Thanks to Carol Lindberg for reaching out to share their resource on Cyberbullying. This is a subject near to our hearts and very privileged to share such a resource the covers many areas of cyberbullying including, What is Cyberbullying, Five Ws of Cyberbullying (below), Types of Cyberbullying, Effects of Cyberbullying, information for victims of Cyberbullying and helping them plus questions to ask when Cyberbullying occurs.

The Five W’s of Cyberbullying

The 5 W’s of cyberbullying describes the where, when, who, why, and what of cyber bullying. This in-depth process is discussed in more detail below.

Where?

It is important to understand where the bullying takes place. Cyber bullies hide online because that is the place with the least amount of supervision. There are people of all kinds on the internet, each of them susceptible to one form of abuse or the other.

There is a wide market variety of cyber bullies to choose from, so people are advised to be careful when surfing the net. Traditionally, bullies would attack their victims on the bus ride home, during the lunch hour, in the school bathroom, or on the playground. The playing field has now been taken online, making it harder for the bullies to be flushed out and brought to justice.

Why?

People often wonder why the bullies pick them out of all the millions of people on the internet.  Most people bully because of feelings of jealousy, fear, distrust and the overall need for a cool or popular image.

Bullies may feel their behavior will make fellow students respect them or think they are funny, or they may not be held accountable for their unacceptable behavior by their parents. In addition, students who face physical, mental, or verbal abuse at home tend to copy these behaviors and interact with their classmates the same way, just to channel their vulnerability. 

When?

Twenty-eight percent of school children are bullied on a regular basis, yet bullying is more prevalent in some ages than others. Over 44% of the students in middle school have been made fun of, or worse still, called names, while 27% indicate that they have been threatened by classmates at some point. This is according to data obtained from a study conducted by NoBullying in 2015. 37% of those in the sixth grade report being bullied, but only 22% high school seniors faced abuse at school. These statistics were recorded by a research conducted by the National Center for Education.

Who?

Ethnicity and race are among the driving force, though the study indicated that minorities are likely to experience the same bullying, regardless of ethnic background. Students who identify as lesbian, gay, bisexual or transgender (LGBT) are at a much higher risk for being targeted. 3% of LGBT students missed at least one day of school in the past month because they felt unsafe, while 10.6 percent missed four or more days in the same time-frame.

What?

So just what does bullying look like? Forms of harassment within the internet include abusive text messages and attacks via social media. This is in addition to the face to face aggression that students have to deal with today. Bullying takes many different forms, and while all children may be prone to mischievous or mean behavior at times – WebMD notes one of the defining features of bullying is repetition. Bullying is many things, but it is not an isolated incident.

Visit A Real Online Degree’s post on Cyberbullying which details types of Cyberbullying, the effect of Cyberbullying and how victims can be supported.