1. No category

Bully and Cyberbullying: Challenges and
Opportunities in Research
Peter K Smith
Goldsmiths College, University of London,
England
[email protected]
Cordoba, February 2011
Copyright, 1996 © Dale Carnegie & Associates, Inc.
Plan of talk
 What is bullying and
cyberbullying?
 4 waves of bullying
research programme
 Some research findings so
far in cyberbullying
 Interventions/guidance
 Definitional and historical
challenges
 Some opportunities for the
future
DEFINITION:
What do we mean by ‘bullying’?
 Aggression as intent to cause harm
 A widely accepted definition is that ‘bullying’
refers to repeated aggressive acts against someone
who cannot easily defend themselves (Olweus,
1999)
 A ‘systematic abuse of power’ (Smith & Sharp
1994)
 Can take various forms: physical, verbal,
relational, indirect; and now, cyber.
What is cyberbullying?
Victimisation using electronic forms
‘The use of ICT to support deliberate, repeated
and hostile behavior by an individual or group
that is intended to harm others’ (Belsey, 2004)
‘An aggressive, intentional act carried out by a
group or individual, using electronic forms of
contact, repeatedly and over time against a
victim who cannot easily defend him or
herself’ (Smith et al., 2008)
Four waves of studies in ‘bullying’
research program: (1) 1970s-1988
Origins in school-based bullying: Olweus‘Forskning om
skolmobbning’ (1973), translated (1978) as ‘Aggression in Schools:
Bullies and Whipping Boys’. Develops self-report questionnaire;
school-based intervention program 1983-1985. Definition of
bullying in terms of physical and verbal behaviours. Japan –
studies on ijime in 1980s.
Four waves of studies in ‘bullying’
research program: (2) 1989-mid 1990s
Establishing a research program
Surveys in other countries
beyond Scandinavia; meetings
between western and Japanese
researchers
Peer nominations methodology
developed
Interventions in other countries –
England, Canada, Belgium
Inclusion of ‘indirect’
aggression/bullying – Olweus
definition expanded
Bullying in other contexts e.g.
workplace, prisons
Four waves of studies in ‘bullying’
research program: (3) mid 1990s - 2004
Now an established international research program.
Participant roles developed by Salmivalli
Surveys, interventions in many countries, e.g.
Smith, Morita,Junger-Tas, Olweus, Catalano & Slee
(1999) (eds.), The Nature of School Bullying: A CrossNational Perspective.[21 country reports]
Rigby (2002) New Perspectives on Bullying.
Espelage & Swearer (eds) (2004) Bullying in American
Schools.
McGrath & Noble (eds) (2006) Bullying solutions:
Evidence-based approaches to bullying in Australian
schools.
The area becomes a significant contributor to international
conferences.
Increase over time in studies on bullying
– from Farrington & Ttofi (2008)
ACHIEVEMENTS of the traditional
school bullying program
 Basic data on incidence, age, gender, where happens,
who told, coping strategies
 Developing participant roles
 Recognising possible adaptive nature of much
bullying (for individual; bullying and theory of mind)
 Collaboration with school personnel, government
departments
 Interventions have some success, up to around 50%
reduction in victimisation rates.
LIMITATIONS of the traditional school
bullying program (1)
Disciplinarity narrowness - mainly by
developmental/educational psychologists
so focus on individuals (even ‘participant roles’
taken as individual characteristics, until recently)
relatively little on school and class level factors
little on how group affects individual
Generally very quantitative, questionnaire
based – few qualitative studies
LIMITATIONS of the traditional school
bullying program (2)
 School bullying research programme relatively isolated
developmentally and contextually
 Developmentally – little links to bullying in adults
 Contextually – little linkage from school to community, or
home (‘abuse’)
 Relatively little use of theory
 Olweus – opportunity costs and benefits
 Dodge, Crick – social skills deficits [largely disproved for
bullies]
 Schuster – scapegoat theory for victims - disproved
 Pellegrini; Salmivalli and others – bullying as a strategy to
gain peer group status.
Four waves of studies in ‘bullying’
research program: (4) 2004 Cyberbullying: while origins may
be before 2000, most press
reports and awareness of the issue
date from this century, starting
with text message bullying [but
now, many forms].
Text message
bullying: Wendy
sends nasty text
messages to Linda
every break time
Development of cyberbullying research
‘Academic’ publications mainly from last 5 years.
 Willard, N.E. (2006). Cyberbullying and cyberthreats. Eugene, Oregon:
Center for Safe and Responsible Internet Use.
 Special issue of J Adolescent Health, Dec 2007
 Shariff, S. (2008). Cyber-bullying: Issues and solutions for the school, the
classroom and the home. New York: Routledge.
 Kowalski, R.M., Limber, S.P., & Agatston, P.W. (2008). Cyber Bullying:
Bullying in the digital age. Malden, MA : Blackwell.
 Hinduja, S. & Patchin, J. (2008). Bullying beyond the schoolyard:
Preventing and responding to cyberbullying. Thousand Oaks, CA: Corwin
Press.
 Special issue of J of Psychology, Nov 2009
 Mora-Merchan, J. & Jäger, T.(eds) (in press, 2010). Cyberbullying: A
cross-national comparison. Landau: Verlag Emprische Padagogik.
 Li, Q., Cross, D. & Smith, P.K. (in press, 2011). Bullying goes to the global
village: Research on cyberbullying from an international perspective.
Wiley-Blackwell.
 Special issue of European J Developmental Psychology, in progress.
Cyberbullying: differences from
traditional bullying







It depends on some degree of technological expertise
There are rapid historical changes in the nature of cyberbullying due to
technological change
It is primarily indirect rather than ‘face-to-face’
The perpetrator has some anonymity (e.g. through using online
pseudonyms)
The variety of bystander roles in cyberbullying is more complex than in
most traditional bullying
It is difficult to escape from cyberbullying – there is ‘no place to hide’.
The victim may be sent messages to their mobile or computer, or access
nasty website comments, wherever they are.
Cyberbullying can reach particularly
large audiences compared with the
normally small groups that traditional
bullying reaches; for example mobile
phone networks, or nasty comments
posted on a website.
Cyberbullying: Some research findings
so far
Prevalence; age, gender; roles; impact/
emotions/adjustment, self-esteem.
Age data from 1464 representative sample of internet users in
Czech Republic (Ševčíková & Šmahel, 2009) (percentages)
AGE
years
12-15
Not
Involved
Only
Target
Only
Aggressor
Target +
Aggressor
82.1
7.6
1.8
8.5
16-19
78.7
14.1
1.2
6.0
20-26
81.3
14.1
0.9
3.7
27-35
89.3
6.8
1.0
2.9
36-49
88.9
5.5
0
5.5
50-88
85.0
12.9
0
2.1
NORWAY [Olweus]
% GIRLS BEING BULLIED ELECTRONICALLY vs GLOBALLY, 2-3
TIMES/MONTH (n= 2000)
12
9
6
3
0
Electr.
Global
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
1.6
8.8
2.1
9.7
1.5
8.4
1.4
5.9
3.4
5.6
3
5.4
1
0.5
GIRLS: Average electronically = 2,0%
Average globally = 6,8%
OLWEUS GROUP
AGAINST BULLYING
NORWAY [Olweus]
% BOYS BEING BULLIED ELECTRONICALLY vs GLOBALLY, 2-3
TIMES/MONTH (n= 2000)
20
15
10
5
0
Electr.
Global
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
6
14.5
2.9
14.4
1.4
8.1
2.9
10.5
3.7
8.9
6.5
12.8
1.5
5.5
OLWEUS GROUP
AGAINST BULLYING
BOYS: Average electronically: 3,6%
Average globally: 11,0 %
Gender differences: Inconsistent findings from
different studies. Generally  Cyber-bullies: boys more, or no difference, or girls more.
 Cyber-victims: girls more, or no difference, or boys more.
These inconsistencies may reflect variations by
type of cyberbullying [e.g. Kapatzia & Syngollitou, 2007, in
Greece, more boys involved in mobile phone bullying, but more
girls involved in internet bullying]
rapid changes in patterns of technology use and abuse.
As in traditional indirect bullying, girls may be relatively
more interested in cyber than face-to-face bullying
(reputation damage rather than strength); girls may be
more confident in computer use, interested in social
networking (e.g. in U.K., Computers for Schools survey, 2008;
National Family Week survey, 2010 – technology a big influence in
life for 41% girls, 17% boys).
Bystander roles in cyberbullying:
England (mobile)
Number of participants who ‘had seen’ bullying by mobile
and ticked any of three participant roles in three situations
(with victim; with bully; alone).
500
250
400
200
300
150
200
100
100
50
0
defender
outsider
reinforcer
0
defender
mobile with victim
Numbers of pupils
defender
outsider
reinforcer
Mobile with
victim
421
222
87
Mobile with
bully
213
212
82
Mobile alone
195
262
89
250
200
150
100
50
0
outsider
mobile alone
reinforcer
mobile with bully
300
defender
outsider
reinforcer
Bystander roles in cyberbullying:
England (Internet)
Number of participants who ‘had seen’ bullying on the internet
and ticked any of three participant roles in three situations
(with victim; with bully; alone).
400
150
300
100
200
50
100
0
defender
outsider
reinforcer
0
defender
internet with victim
150
100
50
0
outsider
internet alone
reinforcer
internet with bully
200
defender
outsider
reinforcer
Numbers of
pupils
Defender
Outsider
Reinforcer
Internet with
victim
343
154
65
Internet with
bully
146
128
65
Internet alone
158
175
62
Incidence of being a cybervictim is
greater out of school than in school
(Smith et al, 2008: UK pupils aged 11-16 years)
Have you ever been:
IN
OUT
BOTH
Bullied (not cyber) 37%
5%
12%
Cyberbullied
3%
11%
3%
Perceived impact of cyberbullying (cf.
traditional bullying): Smith et al. 2008
Phone
call
Text
Email
Message
IMP -0.43 -0.20 0.02
ACT
Picture/ Instant
Messaging
video
clip
Chatroom
Website
+0.53 -0.07 -0.02 -0.09
More, same or less harmful than traditional bullying?
Typical comments for Picture/video clip bullying
More
Same
Less
‘Because it can be sent around to people you don’t
know and they will insult you because of it’
‘Because it is more humiliating, the videos are
shown to others’
‘Because loads of people see it’
‘Because the person is still being bullied and still
feeling sad’
‘They have not physically hit you’
‘Because I believe physical bullying hurts the most’
More, same or less harmful than traditional bullying?
Typical comments for Chatroom bullying
More
‘You can never be sure who it really is’
‘You could accidentally give private details’
Same
‘They are still being mean and saying horrible
things’
Less
‘‘Because you can just not go in the chatroom
anymore’
‘Because it can only be threats’
‘Because they don’t know where you live or your
contact number’
Emotional impact: Ortega et al., 2009
[clusters; gender differences – girls more A, boys more B]
Direct bullying
Indirect bullying
Mobile bullying
Internet bullying
Adjustment: Gradinger, Strohmeier &
Spiel, 2009. DEP=depression, SOM=somatic
NOT
INV
Trad Cyber Tr+Cy Trad
V only V only V
BV
Tr+Cy
BV
DEP
0.28
0.45
0.51
0.80
0.46
1.10
SOM
0.42
0.63
0.59
0.71
0.66
0.86
Self esteem: victims (DAPHNE project)
3.6
Non involved
3.4
3.2
Mobile victim
3
2.8
Internet vicitm
2.6
Mobile and
internet victim
2.4
2.2
Global
Sport
School
Body
Peers
Family
 Victims of only internet bullying scored significantly lower on
all measures of self esteem, compared to those who had not
been cyberbullied.
 Children who had experienced both mobile and internet
bullying also scored significantly lower on global, school,
body and peer measures of self esteem
Self esteem: bullies (DAPHNE project)
3.6
3.4
3.2
3
2.8
2.6
2.4
2.2
Non involved
Mobile bully
Internet bully
Mobile and
internet bully
Global
Sport
School
Body
Peers
Family
Children who bullied others either using just the internet, or
using mobiles and the internet scored significantly lower on
school and family measures of self esteem than those who had
not taken part in cyberbullying.
Guidance and Intervention
Generally, include cyberbullying explicitly in
School policies
Anti-bullying materials
Teacher training materials for anti-bullying work
Guidance for parents
Guidance for children and young people
Campbell Systematic Review:
Mishna et al., 2009.
Interventions for children, youth, and parents to prevent and
reduce cyber abuse. (3 articles)
I-SAFE: 5 lessons/activities, grades 5-8 (U.S.).
→ increase in internet safety knowledge, no change in
behavior
Missing: interactive computer game to develop guidelines,
grades 6-7 (Canada).
→ little effect on attitudes or behavior
HAHASO: five classes on Help, Assert Yourself, Humor,
Avoid, Self-talk, Own-it, grades 5-6 (U.S.).
→ no change in behavior.
Resources, e.g. U.K.
In England, Department for Education: suite of
antibullying materials,including cyberbullying, at:
www.teachernet.gov.uk/
Other resources, e.g. BeatBullying (2009)
www.digitalparents.org/cyberbullying/
Easily accessible materials for children and parents
Short educational videos for discussion.
www.cybermentors.org.uk
CYBERMENTORS: Training for young people to help
peers bullied on the internet.
Resources: Europe
CyberTraining – A Research-based European
Training Manual On Cyberbullying:
http://www.cybertraining-project.org
EU-funded project 2008-2010, providing a training
manual on cyberbullying for trainers dealing with
different target groups such as pupils, parents,
teachers or whole schools.
Will be available online in form of a user-friendly
eBook in English, German, Spanish, French and
Portuguese versions.
Contact: Thomas Jäger, [email protected]
European Research Network: COST Action IS0801:
Cyberbullying: coping with negative and enhancing positive uses of new
technologies, in relationships in educational settings
Objectives
To share expertise on cyberbullying in educational
settings, coping with negative and enhancing positive uses
of new technologies in the relationships area, moving
towards a common set of guidelines applicable in Europe.
 The Action lasts 4 years, October 2008 to October 2012.
So far 27 European countries plus Ukraine, Australia
http://sites.google.com/site/costis0801/
European Research: EU Kids Online
 EU Kids Online (2006-9) Funded by the European
Commission’s Safer Internet Programme, aimed to identify,
compare and draw conclusions from existing and ongoing
research on children and online technologies conducted in
Europe.
 Policy recommendations – maximising opportunities,
minimising risks; Research recommendations.
 EU Kids Online II (2009-2011): Enhancing knowledge
regarding European children’s use, risk and safety online.
 Aims to produce a rigorous, cross-nationally comparative
quantitative evidence base regarding internet use across
Europe; research teams in over 20 participating countries.
 www.eukidsonline.net.
Challenges and opportunities in
cyberbullying research
DEFINITIONAL CHALLENGE:
e.g. Vandebosch & van Cleemput (2008); Dooley,
Pyzalski & Cross (2009): do traditional bullying
criteria of repetition, and power imbalance, apply to
cyberbullying?
[repetition may not be by the perpetrator] [power imbalance is not
physical]
Do children/young people use or recognise the term
‘cyberbullying’?
Are we really studying ‘cyber-aggression’, or ‘cyberabuse’?
Challenge of greater importance of
historical factors
Historical factors not unimportant in traditional
bullying, e.g. changes in definition, but usually
assess in decades.
Much more important and rapid in cyberbullying
Changes in technologies, and in popularity of
technologies (e.g. texts → instant messaging →
social networking sites).
Two examples of impact of historical
change on research:
(1) Noret & Rivers (2006) provide the best longitudinal
data on cyberbullying in England (over 11,000 pupils
from 2002 to 2005), but used the question: ‘How
often have you received any nasty or threatening text
messages or emails?’ – these are now only a fraction
of all cyberbullying.
(2) DAPHNE project (2007-2009) distinguished
‘mobile’ and ‘internet’ forms of cyberbullying – but
now smart phones having access to the internet have
confused this distinction.
Opportunities (1): disciplines
Wide disciplinary base (not just psychology,
but sociology, technology, legal studies ….)
Take account of social/group context, bystanders
– more complex in cyberbullying?
Developments in technology, fashions (e.g. happy
slapping, Saunders 2005).
Legal aspects – more prominent and less
understood than in traditional bullying.
Opportunities (2): methods
Combine quantitative and qualitative studies –
especially relevant in a new area: e.g.
Spears et al. (2009): (Australia) - narratives of
cyberbullying from students, teachers and school
counselors.
Parsonson (2009): (New Zealand) – mixed
methods, retrospective study with first year
undergraduate students.
Use existing material e.g. on the internet.
Opportunities (3)
Young people as researchers
e.g. Treseder (1997), Jennifer & Cowie (2009)
Traditionally children/young people give their opinions
via questionnaires, interviews, focus groups. But they
could be involved further, e.g.:
-
Give advice on design of an adult-designed project
Help gather data in a project
Be involved in the planning and implementation of a project
Design a project, adults just advise.
Such approaches may be especially useful for
cyberbullying, where young people are the ‘digital
natives’.
Opportunities (4): context
Broaden context
Settings – most cyberbullying by children is not in
school but in many other outside settings.
Cyberbullying can occur in virtual worlds (e.g.
Coyne et al., 2009)
Developmentally – cyberbullying may have more
age permeability than traditional bullying.
Developmental changes less confounded by
setting changes?
Opportunities (5):
theories of technology use
Technology use – e.g. Technology Acceptance
Model (Davis, 1986; building on Fishbein &
Ajzen’s Theory of Reasoned Action, 1975)
examines ease of use, and usefulness, as predictors
of use of a new technology.
Extended (Sun & Zhang, 2006) to include subjective
norms (views of what others think).
Their integrated model includes 10 moderating
factors grouped into organisational, technologyrelated, and individual.
Opportunities (6):
explaining cultural differences
Present in cyberbullying – e.g. low in Korea &
Japan cf. Australia, Canada (Taki/NEXT
study); low in Finland cf. Spain, Italy, England
(DAPHNE study)
Availability and use of new technologies
Educational systems
Local and national policies
Hofstede categories: individualism-collectivism;
power distance; masculinity-femininity.
Summary
Cyberbullying has built
on a previous research
tradition in bullying.
A considerable amount
of basic research, mostly in last 5 years.
Some guidance and interventions, as yet poorly assessed.
Some challenges: definition; rapid historical change.
Some opportunities: disciplinary mix, new/mixed methods and
possible use of young people as researchers, broader context – not
just school, broader developmental perspective – not just school
age, examine motives in cyberbullying, use technology
acceptance model, examine cultural differences.