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The purpose of this study was to investigate several factors associated with cyberbullying and its victims; gender, age, and the time spent using various forms of computer-mediated communication (CMC). Because cross-national studies are so important to understanding the similarities and differences found in this global problem, the current study explored the connection between traditional bullying and cyberbullying in middle school students in both the United States (N = 111) and Germany (N = 279). Participants ranged in age from 12 to 15 years and were administered self-report questionnaires during the regular school day. It was predicted that German students would have higher mean rates of CMC use; Americans would have higher mean rates of participation in and being victims of cyberbullying; there would be no mean differences in American and German student outcomes as either victims or perpetrators of traditional bullying. Results indicated that German students did use CMC more often than American students did, but Americans used certain forms of CMC more often, such as texting, IM and email. Contrary to expectations, Germans were more likely to participate in cyber and traditional bullying behavior. Americans did have a greater number of victims compared to perpetrators for both traditional and cyberbullying behavior. Additional results found that the American sample had a pattern of decreasing then increasing behavior as student age increased, across participation in all forms of bullying behavior, and participation rates often depended on the age of the students involved. Future research suggestions might focus on the importance of distinguishing the varying thought processes that define cyberbullying within a culture, specifically within our own culture. Additional research might also address how online communities and their inherent social norms and interactions, may inadvertently contribute to increasing cyberbullying and victimization of others outside of those groups and communities. Finally, due to the constant updating and improvement of social media, a follow- up study utilizing updated online applications would add considerably to the current knowledge base.
According to a survey performed by Pew Research in 2014, 40% of Internet users have experienced online harassment. 18% had experienced severe harassment – stalking, sexual harassment, physical threats – while 22% had only experienced less severe harassment, such as name-calling. Women ages 18–24 receive a disproportionately large percentage of all severe online harassment. The emotional trauma suffered from severe or long-term harassment can lead to (and has led to) fear, depression, and suicide in the worst cases.
The anonymity of the Internet partially enables online harassment, since it allows perpetrators to hide behind usernames or false images while they harass others — there is little accountability. However, 66% of online harassment happens on social media platforms, where people's names and images are usually readily available. This indicates that anonymity is not the only factor, and not even the main factor. Rather, the separation of the Internet from the physical world, that which makes it less "real," is what enables harassers to treat it as entirely different experience. They can say across a keyboard what they might never say face-to-face.
To increase my understanding of the problem, I made two three-dimensional pieces – a functioning clock and an exhibit wall. Each project explored different aspects of online harassment and implored the audience to keep compassion and kindness in mind while interacting with others digitally.
Another goal was to create a campaign which could tackle the problem on a larger, more definite scale. To learn from others' attempts, I studied two recent, real-world campaigns against online harassment, Zero Trollerance and HeartMob. Each of these received significant amounts of good press on online news outlets, but people who enjoyed or were helped by those campaigns were grossly outnumbered by those who criticized and even lambasted those campaigns, for various reasons.
I determined that the reactive nature of those campaigns was the main cause of their failure, so I created a proactive campaign with the goal of preventing online harassment, rather than correcting it. I designed the beginnings of "You & I," a multiplayer online game for children ages 4–6, which would encourage positive interaction between players through its very game mechanics. Ideally, the habits formed by the children while playing this game would carry over to their future Internet experiences, and a new generation of kinder, more cooperative, "native" Internet users would arise, reducing the amount of harassment seen on the Internet.
Over the past several decades, cyberbullying has increasingly become one of the most dangerous threats to an adolescent’s mental health. Heather Springer, writing for the American Psychological Association, projects that roughly 33% of American teenagers are affected by cyberbullying while on social media (Springer). This startling percentage, compounded by an escalating need to combat cyberbullying’s negative impact on mental health, has catalyzed a wave of psychological research to explore the ways in which social media impacts teens. Over the years, researchers have produced a plethora of publications on the subject, inspiring families to pursue cyberbullying prevention for their loved ones. However, despite this surge in anti-cyberbullying interest, few researchers have attempted to coalesce these psychological findings with computer applications, and fewer still have sought to prevent cyberbullying through the strengthening of parent-teen relationships (Silva et al., 2019). Because of this, the BullyBlocker team, led by Dr. Yasin Silva and Dr. Deborah Hall, has spent the past couple years developing a mobile application called ActionPoint. Our team hopes that through this app, the risk of cyberbullying is drastically decreased and even prevented.
With this research and creative project, I aim to accomplish the following: first, I narrate my own experience as a victim of cyberbullying and the jumbled, inadequate response from my university; second, I assemble a literature review of best practices for university responses to student reports of cyberbullying and cyber assault; third, I offer a call to action for universities to adopt the best practices to deter cyber assaults and learn how to listen and respond to victims
Bad actor reporting has recently grown in popularity as an effective method for social media attacks and harassment, but many mitigation strategies have yet to be investigated. In this study, we created a simulated social media environment of 500,000 users, and let those users create and review a number of posts. We then created four different post-removal algorithms to analyze the simulation, each algorithm building on previous ones, and evaluated them based on their accuracy and effectiveness at removing malicious posts. This thesis work concludes that a trust-reward structure within user report systems is the most effective strategy for removing malicious content while minimizing the removal of genuine content. This thesis also discusses how the structure can be further enhanced to accommodate real-world data and provide a viable solution for reducing bad actor online activity as a whole.