Cyberbullying has emerged as a new form of antisocial behaviour in the context of online communication over the last decade. The present study investigates potential longitudinal risk factors for cyberbullying. A total of 835 Swiss seventh graders participated in a short-term longitudinal study (two assessments 6 months apart). Students reported on the frequency of cyberbullying, traditional bullying, rule-breaking behaviour, cybervictimisation, traditional victimisation, and frequency of online communication (interpersonal characteristics). In addition, we assessed moral disengagement, empathic concern, and global self-esteem (intrapersonal characteristics). Results showed that traditional bullying, rulebreaking behaviour, and frequency of online communication are longitudinal risk factors for involvement in cyberbullying as a bully. Thus, cyberbullying is strongly linked to real-world antisocial behaviours. Frequent online communication may be seen as an exposure factor that increases the likelihood of engaging in cyberbullying. In contrast, experiences of victimisation and intrapersonal characteristics were not found to increase the longitudinal risk for cyberbullying over and above antisocial behaviour and frequency of online communication. Implications of the findings for the prevention of cyberbullying are discussed.

Based on the notion that the history of victimization has an impact on the sensitivity to current victimization situations this study investigated whether victims of bullying show more pronounced responses to single episodes of social exclusion. We examined whether victimization experiences in school are associated with responses to ostracism in a virtual ball tossing game (Cyberball). We compared two groups of students: 26 victims of bullying and 32 students not involved in bully/victim problems (mean age = 12.12). After playing Cyberball, the victimized students in the ostracism condition scored significantly lower on feelings of meaningful existence compared to the ostracized students not involved in bully/victim problems. These results strongly support the idea that previously victimized students are more affected by experiences of social exclusion than students who are not involved in bully/victim problems.

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We examined the effects of ostracism in early adolescent populations using the cyberball paradigm ( Williams, Cheung, & Choi, 2000 ). Ninety-one Swiss school students, aged 10–14 years, were randomly assigned to the ostracism (24 girls, 23 boys) or the inclusion (23 girls, 21 boys) condition and were led to believe that they were playing cyberball with two other same-sex students. In reality, they were computer-generated confederates. We assessed self-reported levels of mood before and after playing the game as well as sense of belonging, self-esteem, meaningful existence, and control after the game. Compared to nonostracized students, adolescents in the ostracism condition reported significantly lower levels of positive mood after playing the game. Furthermore, they reported a lower sense of belonging and lower levels of self-esteem, meaningful existence, and control. The present results from a non-English-speaking sample correspond well to the few earlier findings in adolescent and adult populations by suggesting that even brief periods of ostracism with unknown others can lead to a significant decrease in well-being in these age groups.

Ostracism is defined as acts of ignorance or social exclusion by another individual or group (Williams, 2001), which can be described as a powerful negative experience that may have a negative impact on a child's socio-emotional development. When ostracized, people report feeling frustrated, anxious, or nervous (Williams, 2001). The initial reactions to ostracism are similarly felt by all individuals regardless of personality or social and situational factors. Ostracism then instigates actions aimed at recovering thwarted needs of belonging, self-esteem, control, and meaningful existence. Ostracism has been studied in many ways according to different traditions in various research areas (for excellent reviews see Williams, 2001;. For example, some researchers have addressed it using methodologically sound survey scales with satisfying psychometric properties (Crick & Grotpeter, 1996;Werner & Crick, 2004) while others have addressed it in experimental studies utilizing rejection paradigms (Twenge, Catanese, & Baumeister 2003;Zadro, Williams, & Richardson, 2004). In this respect, the most commonly applied assessment form has been the cyberball paradigm (Williams, Cheung, & Choi, 2000).