If your child spends a lot of time online and if they are getting bullied in school, it's more than likely they will be targetted for cyberbullying. New research from UCLA and published in the September issue of "Journal of School Health" gives us more insight into the common experience of cyberbullying. Whereas previously we said that 43% of kids are being cyberbullied, this study shows the numbers are creeping up above 75%! Is cyberbullying just the nature of being an online kid?
The authors also show that certain behaviors seem to lend themselves to being a target: such as spending a lot of time online, and already being a victim of schoolyard bullying offline, and to some degree, having a webcam! While the experience of being bullied is incredibly common, these poor kids do not feel they can seek help with the problem. Fewer than 1 in 10 have reported their bullying to a parent or trusted adult. And why? It's pretty predictable. Teens do not expect parents to understand and with some justification. Often, parents overreact by removing the computer or denying the teen time to enjoy their online lives.
A more productive strategy would be to share these articles and studies with our teens and have them tell us what they think we ought to do. For example, in the study they showed that one of the most common ways teens are cyberbullied is with Instant Messaging (or IM). It's so very easy to block someone in IM and you as the parent can enforce that as a rule. If anyone is sending rude or insulting messages, or asking your teen to do something embarassing like send a photo of themselves, insist that the harasser be blocked, at least for several weeks. Allow your teen to use you as "the bad guy" to explain why they are changing their online behaviors. "Mom made me turn off IM" or "I had to move my computer to the kitchen" sounds plausible, even if the real reason is your teen wants the bullying to stop and needs to use you as an excuse.
The types of bullying found in the study include the normal name calling, teasing and embarassing photos being posted online. I found it interesting that the second most common problem included in the category of cyberbullying is my new pet peeve: password theft!