Is cyberbullying a serious problem?
When is an issue a problem? There is no simple answer to this question and every issue is a problem if that “issue” produces negative experiences for you. What we are considering here is the question of when does a problem occur with such frequency, have such consequences, or represent such an obvious case of responsibility that action must be taken by a given entity. In this case, of course, we are attempting to consider whether among all of the potential problems that impact children of school age, schools should attempt to address the causes and consequences of cyberbullying. What we can say in response to the issue of cyberbullying and schools is that schools must address the problem if the school expects to receive federal support for the use of technology (we discuss the e-rate program elsewhere). We can also provide information about the prevalence of cyberbullying and we can identify correlates of cyberbullying; negative feelings and behavioral characteristics. We prefer to refer to the connections between being cyberbullied and feelings or behaviors as correlates rather than consequences because these variables are probably interconnected in complex ways. It is likely cyberbullying frequently produces negative consequences, but it also seems that certain personal attributes that differentiate some students from the norm may make these students targets.
The general public most frequently hears of cyberbullying when the media brings attention to extreme cases such those that result in the suicide of a victim. It does appear that cyberbullying is associated with a doubling of the rate of suicide attempts and an increase in thoughts of suicide among victims in comparison to those not identifying themselves as the targets of cyberbullying (Hinduja & Patchin, 2010). The connection is complex and it appears that other factors are involved with online aggression increasing the stress that is experienced as a consequence of multiple factors. Perpetrators of online violence are also more vulnerable to self-directed aggression, but not to the extent of their victims.
Victims of cyberbullying are more likely to experience depression (Ybarra, 2004), to have lower self-esteem (Patchin & Hinduja, 2010), and to score higher on indicators of social anxiety (Dempsey, Sulkowski, Nichols, & Storch, 2009). It would be tempting to comclude that such negative emotions are the consequence of being bullied, but those who summarize the reseach on this topic (e.g., Patchin & Hinduja, 2012) caution against jumping to such a conclusion. They note that adolescents without a sense of confidence and poor social skills are less likely to fit in and to have less developed coping skills rendering them poorly prepared to deal with peer conflicts. When I teach Introduction to Psychology students about psychopathology, I describe the social consequences of depression in a similar way. Social interaction is helpful to those prone to depression, but the characteristics of depression do not make depressed individuals fun to be around. A negative spiral can develop in such situations with negative emotional and psychological characteristics being both a consequence and a cause of damaging patterns of social interaction. The support of peers can be very important in these situations and we will comment more at a latter point on the role of peers in combating cyberbullying.
There are school-related behavioral consequences in addition to the emotional consequences just identified. Bullied students claim that the harrassment of peers is responsible for a decline in their grades (Beran & Li, 2007) and that they sometimes avoid going to school because of their treatment online (Katzer, et al., 2009; Ybarra, et al., 2007). Despite the negative experiences occuring online, the victims of bullying feel less safe in school (Varjas, et al., 2007).