Causes of cyberbullying and its different types

Posted by John Smith on July 1st, 2019

The study of bullying prevention is relatively recent and there are few investigations that have investigated the causes of cyberbullying. To be able to contemplate the causes, several factors must be taken into account, such as:

• The values
• The education
• Emotional factors
• Social factors
• Psychological factors

However, it should be noted that children and adolescents are in full exploration of their own existence, seeking to fit into different social groups and any aspect that unravels or is different in one of them, becomes an object of ridicule. On the other hand, victims perceive that they are being harassed for the mere amusement of the harasser and self-perceiving themselves as weak or inferior.

Consequences of cyberbullying:

There are many consequences that arise when suffering or executing a situation of harassment or cyberbullying, both for the victim and for the aggressor, with suicide being the most alarming.

Consequences of cyberbullying for victims:

The emotional damage caused by these behaviors in the victims is very significant. This emotional suffering can be higher than harassment through other methods, because the harmful information is public and available during the 24 hours, being very difficult to eliminate the content. The consequences of cyberbullying are similar to the consequences of workplace bullying. The most representative consequences are the following:

• Feelings of anxiety
• Depression
• Suicidal ideation
• Stress
• Fear
• Low self-esteem
• Feelings of anger and frustration
• Feelings of helplessness
• Nervousness
• Irritability
• Sleep disorders
• Difficult to focus

Types of cyber bullying

Faced with cyberbullying, there are different forms of harassment. The types of acts in cyberbullying are:

• Exclusion: not allowing the victim to participate in a specific technological space, such as a whatsapp chat.
• Harassment: repeatedly sending offensive messages to a single person, one or more being the harasser can be given on social networks, e-mail, on the mobile phone, and etc.
• Insults: exchange of insults by both parties involved, which takes place from new technologies.
• Denigration: publishing or sharing derogatory information, which is false, of a person, disseminated via new technologies. For example: alter an image of a teenager to make it look like she is pregnant.
• Impersonation: the harasser gets access to the social profiles of the victim and in them he pretends to be the person, sending offensive or negative comments, as if he had been the victim.
• Disclosure and education: disseminate confidential information of the victim