Phenomenon of cyber bullying among school students in relation to gender and socioeconomic background

Abstract

The harassment of a person through the means of internet-based communication technologies like SMS, MMS, instant message apps, social media platforms, email, voice calling, videogames etc is called cyberbullying. The study investigated the incidence of cyberbullying among school students. The three dimensions of cyber bullying are cyber victimisation, cyber perpetration and cyber bystanding. The association between the three cyberbullying dimensions among school students was probed. The association of the three cyberbullying dimensions with gender and socioeconomic background was investigated. The Sequential Explanatory Research Design was followed. The study included both quantitative and qualitative phases which were then integrated to derive meaningful conclusions. Self-developed Incidence of Cyberbullying Questionnaire and self-developed Interview Schedule for In-Depth Analysis of Cyberbullying were the tools used to gather data for the study. A nested sampling approach was used for this study where the sample for the qualitative phase was obtained from the sample of the quantitative phase. For the quantitative phase, Chandigarh was divided into six zones based on location. Quantitative data was collected from 829 senior secondary school students from 22 schools, consisting of 12 government schools and 10 private schools. The results of the quantitative phase led to the identification of the students for the qualitative phase. The sample for the qualitative phase consisted of 15 students, five from high ranks of each dimension of cyberbullying. Analysis of the quantitative data was done using descriptive statistics and chi square. For the qualitative phase, thematic analysis of in-depth interviews of students was done. The results indicated that students experienced low cyber victimisation and also demonstrated low cyber perpetration behaviour. High cyber bystanding behaviour was observed. A significant association was found between all three dimensions of cyberbullying.