Tag Archives: research

Cyberbullying: Neither an Epidemic nor a Rarity

Article posted by Justin W. Patchin in March 21, 2013 at 10:20 am.

(8 votes, average: 5.00 out of 5)

Loading ...

If you pay attention to the news reports of cyberbullying incidents (like we do), you would probably think that these inappropriate online behaviors are happening at epidemic levels. When we first started studying cyberbullying over a decade ago, Sameer and I would literally print out any news article we saw that talked about a cyberbullying incident – because they happened (or at least were reported) so infrequently. Now, it seems, cyberbullying occurs (and is reported) at an almost constant rate. To test this theory, set up a Google alert with “cyberbullying” and see how many articles come through every day. Your inbox will be inundated.

In contrast to this perspective, the argument has been advanced that cyberbullying is not occurring at levels that require our significant attention. Specifically, Professor Dan Olweus, who has done more to advance the scholarship of school bullying than anyone else in the world recently published an article in which he argued that “…cyberbullying is a basically low-frequent phenomenon and that there has not occurred a marked increase in the prevalence rates of cyberbullying over the past five or six years.” We agree with Professor Olweus on most issues but believe that the nature and extent of cyberbullying does warrant independent empirical, legal, and educational attention. We were honored to be invited to write a commentary on Professor Olweus’ remarks and those who are interested in this exchange can read our response here (you can also email us if you would like a copy of our paper).

So how much cyberbullying is really occurring? Is it an epidemic or a rarity? Well, the answer as you might guess is somewhere in between.

To be sure, we have covered this ground many times on this blog. You can also take a look at much of our original research that we include here. In Cyberbullying Prevention and Response: Expert Perspectives we reviewed all of the empirical research that had been published as of 2011 and found that across 35 refereed articles 5.5 to 72 percent of students had been cyberbullied and 6 to 30 percent of students had admitted to cyberbullying others. The School Crime Supplement of the National Crime Victimization Survey (which utilizes a representative sample of students in the U.S.) added a handful of cyberbullying questions to their survey in 2009 and those data showed that 6% reported being bullied “by electronic means anywhere.” Many additional articles have been published in the last two years but we rarely see numbers lower than 10% or higher than 40%.

In our own work, we’ve now surveyed nearly 14,000 middle and high school students from a variety of schools across the United States. Our first studies were online convenience samples, intended only to gather early information about an emerging problem. The last 6 studies we have done, however, have all been conducted among random samples of known student populations in schools. Across those samples, the percent of students who reported being the victim of cyberbullying ranged from 18.8 to 29.2 percent (average 23.9%). Similarly, 11.5 to 19.4 percent of students admitted to cyberbullying others at some point in their lifetimes (average 16.9%). (for more information about our methodology, please click here).

Even though we have done 8 different surveys over the past 9 years, we aren’t able to look at these data in a way that identifies trends because most involved different school populations. We have surveyed students in “District A” three separate times but don’t see much of a pronounced trend that shows the behaviors are increasing or decreasing. Our friends at the Crimes Against Children Research Center at the University of New Hampshire have collected data from students across the U.S. in 2000, 2005, and 2010 and saw a modest but steady increase in cyberbullying between 2000 and 2010 (from 6% to 11%). Their numbers are lower than ours because of the different way they conducted their research, but since they have looked at cyberbullying the same way in three different national studies we can use the results to estimate that cyberbullying in general seems to be increasing.

So where does this leave us? Professor Olweus is right that cyberbullying isn’t some new phenomenon that is completely distinct from the bullying that has been perpetrated by and toward teens for generations. But it is occurring at levels that demand our attention and initial evidence suggests that it is increasing. We know that most cyberbullying is connected to offline relationships and that most teens who cyberbully also bully at school. Cyberbullying is neither an epidemic nor a rarity. But is it something that everyone has a responsibility to work toward ending. What are you going to do?

Tags: cyber-bullying, cyberbullying, cyberbullying research, data, research, teens.
Subscribe to this blog via RSS or Email.

(2) comments

New Teen Sexting Study

Article posted by Justin W. Patchin in July 9, 2012 at 12:48 pm.

(11 votes, average: 4.91 out of 5)

Loading ...

There is a new study on teen sexting that has been published (online at least) in the journal Archives of Pediatrics and Adolescent Medicine that is receiving tons of media attention. Most research that is published in academic journals is largely ignored by the media and the public, but for some reason this article has generated some interest. To be sure, articles and books that include the word “sex” in the title are likely to draw more attention. (See our new book, entitled “School Climate 2.0: Preventing Cyberbullying and SEXting One Classroom at a Time!”)

The headline that is most commonly pulled from this particular study seems to be that about 28% of the students who responded to the researcher’s survey said that they had “sent a naked picture of themselves through text or e-mail.” This figure is a lot higher than most previously published research. For example, in School Climate 2.0 we reviewed 5 previous studies and our own preliminary research on teen sexting (see also our brief Sexting Fact Sheet). Across these surveys, the percent of students who reported sending a “sext” ranged from 2.5% to 19%. Much of these differences in rates can likely be attributed to the different ways the studies were set up. The National Campaign to Prevent Teen and Unplanned Pregnancy (2008) reported that 19% of teens had sent a “sexually suggestive picture or video.” Sexually suggestive is quite different than “naked.” Moreover, the National Campaign sample included teens who ranged in age from 13 to 19. By contrast, our sample, which found that 8% of teens had sent a “naked or semi-naked image” of themselves to others, included middle and high school students between the ages of 11 and 18. Consistent with intuition, our analysis also showed that older teens were more likely to participate in sexting and therefore by including 18 and 19 year-olds, as the National Campaign Study did, we would expect the numbers to be higher. A study sponsored by MTV and the Associated Press that recorded the second highest prevalence rate (10%) also included much older respondents (up to age 24) than the other studies.

The new study targeted 10th and 11th graders from 7 high schools in Texas and included students between the ages of 14 and 19. It is unclear from the article if students were randomly selected to participate, meaning the sample would be somewhat representative of all students in 10th and 11th grade from these schools, or if they were chosen deliberately or haphazardly. Knowing more about the broader characteristics of the population of students at the schools would help us in better interpreting the results.

Specifically, the Texas study found that 27.8% of the students had sent a sext. Digging more deeply into the results, we can see that more White/non-Hispanic youth reported that they had sent a sext than other racial groups, and like in our study, older students were involved at higher rates. Almost half (45%) of the 18 and 19 year old students had sent a sext, though this is a tenuous finding as there were only 31 students in the sample who were those ages.

The authors intentionally limited their inquiry to naked pictures and did not include semi-naked images or explicit text. This makes their high prevalence finding even more surprising. So why does this study differ so much from the other available research? Different methodologies between this and the other studies, as discussed above, is probably the most likely cause (different ways of sampling, asking questions, etc.). But it could also be that teens in Texas, or at least the 7 schools targeted in this study, are participating in sexting at a higher rate than the country as a whole. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Texas high school students are slightly more sexually active than the United States as a whole (37.7% compared to 34.2% had sexual intercourse in the previous 3 months), but this alone can’t explain the dramatic difference.

Clearly more research is necessary – at the local, state, and national level. Moreover, qualitative work can perhaps uncover in more detail why teens engage in sexting, and attempt to learn if they understand the potential consequences of the behavior. For example, Jessica Ringrose from the University of London and her colleagues recently released a report that presents the perspectives of 35 students based on an in-depth investigation that included focus groups, individual interviews, and consultations with teachers and other school staff. I was introduced to Jessica’s work when I met her last fall when we both participated in a conference at the University of London. The report describes, among other things, that teens are often pressured, subtly or overtly, into participating in sexting: “Much of young people’s talk, therefore, reflects an experience that is pressurized yet voluntary – they choose to participate but they cannot choose to say ‘no’.” The desire to fit in and be well-liked within one’s peer group results in some teens doing things that they know they shouldn’t. With this in mind, some of the variation in reporting across studies might be explained by teens under-reporting behaviors they know are wrong, or in other cases even over-reporting behaviors they think are social acceptable (see my recent blog on social norming and peer influences here).

In short, we need to continue to work to better understand why teens sext as well as evaluate efforts to prevent them from doing it in the first place. Scaring them with the threat of formal prosecution and severe criminal sanctions undoubtedly will not stop all youth from experimenting with these behaviors (just like it doesn’t stop them from using drugs or participating in other delinquent behaviors – see the work of Raymond Paternoster, and others). Instead, we all need to work to create family, school, and community cultures where sexting, cyberbullying, and other inappropriate behaviors online and off are not tolerated and simply “not what we do.” Behaviors are influenced to a much greater extent by positive relationships (that is, we behave in accordance with the people we care about), and to the extent we develop valued connections in various domains, we will have the power to shape teen behaviors for the better.

Tags: cell phones, prevention, research, response, sexting.
Subscribe to this blog via RSS or Email.

One comment

Peer Influences and Social Norming

Article posted by Justin W. Patchin in June 1, 2012 at 2:39 pm.

(19 votes, average: 4.58 out of 5)

Loading ...

We are working on a new paper that examines the influence of peers on cyberbullying behavior. We have long known that there is a strong correlation between a youth’s behaviors and those of his or her friends (see Mark Warr’s work, especially “Companions in Crime”). It should come as no surprise, then, that we are seeing similar results in our analysis. Students who reported to us that many of their friends had bullied others (at school, using a computer, and using a cell phone) were significantly more likely to have also reported to us that they too had bullied and cyberbullied others. Specifically, only 4% of the respondents who said none of their friends had cyberbullied others in the previous 6 months reported that they had cyberbullied others in the last 30 days. In contrast, 62% of the students who said “all” or “most” of their friends had cyberbullied others in the previous 6 months reported that they cyberbullied others.

There are many theoretical reasons to help us understand this relationship. For example, it could be that cyberbullying, like just about anything else, is learned behavior. Teens see their friends cyberbully others and not only learn the specific techniques or tactics, but also learn to justify the behaviors (it is just a joke, the target had it coming, it is no big deal, they won’t get caught, etc.). The behaviors could be reinforced further if their peers encourage them through social acceptance or if they are otherwise rewarded (or at least not punished) for what they did. A teen might cyberbully another simply to avoid the possibility that negative attention will be directed back at them if they do not go along with the crowd. It could also be a sort of “birds of a feather flock together” syndrome whereby teens who are cyberbullying others seek each other out to reaffirm the normality of their behaviors. No matter what the precise reason is, it makes sense that kids who participate in cyberbullying might tend to hang out with others who also engage in cyberbullying.

Of course there are some limitations to using a teen’s report of their peer’s behaviors as a measure of the peer’s actual behaviors. Teens could simply be reflecting their own behaviors on others or may think that their friends are behaving in certain ways, when they really aren’t. I see this phenomenon often when speaking with students. I ask them to tell me what percent of students cyberbully others. Their estimates are all uniformly very high (70-80-90%). They are surprised when I tell them that the correct number is actually much lower than that – less than 10% have done it in the previous 30 days. I was at a school this spring that had just collected data from its students about cyberbullying. I quickly skimmed through the handout that the principal gave me with a summary of the results and noticed that 9.5% of the students admitted that they had cyberbullied others. Yet when I asked the students during my presentation, they too estimated the number to be in the 80-90% range.

Correcting the perceptions of youth about these facts is important because if they come to see a certain behavior as normative, they may feel free to engage in that behavior. Or they may feel pressure to “fit in” by doing what they think “everyone” else is doing. Well, the truth is that most students are not cyberbullying others. I tell teens that it is in their best interest to work to reduce the 10% number even more because, like them, the adults in their lives often see the behaviors of the 10% and assume that most young people must be behaving similarly. I mean, there is no shortage of examples in the morning paper or on the nightly news of teens getting into trouble for misusing technology. But these examples represent the exceptions rather than what is most often occurring.

In the end, perceptions can be just as important as reality in terms of influencing behaviors. Which is why we need to work to educate teens and adults alike about what most youth are doing online, using valid and reliable data. (We discuss social norming theory and how it applies to cyberbullying and sexting in our new book). And the data show that teens generally do behave in concert with what they believe their friends are doing. This is even more evidence in support of working to create a climate at school where no form of bullying is tolerated. If students don’t see bullying and cyberbullying happening, or if they see it but the behaviors are immediately condemned by people they care about (their peers and adults), then hopefully they will learn that the norm in their school is to treat each other with respect.

Tags: cyberbullying, cyberbullying research, prevention, research, social norms.
Subscribe to this blog via RSS or Email.

(8) comments

Remarks to the Minnesota Task Force on the Prevention of Bullying

Article posted by Justin W. Patchin in May 22, 2012 at 5:03 pm.

(12 votes, average: 4.67 out of 5)

Loading ...

Yesterday I had the opportunity to speak to members of the Minnesota Task Force on the Prevention of Bullying. Members were appointed by Governor Mark Dayton with the charge of recommending a course of action to the governor about how best to prevent and respond to bullying. Below were my comments to the group.

Remarks to Minnesota Governor Mark Dayton’s Task Force on the Prevention of Bullying

May 21, 2012

Justin W. Patchin, Ph.D.

http://www.cyberbullying.us/

Good afternoon ladies and gentlemen. I am happy to be with you today to talk a little bit about my research and life’s work over the last decade. I have to say that I am not accustomed to writing my comments ahead of time and reading them in this way, but for this particular event I thought it was necessary to make sure I was able to convey as much of the important information as concisely as possible in about 10 minutes to set the stage for our discussion. I am used to presenting a 6 hour workshop for educators and I don’t think anyone here would like it if I went that long. In addition, I will make these remarks, with appropriate citations, available to you all for review following our discussion.

My name is Justin Patchin and I am an Associate Professor of criminal justice at the University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire. I have just finished my 8th year on campus. Prior to arriving in Eau Claire, I spent 5 years at Michigan State University, completing my graduate work, teaching classes, and conducting research. I did my undergraduate work at the University of Wisconsin-Superior. I grew up in Northern MN, on the Iron Range. My parents still live up there and I frequently visit and spend time in and around the Boundary Waters. Much of my extended family lives here in the metro area.

While I was in college I started working with delinquent youth in residential and then day treatment in Duluth. I was talked into applying for graduate school and when I got accepted to Michigan State, intended to get a Master’s Degree in criminal justice with an emphasis on juvenile delinquency prevention and then come back to MN to be a juvenile probation office. Well, I just enjoyed MSU so much I stuck around long enough for them to give me a PhD.

In my first days on campus, I met up with Sameer Hinduja, who came to Michigan State to study computer crime. We shared a very small office together and one day just started talking about our respective interests: mine in juvenile delinquency, school violence, and bullying; and his in computer crime, identity theft, and other emerging forms of high-tech crime. We started thinking about the ways that youth were using technology to cause harm to one another. We had heard of the term “cyberbullying” but didn’t know what it really involved. This was around 2001 and no one else was really studying the problem either, so we started to. Since then we have conducted 7 formal surveys of over 12,000 students in over 80 schools from around the United States. We have also surveyed parents, educators, and law enforcement officers on their perspectives of this problem. I want to spend a few brief minutes talking about what we have learned over the last 10 years through these studies, focusing specifically on 3 areas: 1) Research; 2) Legislation; and, 3) Prevention.

Now, we have also asked questions about traditional bullying that happens at school, but there are many other competent researchers who have addressed this problem, so I will focus my comments on cyberbullying. We define cyberbullying as “willful and repeated harm inflicted through the use of computers, cell phones, or other electronic devices” (Hinduja & Patchin, 2009). Admittedly, this is an imperfect definition, which is why when we survey others about this problem, we approach it from two perspectives. First, we instruct respondents that “cyberbullying is when someone repeatedly harasses, mistreats, or makes fun of another person online or while using cell phones or other electronic devices.” We then ask if they have experienced this or done this to others in their lifetime or the previous 30 days. Second, we ask them about particular behaviors they have experienced. Specifically, we ask them if they have experienced or done any of the following:

•   posted mean or hurtful comments online
•   posted a mean or hurtful picture online
•   posted a mean or hurtful video online
•   created a mean or hurtful web page
•   spread rumors online
•   threatened to hurt through a cell phone text message
•   threatened to hurt online
•   pretended to be me someone else and acted in a way that was mean or hurtful

We also spend a great deal of time trying to keep up with the research that others are doing, both in the U.S., and abroad.

What We Know About Cyberbullying

Estimates of the number of teens who have experienced cyberbullying are all over the map. I can point you to a paper published in a peer-reviewed academic journal that says that 72% of students have been cyberbullied while another published study puts the number at less than 5%. The numbers are similarly varied when it comes to the number of students who have cyberbullied others. So how many teens have been involved? Last summer we reviewed all of the published papers on cyberbullying to try to get a handle on this question. These results were published last year in our book Cyberbullying Prevention and Response: Expert Perspectives, which included contributions from a number of knowledgeable sources from around the United States.

As of the summer of 2011, there had been at least forty-two articles on the topic of cyberbullying published in peer-reviewed journals across a wide variety of academic disciplines. Although there are additional articles being published quite regularly and it is likely that we have missed some published works, this review represents the most comprehensive summary of available research findings at the time of its writing.

Among the thirty-five papers published in peer-reviewed journals prior to the summer of 2011 that included cyberbullying victimization rates, figures ranged from 5.5% to 72% with an average of 24.4%. Most of studies (n=22) estimate that anywhere from 6% to 30% of teens have experienced some form of cyberbullying. These findings are consistent with our own research over the last ten years. The percent of youth who responded to our surveys who have experienced cyberbullying at some point in their lifetime ranged from 18.8% to 40.6% in our studies, with an average of 27.3%. Our most recent study based on data collected in the spring of 2010 found that about 21% of youth had been the target of cyberbullying.

Moreover, the number of youth who admit to cyberbullying others at some point in their lives is a bit lower, though quite comparable. Among twenty-seven papers published in peer-reviewed journals that included cyberbullying offending rates, 3% to 44.1% of teens reported cyberbullying others (average of 18%). Across all of our studies, the rates ranged from about 11% to as high as 20% in our most recent study (average 16.8%).

A couple of other broad generalizations can be made about cyberbullying, based on the extant literature:

•   Adolescent girls are just as likely, if not more likely than boys to experience cyberbullying (as a victim and offender) (Kowalski et al., 2008; Hinduja & Patchin, 2009)

•   Cyberbullying is related to low self-esteem, suicidal ideation, anger, frustration, and a variety of other emotional and psychological problems (Hinduja & Patchin, 2010; Patchin & Hinduja, 2010; Patchin & Hinduja, 2011)

•   Cyberbullying is related to other issues in the ‘real world’ including school problems, antisocial behavior, substance use, and delinquency (Hinduja & Patchin, 2007; Hinduja & Patchin, 2008)

•   Traditional bullying is still more common than cyberbullying (Lenhart, 2007; Smith et al., 2008)

•   Traditional bullying and cyberbullying are closely related: those who are bullied at school are bullied online and those who bully at school bully online (Hinduja & Patchin, 2009; Ybarra, Diener-West, & Leaf, 2007)

Of course more research is necessary. We do not have any good longitudinal research on cyberbullying. We also do not have any good evaluations of programs that target online safety or cyberbullying. The Olweus Prevention program has demonstrated some success with respect to bullying at school, especially internationally, but even that program could benefit from more sophisticated process and outcome evaluations. Such endeavors are costly and take time, but would be well worth the money in the long run.

Legislative Issues

Forty-nine states now have bullying laws in place or scheduled to be implemented in 2012. Minnesota law requires schools to have a bullying policy that seemingly includes “electronic forms and forms involving Internet use” but does not explicitly refer to cyberbullying or include guidance for responding to off-campus incidents of bullying. Educators are particularly challenged by this last issue; that is, knowing whether or not they can discipline students for cyberbullying when the behaviors largely occur away from school. Thankfully, caselaw provides much guidance on this question.

In the landmark case Tinker v. Des Moines (1969) the Supreme Court stated: “it can hardly be argued that either students or teachers shed their constitutional rights to freedom of speech or expression at the schoolhouse gate…” and that only speech or behavior which “materially and substantially interfere(s) with the requirements of appropriate discipline in the operation of the school” are subject to discipline. Barr v. Lafon (2007) clarified that schools need not wait for a disruption to occur before intervening and that if they can articulate a clear and imminent threat to the order of the school then appropriate action can be taken.

We know from Thomas v. Board of Education, Granville Central School District (1979) that student speech that occurs away from school is generally more protected than the speech that occurs at school, but several recent cases have demonstrated that off campus behaviors and speech are subject to school discipline, if the behavior or speech: (1) substantially or materially disrupts the learning environment at school; (2) interferes with the educational process or school discipline; or (3) threatens or otherwise infringes on the rights of other students (see J.S. v. Bethlehem Area School District, 2000; Wisniewski v. Board of Education of the Weedsport Central School District, 2007; and especially Kowalski v. Berkeley County Schools, 2011).

The key issue that has been addressed in many cases is that the behavior that occurs away from school results in (or has a likelihood of resulting in) a substantial disruption at school (see Layshock v. Hermitage School District and Blue Mountain School District v. J.S. which were both recently reviewed by the Third Circuit Court of Appeals [2011]). In short, if one student is being harassed or threatened repeatedly by another student, whether online or at school, there is little question that the ability of that student to learn is being disrupted. Moreover, a target’s right “to be secure and to be let alone” (also from Tinker) is being violated. As such, it is important that any state bullying law includes this information so that schools know that they do in fact have the authority to respond. It is also important that schools include this information in their policies because students need to be notified that their off campus conduct is subject to school sanction, within the above-discussed parameters.

Specifically, I urge the legislature to adopt a modified version of New Hampshire’s recently-passed bullying law (HB 1523):

“Schools have the authority and responsibility to apply reasonable and educationally-based discipline, consistent with a pupil’s constitutionally granted privileges, to bullying that: (a) Occurs on, or is delivered to, school property or a school-sponsored activity or event on or off school property; or (b) Occurs off of school property or outside of a school-sponsored activity or event, if the conduct interferes with a pupil’s educational opportunities, creates a hostile environment for that pupil or others, or substantially disrupts the orderly operations of the school or school-sponsored activity or event.”

Similar language has also been adopted in New Jersey and Connecticut law recently. I have modified it minimally to ensure that a student’s constitutionally protected speech is not infringed upon by threatening to discipline a student who is exercising protected speech. As Tinker clearly stated, students have free speech rights, but they are not free to disrupt the learning environment at school (create a disruption, threaten or infringe on the rights of others, etc.).

I also encourage the legislature to provide resources to schools so that they can effectively implement the recommendations and/or requirements included in the law. Schools want to prevent and adequately respond to all forms of bullying and harassment and are simply looking for resources that they can use to assist in such efforts. For instance, legislation should provide staff development and training resources to the Department of Education or other state educational training service providers in order for school officials to learn about the law and about how to prevent and respond to cyberbullying more effectively.

The Importance of School Climate

The benefits of a positive school climate have been identified through much research over the last thirty years. It contributes to more consistent attendance, higher student achievement, and other desirable student outcomes. Though limited, the research done on school climate and traditional bullying also underscores its importance in preventing peer conflict. Existing research has consistently identified an inverse relationship between specific components of school climate and bullying among students (e.g., Gottfredson & Gottfredson, 1985; Malecki & Demaray, 2004; Rigby, 1996; Whitney & Smith, 1993). Our recently published book: School Climate 2.0: Preventing Cyberbullying and Sexting One Classroom at a Time argues that the impact of a positive climate extend beyond the classroom walls.

For example, our research has shown that students who experienced cyberbullying (both those who were victims and those who admitted to cyberbullying others) perceived a poorer climate at their school than those who had not experienced cyberbullying. Youth were asked whether they “enjoy going to school,” “feel safe at school,” “feel that teachers at their school really try to help them succeed,” and “feel that teachers at their school care about them.” Those who admitted to cyberbullying others or who were the target of cyberbullying were less likely to report feeling safe and cared about at school. The better the climate, the fewer problematic online behaviors were reported by students (cyberbullying and sexting).

We also found that teachers who talk about these issues with their students are making a difference. Even though almost half (46 percent) of students said their teacher never talked to them about being safe on the computer and 69 percent of students said their teacher never talked to them about using a cell phone responsibly, when these conversations happen, they seem to have a positive impact. Students who told us that a teacher had talked to them about being safe on the computer were significantly less likely to report that they had cyberbullied others in the previous 30 days.

Finally students from schools with a better climate were more likely to report that they felt as though their school was likely to respond to incidents of cyberbullying when it was reported to a teacher or other educator at school. In short, educators who do establish a nurturing and caring classroom and school climate will make great strides in preventing a whole host of problematic behaviors, both at school and online.

Conclusion

In conclusion, I would like to advocate for three specific areas of focus as you move forward with your work. First, more research is necessary. We need to know more about all forms of bullying, and especially what works in the areas of prevention and response. Second, we need legislation that is prescriptive, thoughtful, evidence-based, and supported with adequate resources. If legislators are serious about doing something to stop bullying, they must move beyond the rhetoric and provide appropriate resources for schools, parents, law enforcement, and other community institutions to tackle this problem. Third, focusing on improving the climate at school can have a significant impact on a host of problematic behaviors. If students believe that they are cared about at school, and they value those relationships with their teachers, counselors, and administrators, they will in turn refrain from engaging in behaviors that would risk damaging those relationships. That said, bullying and cyberbullying are not just school problems, they are societal problems. Everyone has a role and responsibility to do something, and it can start right here with us today.

Thank you.

Works Cited

Gottfredson, G. D., & Gottfredson, D. G. (1985). Victimization in schools. New York: Plenum Press.

Hinduja, S. & Patchin, J. W. (2007). Offline consequences of online victimization: School violence and delinquency. Journal of School Violence, 6(3), 89-112.

Hinduja, S. & Patchin, J. W. (2008). Cyberbullying: An exploratory analysis of factors related to offending and victimization. Deviant Behavior, 29(2), 129-156.

Hinduja, S. & Patchin, J. W. (2009). Bullying beyond the Schoolyard: Preventing and Responding to Cyberbullying. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications (ISBN: 9781412966894).

Hinduja, S., & Patchin, J. W. (2010). Bullying, Cyberbullying, and Suicide. Archives of Suicide Research, 14(3).

Hinduja, S. & Patchin, J. W. (2012). School Climate 2.0: Preventing Cyberbullying and Sexting One Classroom at a Time. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.

Kowalski, R. M., Limber, S. P., & Agatston, P. W. (2008). Cyber bullying: Bullying in the digital age. Malden, MA: Blackwell Publishing.

Lenhart, A. (2007). Cyberbullying and Online Teens. Retrieved June 27, 2007, from http://www.pewinternet.org/pdfs/PIP%20Cyberbullying%20Memo.pdf

Malecki, C. K., & Demaray, M. K. (2004). The role of social support in the lives of bullies, victims, and bully-victims. In D. L. Espelage & S. M. Swearer (Eds.), Bullying in American schools (pp. 211-225). Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum.

Patchin, J. W. & Hinduja, S. (2010). Cyberbullying and self-esteem. Journal of School Health, 80(12), 614-621.

Patchin, J. W. & Hinduja, S. (2011). Traditional and nontraditional bullying among youth: A test of general strain theory. Youth and Society, 43(2), 727-751.

Patchin, J. W. & Hinduja, S. (2012). Cyberbullying Prevention and Response: Expert Perspectives. New York: Routledge (ISBN: 978-0415892377).

Rigby, K. (1996). Bullying in schools: And what to do about it. London: Jessica Kingsley Publishers.

Smith, P. K., Mahdavi, J., Carvalho, M., Fisher, S., Russell, S., & Tippett, N. (2008). Cyberbullying: its nature and impact in secondary school pupils. Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry, 49(4), 376-385.

Whitney, I., & Smith, P. K. (1993). A survey of the nature and extent of bullying in junior/middle and secondary schools. Educational Research, 31(1), 3-25.

Ybarra, M. L., Diener-West, M., & Leaf, P. J. (2007). Examining the Overlap in Internet Harassment and School Bullying: Implications for School Intervention. Journal of Adolescent Health, 41, S42-S50.

Tags: cyberbullying research, definition, education, legislation, prevention, research, schools.
Subscribe to this blog via RSS or Email.

(2) comments

160,000 Students Stay Home from School Every Day Because of Bullying. Really?

Article posted by Justin W. Patchin in January 20, 2012 at 10:33 am.

(43 votes, average: 4.26 out of 5)

Loading ...

At the Cyberbullying Research Center we strive to approach the issue of teen technology use and misuse from a data-informed perspective. Just to be clear, data doesn’t just mean bar charts. Over the last ten years we have formally surveyed over 12,000 middle and high school students, so yes, we have a lot of bar charts. But we have also spoken to thousands of teens in schools all around the United States (and abroad). We get emails and phone calls daily from teens, parents, educators, and others who care about the online behaviors of young people. We have done focused interviews with small groups of students. We also review research articles written by other scholars (both published and unpublished). All of these are valuable sources of data. Taken together, we can start to develop a more comprehensive understanding of what is really going on.

Some data sources are definitely better than others, and we take into consideration the quality of the source and the sophistication of the methodology when interpreting results. Randomly selecting participants from a known sample is much better, for example, than arbitrarily selecting people who happen to be at a particular place and time.

To illustrate, I was recently at a school where a teacher told me that *every* student at her school that she had talked to had “either seen or engaged in sexting.” When pressed, she admitted that this wasn’t a “scientific survey,” just a questioning of a few of the students coming out of the cafeteria one day. So she extrapolated that to estimate that “everyone” at her school was in some way involved in sexting. Of course this is ridiculous. I haven’t seen a sexting study report prevalence rates higher than 31% for receiving a “sext” and most studies put the rate in the teens. In fact the Crimes Against Children Research Center recently reported that only 7.1% of students between the ages of 10 and 17 had received a “sext” (and this was a nationally representative survey – about as good as you can get methodologically).

So whenever I find a particular statistic cited, the first thing I do is attempt to uncover the original source and then review the methodology. What was the sample? How were participants selected to be in that sample? What specific questions were asked? Take once again the issue of sexting. How exactly is “sexting” defined? If you ask teens whether they have *ever* seen a nude or semi-nude image of another person on a cell phone, the number who say yes will likely be very high (if they are being truthful). If you ask them, on the other hand, if they had seen a nude or semi-nude image of another student from their school in the last 30 days, the number will be much lower. This is the question that we asked in our research, but even it can be misinterpreted. I mean, what exactly is “semi-nude?”

This brings me to the original point of this post. I have seen too many times to count the statistic that “over 160,000 students stay home every school day due to bullying.” Here are some representative examples:

“Bullying Statistics”

“Facts About Bullying”

“Bullied to Death in America’s Schools”

“Things You Should Know About Bullying”

I have also seen it twice in the last week in summaries for bullying prevention programs being offered by experts. I even found it in a 1993 article in the New York Times. Interestingly, I see it most commonly cited in news reports and governmental reports. Do a Google search for that statistic and you will see it thousands of times. But where did it come from? It has been attributed to many different sources (ABC News, National Education Association, and several books). Most commonly, it is credited to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). At least one CDC report cites a book written in 1998 (Real boys: Rescuing our sons form the myths of boyhood by William Pollack). That book attributes the statistic to the National Association of School Psychologists, but doesn’t provide a specific citation to a specific study or source. So where did it come from? I have put the question to some of the brightest minds in the area of bullying prevention and research and nobody knows. So if anyone out there has a specific study that includes this statistic, I would love to see it.

There is no question that too many students stay home from school every day because of fear of bullying. The exact number is difficult to really know. But it does this field a disservice to mis-cite or simply report statistics without being able to substantiate them. Bullying *is* a serious problem that warrants our attention. But the case can be made for this using reliable and valid statistics, not hyperbole.

Tags: bullying, cyberbullying research, research, schools, students.
Subscribe to this blog via RSS or Email.

(13) comments