Cyberbullying Definition Among Adolescents: A Comparison Across Six European Countries

Abstract

Several criteria have been proposed for defining cyberbullying to young people, but no studies have proved their relevance. There are also variations across different countries in the meaning and the definition of this behavior. We systematically investigated the role of five definitional criteria for cyberbullying, in six European countries. These criteria (intentionality, imbalance of power, repetition, anonymity, and public vs. private) were combined through a set of 32 scenarios, covering a range of four types of behaviors (written-verbal, visual, exclusion, and impersonation). For each scenario, participants were asked whether it was cyberbullying or not. A randomized version of the questionnaire was shown to 295 Italian, 610 Spanish, 365 German, 320 Sweden, 336 Estonian, and 331 French adolescents aged 11-17 years. Results from multidimensional scaling across country and type of behavior suggested a clear first dimension characterized by imbalance of power and a clear second dimension characterized by intentionality and, at a lower level, by anonymity. In terms of differences across types of behaviors, descriptive frequencies showed a more ambiguous role for exclusion as a form of cyberbullying, but general support was given to the relevance of the two dimensions across all the types of behavior. In terms of country differences, French participants more often perceived the scenarios as cyberbullying as compared with those in other countries, but general support was found for the relevance of the two dimensions across countries.

Mapping Developmental Precursors of Cyber-Aggression: Trajectories of Risk Predict Perpetration and Victimization

“…There is general consensus that, like face-to-face aggression, online aggression can result in negative consequences for victims and perpetrators, although variation in definitions and measures results in a wide range for prevalence estimates of online aggressive behavior (Levy, Cortesi, Crowley, Beaton, Casey, & Nolan, 2012;Ybarra, Boyd, Korchmaros, & Oppenheim, 2012). For instance, there is considerable discourse regarding the use and operationalziation of terms such as online aggression, internet harassment, online bullying, electronic bullying and cyberbullying (Langos, 2012;Menesini et al, 2012;Pyzalski, 2012;Ybarra, Boyd et al, 2012). In particular, the traditional bullying construct has not been readily translatable to the cyber realm (Dooley, imbalance may not apply to cyberbullying (Dooley et al, 2009;Runions, Shapka, Dooley, & Modecki , 2012;Ybarra, Mitchell et al, 2012) .…”

Cyberbullying and Primary-School Aged Children: The Psychological Literature and the Challenge for Sociology

“…According to Vygotsky's Sociocultural theory, language and dialogues are culturally specific [66]. The inconsistency in definitions and language used to describe cyberbullying across cultures, not only have implications with cross-culture comparison research [5], but also have implications when researching with children. Young children from cultures that have no specific word for bullying would indeed have difficulty explaining or understanding cyberbullying, but may find it easier to articulate aggression, or cyber-aggression.…”

Effects of Cyberbullying on Adolescents’ Mental Health

“…No entanto, vários estudos sugerem que a autoapresentação e a autorrevelação acontecem, cada vez mais, por intermédio da Internet 10,11 . 18 . A seguir apresentaremos os resultados de pesquisas recentes.…”