Ersilia Menesini

Cyberbullying Definition Among Adolescents: A Comparison Across Six European Countries

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.

Cyberbullying Definition and Measurement

This definition implies that cyberbullying is similar to traditional bullying, but involving the use of new communication technologies. Its hostile trait derives from the aggressive nature of the behavior. The intention refers to the degree of awareness of harming others, although we might argue to what extent perpetrators are aware of the seriousness of their acts. The indirect nature of cyberbullying makes it difficult to evaluate the intentional or reactive nature of the attack. Moreover some authors stated that cyberbullying, even if a single individual act, can be circulated widely or copied by others meeting the criteria of repetition and frequently creating an imbalance of power. It is hard to detail the concept of imbalance of power in the cyber context, since in face-to-face bullying it was derived by the higher physical or psychological strength of the bully or by a numeric criterion (the number of bullies in comparison with just one victim). How can we define in the cyber context? Can we refer just to a higher technological ability of the bully or, conversely, to a higher rank position of the bullies in the virtual community? Wolak, Finkelhor, Mitchell, and Ybarra (2007) and Ybarra and Mitchell (2004), showed that in many cases youth harassed online or by phone were not distressed or could easily block the harasser. The easy termination of these episodes suggests that part of online harassment may not involve imbalance of power in which victims have difficulty defending themselves from aggressors. It also involves other criteria to distinguish between bullying and harassment such as the number of incidents and the degree of reported distress by the victim. In relation to this issue scholars have proposed alternative terms, such as online, cyber, Internet harassment, or attacks (Dooley, Py_ zalski, & Cross, 2009; Patchin & Hinduja, 2006; Wolak et al., 2007). Measurement

Bullies and victims in schools in central and southern Italy

Anonymous questionnaires assessing the amount and nature of bullying/victimization were given to 1379 primary and middle school pupils (8–11; 11–14yrs) in two towns of Central and Southern Italy, Florence and Cosenza. The questionnaire closely followed the design of Olweus (1991) and Whitney and Smith (1993). Results were analysed in terms of percentages of bullying others and being bullied, types of bullying behaviour, where it occurred and who were the perpretators. Bullying was reported in both Italian areas at a more substantial level than found in other countries, including Norway, England, Spain and Japan, although it presented similar structural features to those reported elsewhere: being bullied decreased in older pupils, bullying others was most likely to be admitted by boys, the perpetretators were in the same class as the victims. Considering direct and indirect forms of bullying, year and gender differences are discussed for the two Italian areas and in cross-national perspective.

The measurement of cyberbullying: dimensional structure and relative item severity and discrimination.

In relation to a sample of 1,092 Italian adolescents (50.9% females), the present study aims to: (a) analyze the most parsimonious structure of the cyberbullying and cybervictimization construct in male and female Italian adolescents through confirmatory factor analysis; and (b) analyze the severity and the discrimination parameters of each act using the item response theory. Results showed that the structure of the cyberbullying scale for perpetrated and received behaviors in both genders could best be represented by a monodimensional model where each item lies on a continuum of severity of aggressive acts. For both genders, the less severe acts are silent/prank calls and insults on instant messaging, and the most severe acts are unpleasant pictures/photos on Web sites, phone pictures/photos/videos of intimate scenes, and phone pictures/photos/videos of violent scenes. The items nasty text messages, nasty or rude e-mails, insults on Web sites, insults in chatrooms, and insults on blogs range from moderate to high levels of severity. Regarding the discrimination level of the acts, several items emerged as good indicators at various levels of cyberbullying and cybervictimization severity, with the exception of silent/prank calls. Furthermore, gender specificities underlined that the visual items can be considered good indicators of severe cyberbullies and cybervictims only in males. This information can help in understanding better the nature of the phenomenon, its severity in a given population, and to plan more specific prevention and intervention strategies.

Shame and guilt as behaviour regulators: Relationships with bullying, victimization and prosocial behaviour

This study aimed at investigating intentional and non-intentional situations eliciting shame and guilt in relation to childrens involvement in bullying, victimization and prosocial behaviour. We used the contextual model designed by Olthof, Schouten, Kuiper, Stegge, and Jennekens-Schinkel (2000) according to which certain situations elicit more shame than guilt (‘shame-only’, SO), whereas others elicit both guilt and shame (‘shame-and-guilt’, SAG). Besides these, four new scenarios were added (2 SO and 2 SAG) in which the protagonist was alternatively the perpetrator or the receiver of harm. Participants were 121 children aged 9–11, who filled in the self-report Shame and Guilt Questionnaire, and a peer nomination survey to investigate the roles of bully, victim, prosocial and not involved. Results showed that in SAG situations, perpetrated-harm situations elicited more guilt than neutral situations; while in SO situations, neutral situations elicited more shame than received-harm situations. In SAG situations, prosocial children reported feeling more ashamed and guilty than bullies and not-involved children, while in SO situations, victims scored higher on shame than not-involved children. Results are discussed considering the contextual model employed and the relationship between emotions and behaviours.

Morality, values, traditional bullying, and cyberbullying in adolescence

The aim of the present study was to investigate moral aspects and human values in traditional bullying and cyberbullying, in order to detect differences between the two types of bullying and to test the role of immoral and disengaged behaviours in mediating the relationships between personal values and involvement in bullying. Sample comprised 390 adolescents aged 14-18, balanced for gender, attending different high schools. Traditional and cyberbullying were detected by means of two self-report measures, while the Portrait Values Questionnaire was used to assess 10 values in four dimensions according to the value system model by Schwartz (1992): self-trascendence, self-enhancement, openness to change, and conservation. Finally, immoral and disengaged behaviours were assessed by means of five items about behavioural and personal aspects salient for morality. Results showed that, irrespective of gender, self-enhancement and self-trascendence moderately predicted cyber and traditional bullying, respectively, while immoral and disengaged behaviours predicted both. Indirect effects showed that self-enhancement and openness to change predicted both forms of bullying through immoral behaviour. Results are discussed in terms of similarities and differences between cyber and traditional bullying and with attention to the central role of morality in explaining bullying nature.

Parents' Definitions of Children's Bullying in a Five-Country Comparison

This study was carried out with 30- to 55-year-old parents of children ages 6 to 13 years in five different countries: Italy, Spain, Portugal, England, and Japan. It aimed at analyzing similarities and differences between words in five languages used to describe different types of bullying and social exclusion and identifying which terms are more appropriate to use in comparisons across cultures and languages. Target terms were selected using focus groups of children. Participants were presented with 25 stick figure cartoons showing different types and contexts of bullying and related behaviors. They were asked to evaluate whether the cartoons could be described or not by one of the target terms. Cluster analysis identified six clusters of cartoons characterized by specific behaviors: nonaggression, fighting, severe physical aggression, verbal aggression, exclusion, and severe exclusion. On the basis of these clusters, there were clear differences across terms and countries regarding both the width of the semantic area of a term and its closeness to the usual scientific definition of bullying.

Bullying among siblings: The role of personality and relational variables

This study aimed to investigate: (1) the influence of gender, sibling age, and sibling gender on sibling bullying and victimization; (2) the links between personality characteristics, quality of the sibling relationship, and sibling bullying/victimization; (3) the association between sibling and school bullying/victimization, and the direct and indirect associations between personality variables and school bullying/victimization. The sample comprised 195 children (98 boys and 97 girls, aged 10-12 years). Instruments included: a self-report questionnaire for bullying and victimization, the Big Five Questionnaire for Children and the Sibling Inventory of Behaviour. Results highlighted that the presence of an older brother is a risk factor for the emergence of sibling victimization. For both boys and girls, high levels of conflict in the dyad and low levels of empathy were significantly related to sibling bullying and sibling victimization. For males, energy was associated with sibling bullying and indirectly to school bullying; friendliness and high emotional instability were directly associated with school bullying. School victimization was directly associated with emotional instability for both males and females. Finally, both sibling bullying and sibling victimization were associated with bullying and victimization at school. The discussion highlights the role of a multi-contextual approach to understand and prevent bullying.

Cyberbullying: The right value of the phenomenon. Comments on the paper “Cyberbullying: An overrated phenomenon?”

This comment will try to discuss the point raised by Olweus: is cyberbullying just one type of bullying or a distinct phenomenon and how much does it need a specific approach to be investigated? Specifically I will try to support my perspective taking into consideration five areas of investigation: definition, measurement, association between traditional bullying and cyberbullying, possible consequences and interventions.

Level and change of bullying behavior during high school: a multilevel growth curve analysis

The development of bullying behavior was examined across three years in a sample of 515 adolescents (46% females) from 41 classrooms. At time 1, the students were in grades 9 and 10 (mean age=14.5 years; SD=.54). Results of a multilevel growth model showed that both baseline level and change of bullying varied significantly across individuals as well as across classrooms. At the individual level, gender, aggression and competition for social dominance were related with baseline level of bullying. Competition for social dominance and class change were additionally associated with increases in bullying over time. At the classroom level, pro-bullying behaviors were associated with higher baseline level of bullying, whereas anti-bullying behaviors with decreases in bullying over time. Finally, a cross-level interaction underlined that the link between aggression and bullying was moderated by the pro-bullying behaviors within each class. Results are discussed according to the child by environment perspective.