds, 11% of girls and 8% of boys were cyberbullied at least 2-3 times a month; among 13-year-olds — 6% and 8%, among 15-year-olds — 5% and 7%, respectively) [4].
It should be noted that cyberbullying is not only common among teenagers. For example, an American study in 2017 showed that 41% of Americans were harassed online in any form during the year, and this share reached 67% among 18-29 year-olds [7]. However, teenagers are particularly vulnerable to cyberbullying because, due to their age, they are not inclined to seek support from their parents, are very sensitive to shame, and are not experienced enough to recognize dangerous situations in time. Cyberbullying often becomes known only after the tragic consequences and wide publicity of a particular case. Psychological help cases show that teenagers are more likely than adult users to be victims of blackmail on social networks. Cyberbullying is usually hardly noticeable to an outside observer, as it often occurs in private groups and chat rooms. All this encourages us to pay more attention to the user experience of children and adolescents both as a source of data for research and as a substrate for developing reflection and forming the ethical position of a responsible Internet user, which works to improve the security of the Russian-language Internet in general and reduce the risk of cyberbullying in particular.
The aim of this study was to study the experience of adolescents meeting with episodes of cyberbullying and to obtain an empirical basis for the subsequent development of programs to prevent and stop cyberbullying among adolescents.
The study was conducted in 5 general education institutions in Moscow with the participation of students in grades 5-9 aged 11 to 16 years (Mage= 13.3 years). A total of 294 people (46.0% boys) took part in the study. The confidence interval is ± 5.7% at p= 95%.
The survey used a modification developed by S. Hinduja and J. Patchin's “Cyberbullying and Online Aggression Survey Instrument” questionnaire [11] (Hinduja, Patchin, 2015), which included a working definition of cyberbullying for teenagers (“Cyberbullying is a situation where someone regularly stalks, insults or taunts someone online or using mobile phones and other electronic devices”) and 10 questions aimed at identifying respondents' experience with episodes of cyberbullying as witnesses, victims and aggressors, as well as types of emotional and behavioral responses to these situations. In addition, teenagers were asked to express their own attitude towards cyberbullying, explain its causes, and describe a memorable situation related to someone's online violent behavior. Only 56 such descriptions were obtained from a sample of 294 people, of which more than 70%, according to the survey, have relevant experience. The reasons why teenagers ignored the request to describe (anonymously) these situations may include both the negative experiences associated with the event (shame, guilt, fear, etc.) and the fact that modern teenagers generally prefer to avoid detailed written answers when filling out questionnaires.
The results show that meetings with cyberbullying situations are part of the daily experience of modern Moscow schoolchildren: only 28.4% of respondents reported that they have not encountered this phenomenon (Figure 1). The presented distribution may indicate the existence of two groups of teenagers, one of whom hardly experiences cyberbullying (perhaps they use little social media, play little multiplayer games, or, by our definition, did not recognize familiar forms of cyberbullying, such as griffering)2), and for the second group, cyberbullying is a noticeable phenomenon, which indicates either a different nature of their Internet activity or their greater reflexivity.
2 Griffer is a player who causes moral or material damage to other players in multiplayer games — destroying buildings, killing characters, etc. — for his own pleasure and for degrading the gaming environment.
[[1]]
Figure 1. The frequency of meetings with cyberbullying situations
According to teenagers, rude or offensive comments are the most common form of cyberbullying (Figure 2). It should be noted that not all of them may relate to systematic bullying: these may also be spontaneous manifestations of aggressiveness that are not aimed at consistently causing harm to a specific addressee. The next most common forms of cyberbullying are posting rude and offensive pictures (usually on social media) and spreading rumors and gossip. The least commonly proposed options were SMS messages and web pages specially designed to insult and insult, which reflects the general trend: SMS messages are replaced by correspondence in messengers, and social media aggregators are used instead of web pages.
[[2]]
Figure 2. Experience with various forms of cyberbullying (% of all respondents)
Social networks have the leading place in terms of the frequency of cyberbullying — 40.3% (Figure 3), which is not surprising, given their prevalence and importance for adolescents. Other widely used platforms for cyberbullying are YouTube video hosting (14.6%), chat rooms (13.6%), and online multiplayer games (12.4%), which corresponds to foreign studies.
[[3]]
Figure 3. Sites where teenagers experience cyberbullying (% of all respondents)
Describing the outcomes of specific episodes of cyberbullying, respondents in almost half of the cases indicated that the problem was resolved successfully thanks to the participants' actions; in about a third of cases, the situation calmed down by itself, and about a quarter of the situations were not completed, and aggressive actions continued (Figure 4).
[[4]]
Figure 4. The outcomes of the described situation (N=56)
About 70% of respondents reported that they have experience as a victim of cyberbullying, with 71.64% of boys and 65.61% of girls, possibly due to the fact that, in general, male behavior in Russian culture is more competitive and aggressive. The share of respondents with experience as a victim of cyberbullying is approximately the same in each age group (Figure 5).
[[5]]
Figure 5. Distribution of cyberbullying victim experience among respondents by age (% of all respondents)
As victims, respondents most often encountered rude and offensive comments (29.4%), rumors and gossip (19.8%), and direct insults and threats (16.7%). Young men are slightly more likely to receive direct threats and insults, post offensive pictures and videos, specially created web pages, and girls are slightly more likely to receive rude comments and rumors; differences in these parameters exceed the confidence interval (5.7%) (Figure 6).
[[6]]
Figure 6. Experience with different forms of cyberbullying: gender differences (% of all boys and girls)
Most often, in response to cyberbullying, teenagers wanted to prove their point (23.1%) and find the offender and take revenge on him (22.7%); in other cases, according to their self-reports, there were various negative experiences, ranging from confusion to fear and self-loathing (Figure 7).
[[7]]
Figure 7. Emotional response to cyberbullying as a victim
Typical victim responses include retaliatory insults (26.3%), ignoring (26.3%), exclusion from communication — “ban” (22.8%). In 10% of cases, the victim tries to transfer the showdown into real interaction (Figure 8).
[[8]]
Figure 8. Typical responses to online aggression (the result of free description content analysis)
The most important topic in the context of cyberbullying is who to share it with. As expected, teenagers tend to seek support from their peers; “... at no other stage in human life is the role of a peer team as great as in youth” [3]. Popularity among peers and getting their approval are the most important motives and resources for youthful behavior, and from this point of view, an important area of preventive activity on the part of teachers and parents should be to teach and develop attitudes to pay attention to and help each other in situations of cyberbullying, especially in light of the decrease in attention to support from parents. As Figure 9 shows, girls who are victims of cyberbullying primarily reach out to emotionally close people — friends and parents, while young men are willing to discuss this situation with people involved in the interaction (not necessarily emotionally close ones).
[[9]]
Figure 9. Recipients of cyberbullying victims seeking help (% of all boys and girls who reported the experience of a cyberbullying victim)
44.3% of respondents reported the experience of cyberbullying in relation to other users, while this share is higher among boys (53.7%) than among girls (36.3%). According to the victims' responses, the aggressors indicated that the most common types of pressure are rude and offensive comments, the spread of rumors and gossip, direct insults and threats. As can be seen from Figure 10, there are significant gender differences in bullying methods (the differences are significant according to the chi-square criterion = 16.5 df=8; p=0.036): girls are more likely to use offensive comments, as well as rumors and gossip; it can be assumed that they may be more attentive to such actions at home and others, while boys are more tolerant of such behavior and are more likely to not notice it they. Young men are more likely to deliberately insult and threaten, impersonate someone else, create offensive images and videos, and create a special web page — that is, either direct (threat) or technically indirect forms of aggression.
[[10]]
Figure 10. The use of various forms of cyberbullying (% of all boys and girls who reported the experience of cyberbullying to other users)
When describing their feelings after being harassed by someone online, only about 15% of respondents were satisfied and 26% felt they were right (Figure 11). For most respondents, cyberbullying turned out to be an unsuccessful tool for expressing aggression: anger remained, and shame was added to it; only 15% were satisfied. If this configuration of answers reflects the actual experiences of adolescents, this makes it possible to identify an important resource for preventing bullying, since it is advisable to use personal experience of cyberbullying's ineffectiveness as a means of self-regulation (reducing frustration) and as a way to change interpersonal relationships during reflective training exercises.
[[11]]
Figure 11. Adolescents' experiences as aggressors 39% of all respondents report that they have been both victims and aggressors in cyberbullying situations (Figure 12); the relationship between the experience of a victim and an aggressor is statistically significant (chi-square test, p≤0.001).
[[12]]
Figure 12. Respondents' experience of cyberbullying in different roles (% of all respondents)
Online interaction is often related to real life events: respondents report that in 24.1% of cases, an aggressive episode on the Internet went to the “real” space, and in 17.2% of responses, on the contrary, the situation of face-to-face interaction moved to the Internet. Apparently, the line between virtual and real life is gradually blurring, and we would venture to assume that this trend will only intensify.
One of the most important tasks of adolescence is the development of a system of moral assessments and the formation of moral guidelines. In this regard, it is interesting that more than a quarter of respondents (28.9%) consider cyberbullying to be an ordinary situation that does not require special attention. However, the age dynamics of attitudes towards cyberbullying, which is clearly reflected in Figure 13, are especially important. The share of teenagers who consider cyberbullying to be the norm increases from 8.7% in fifth grades to 37.5% in ninth grades.
Apparently, addiction to cyberbullying coincides with a decrease in the role of external sources of moral assessments (parents, teachers) and an increase in the importance of peers. This alarming indicator indicates, firstly, the need to develop preventive measures with older adolescents in the form of working with group opinions, social perceptions, reflection and acceptance of their own group norms, and, secondly, the need to start working to prevent cyberbullying with younger teenagers or earlier.
[[13]]
Figure 13. Age dynamics of moral assessments of cyberbullying (N=75)
Thus, the study shows that the majority of adolescents surveyed have experienced cyberbullying, and often repeatedly. They are most often found with negative offensive comments, pictures and the spread of rumors and gossip. It is important that a large proportion of children engaged in cyberbullying also have experience as victims of such aggression by users. Judging by the answers, teenagers' own experience suggests that cyberbullying is ineffective in terms of expressing anger; it is an important resource for preventive work. The distinct dynamics of increasing tolerance to cyberbullying with age indicates the development of an addiction to the aggressiveness of the environment and the need to take preventive measures for younger adolescents and elementary school students, i.e. before such desensitization occurs. Also, since social networks are the main place for cyberbullying, preventive or supportive work to prevent cyberbullying can be carried out at these sites.
When talking about psychotherapeutic work with cyberbullying among adolescents, it is important to emphasize two aspects. First, we need to work to resolve tensions in the classroom, similar to working with face-to-face school bullying, which should include not only aggressors and victims, but also the entire classroom, and the support of the educational institution's administration is extremely important. Secondly, we need individual work with a child who is a victim of cyberbullying, who is close to working with a person who has faced painful and traumatic experiences outside the Internet. We assume that after the shock stage, personality adaptation mechanisms are activated; if they do not work or they are not enough, the psychotherapist deals with the consequences of the trauma and the need to work to support the client's negative experiences (fear, pain, humiliation, destruction of self-esteem, loss of security), provide support and gradually restore the client's confidence in the world.
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Source: Digital magazine “Psychology and Law” 2019, Volume 9, No. 2. P. 276-295.
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