Cyberbullying

 After this week's readings, the two things about cyberbullying that I think are the most insidious are the anonymity and the speed with which posts and messages can spread. 

In the Faucher, Cassidy, and Jackson article (2015), the authors mention these nuances of cyberbullying, in addition to others like a detachment from the victim's response and the permanent nature of online messages, that make it different from face-to-face bullying. This offers some explanation as to why it can be so virulent among young people (and of course, adults too)—the lack of connection to the person who sees the message makes it so much easier to say things one would never say in person. 

What's encouraging to me, however, is that anti-bullying programs do seem to work, at least according to both the Cyberbullying.com site and the JMIR article. I found it interesting that the results of the study discussed in the JMIR article found that males seemed to learn and be more likely to adopt prosocial behaviors in conflict resolution after going through the Screenshots curriculum, while females actually went in the opposite direction, being more likely to use verbal aggression. While these results were from a small group of students, it is an interesting finding that perhaps points to the difficulty of disrupting "mean girl" phenomena.

One point that this article also makes, which is very important, is that as students get older—in this case, get to middle school—it becomes more difficult to change strongly held social beliefs because they are turning more toward peers as the authority on social behavior, and away from adults. I think this speaks to the importance of starting anti-bullying programs young, as early as kindergarten, so that students have a strong foundation of beliefs around good digital citizenship that they build upon as they get older. 

The slide above is from Common Sense Media's Grade 2 lesson that is part of their Cyberbullying, Digital Drama, and Hate Speech digital citizenship curriculum. Common Sense has lessons for each grade and age group from K-12. 

I've seen how valuable this can be in my own family life. My older stepdaughters, ages 14 and 16, did not have consistent digital citizenship lessons in elementary school, or much modeling from other adults besides their parents about how to behave online and on social media platforms. They have had to figure out a lot on their own, and there's plenty of problematic online behaviors that we didn't even think to address because we didn't know they were occurring. One example of this is screenshotting friends' texts, and sharing them with others—I erroneously assumed they would know that's a violation of their friend's privacy, but because that's what many of their peers do, they assume that it's a normal social behavior. 

Our younger kids are between 8-10, and all have received consistent digital citizenship lessons from their schools (and they benefit from parents who have learned a lot more about how teenagers communicate online). Already I can see the differences in what they know about online communication and behavior, even though none of them have phones yet and will not until they reach high school. 

When it comes to my own future students, I would advocate strongly for ongoing digital citizenship lessons and a set curriculum for all students at my school. I would also work in additional lessons on cyberbullying and online behavior and privacy from sources like Common Sense Media. 

One other idea that was interesting to me was in the Faucher, Cassidy, and Jackson article (2015): they mentioned a finding that students wanted an anonymous way to report incidents. I think having a box in the library that students could use to submit anonymous "tips" or calls for help would offer students that outlet, while also showing that the school as a whole is committed to stopping bullying of all kinds, and that the library is a safe place for students. The box would also need to have a sign urging students to talk to me or another trusted adult in the school so they could get the help they need, but for students who aren't ready to do that, the box could be quite helpful. 

References: 

Bickham D., Moukalled S., Inyart H., Zlokower R. (2021). Evaluating a middle-school digital citizenship curriculum (Screenshots): Quasi-experimental study. JMIR Mental Health, 8(9). DOI: 10.2196/26197.

Common Sense Education. (2019). Putting a STOP to online meanness. Common Sense Education. https://www.commonsense.org/education/digital-citizenship/lesson/putting-a-stop-to-online-meanness

Faucher, C., Cassidy, W., & Jackson, M. (2015). From the sandbox to the inbox: Comparing the acts, impacts, and solutions of bullying in k-12, higher education, and the workplace. Journal Of Education And Training Studies, 3(6), 111-125.