cyber bullying problem on social media research paper

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Cyberbullying Among Adolescents and Children: A Comprehensive Review of the Global Situation, Risk Factors, and Preventive Measures

Chengyan zhu.

1 School of Political Science and Public Administration, Wuhan University, Wuhan, China

Shiqing Huang

2 School of Medicine and Health Management, Tongji Medical College, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan, China

Richard Evans

3 College of Engineering, Design and Physical Sciences, Brunel University London, Uxbridge, United Kingdom

Associated Data

The original contributions presented in the study are included in the article/ Supplementary Material , further inquiries can be directed to the corresponding author/s.

Background: Cyberbullying is well-recognized as a severe public health issue which affects both adolescents and children. Most extant studies have focused on national and regional effects of cyberbullying, with few examining the global perspective of cyberbullying. This systematic review comprehensively examines the global situation, risk factors, and preventive measures taken worldwide to fight cyberbullying among adolescents and children.

Methods: A systematic review of available literature was completed following PRISMA guidelines using the search themes “cyberbullying” and “adolescent or children”; the time frame was from January 1st, 2015 to December 31st, 2019. Eight academic databases pertaining to public health, and communication and psychology were consulted, namely: Web of Science, Science Direct, PubMed, Google Scholar, ProQuest, Communication & Mass Media Complete, CINAHL, and PsycArticles. Additional records identified through other sources included the references of reviews and two websites, Cyberbullying Research Center and United Nations Children's Fund. A total of 63 studies out of 2070 were included in our final review focusing on cyberbullying prevalence and risk factors.

Results: The prevalence rates of cyberbullying preparation ranged from 6.0 to 46.3%, while the rates of cyberbullying victimization ranged from 13.99 to 57.5%, based on 63 references. Verbal violence was the most common type of cyberbullying. Fourteen risk factors and three protective factors were revealed in this study. At the personal level, variables associated with cyberbullying including age, gender, online behavior, race, health condition, past experience of victimization, and impulsiveness were reviewed as risk factors. Likewise, at the situational level, parent-child relationship, interpersonal relationships, and geographical location were also reviewed in relation to cyberbullying. As for protective factors, empathy and emotional intelligence, parent-child relationship, and school climate were frequently mentioned.

Conclusion: The prevalence rate of cyberbullying has increased significantly in the observed 5-year period, and it is imperative that researchers from low and middle income countries focus sufficient attention on cyberbullying of children and adolescents. Despite a lack of scientific intervention research on cyberbullying, the review also identified several promising strategies for its prevention from the perspectives of youths, parents and schools. More research on cyberbullying is needed, especially on the issue of cross-national cyberbullying. International cooperation, multi-pronged and systematic approaches are highly encouraged to deal with cyberbullying.

Introduction

Childhood and adolescence are not only periods of growth, but also of emerging risk taking. Young people during these periods are particularly vulnerable and cannot fully understand the connection between behaviors and consequences ( 1 ). With peer pressures, the heat of passion, children and adolescents usually perform worse than adults when people are required to maintain self-discipline to achieve good results in unfamiliar situations. Impulsiveness, sensation seeking, thrill seeking, and other individual differences cause adolescents to risk rejecting standardized risk interventions ( 2 ).

About one-third of Internet users in the world are children and adolescents under the age of 18 ( 3 ). Digital technology provide a new form of interpersonal communication ( 4 ). However, surveys and news reports also show another picture in the Internet Age. The dark side of young people's internet usage is that they may bully or suffer from others' bullying in cyberspace. This behavior is also acknowledged as cyberbullying ( 5 ). Based on Olweus's definition, cyberbullying is usually regarded as bullying implemented through electronic media ( 6 , 7 ). Specifically, cyberbullying among children and adolescents can be summarized as the intentional and repeated harm from one or more peers that occurs in cyberspace caused by the use of computers, smartphones and other devices ( 4 , 8 – 12 ). In recent years, new forms of cyberbullying behaviors have emerged, such as cyberstalking and online dating abuse ( 13 – 15 ).

Although cyberbullying is still a relatively new field of research, cyberbullying among adolescents is considered to be a serious public health issue that is closely related to adolescents' behavior, mental health and development ( 16 , 17 ). The increasing rate of Internet adoption worldwide and the popularity of social media platforms among the young people have worsened this situation with most children and adolescents experiencing cyberbullying or online victimization during their lives. The confines of space and time are alleviated for bullies in virtual environments, creating new venues for cyberbullying with no geographical boundaries ( 6 ). Cyberbullying exerts negative effects on many aspects of young people's lives, including personal privacy invasion and psychological disorders. The influence of cyberbullying may be worse than traditional bullying as perpetrators can act anonymously and connect easily with children and adolescents at any time ( 18 ). In comparison with traditional victims, those bullied online show greater levels of depression, anxiety and loneliness ( 19 ). Self-esteem problems and school absenteeism have also proven to be related to cyberbullying ( 20 ).

Due to changes in use and behavioral patterns among the youth on social media, the manifestations and risk factors of cyberbullying have faced significant transformation. Further, as the boundaries of cyberbullying are not limited by geography, cyberbullying may not be a problem contained within a single country. In this sense, cyberbullying is a global problem and tackling it requires greater international collaboration. The adverse effects caused by cyberbullying, including reduced safety, lower educational attainment, poorer mental health and greater unhappiness, led UNICEF to state that “no child is absolutely safe in the digital world” ( 3 ).

Extant research has examined the prevalence and risk factors of cyberbullying to unravel the complexity of cyberbullying across different countries and their corresponding causes. However, due to variations in cyberbullying measurement and methodologies, no consistent conclusions have been drawn ( 21 ). Studies into inconsistencies in prevalence rates of cyberbullying, measured in the same country during the same time period, occur frequently. Selkie et al. systematically reviewed cyberbullying among American middle and high school students aged 10–19 years old in 2015, and revealed that the prevalence of cyberbullying victimization ranged from 3 to 72%, while perpetration ranged from 1 to 41% ( 22 ). Risk and protective factors have also been broadly studied, but confirmation is still needed of those factors which have more significant effects on cyberbullying among young people. Clarification of these issues would be useful to allow further research to recognize cyberbullying more accurately.

This review aims to extend prior contributions and provide a comprehensive review of cyberbullying of children and adolescents from a global perspective, with the focus being on prevalence, associated risk factors and protective factors across countries. It is necessary to provide a global panorama based on research syntheses to fill the gaps in knowledge on this topic.

Search Strategies

This study strictly employed Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses (PRISMA) guidelines. We consulted eight academic databases pertaining to public health, and communication and psychology, namely: Web of Science, Science Direct, PubMed, Google Scholar, ProQuest, Communication & Mass Media Complete, CINAHL, and PsycArticles. Additional records identified through other sources included the references of reviews and two websites, Cyberbullying Research Center and United Nations Children's Fund. With regard to the duration of our review, since most studies on cyberbullying arose around 2015 ( 9 , 21 ), this study highlights the complementary aspects of the available information about cyberbullying during the recent 5 year period from January 1st, 2015 to December 31st, 2019.

One researcher extracted keywords and two researchers proposed modifications. We used two sets of subject terms to review articles, “cyberbullying” and “child OR adolescent.” Some keywords that refer to cyberbullying behaviors and young people are also included, such as threat, harass, intimidate, abuse, insult, humiliate, condemn, isolate, embarrass, forgery, slander, flame, stalk, manhunt, as well as teen, youth, young people and student. The search formula is (cyberbullying OR cyber-bullying OR cyber-aggression OR ((cyber OR online OR electronic OR Internet) AND (bully * OR aggres * OR violence OR perpetrat * OR victim * OR threat * OR harass * OR intimidat * OR * OR insult * OR humiliate * OR condemn * OR isolate * OR embarrass * OR forgery OR slander * OR flame OR stalk * OR manhunt))) AND (adolescen * OR child OR children OR teen? OR teenager? OR youth? OR “young people” OR “elementary school student * ” OR “middle school student * ” OR “high school student * ”). The main search approach is title search. Search strategies varied according to the database consulted, and we did not limit the type of literature for inclusion. Journals, conference papers and dissertations are all available.

Specifically, the inclusion criteria for our study were as follows: (a). reported or evaluated the prevalence and possible risk factors associated with cyberbullying, (b). respondents were students under the age of 18 or in primary, junior or senior high schools, and (c). studies were written in English. Exclusion criteria were: (a). respondents came from specific groups, such as clinical samples, children with disabilities, sexual minorities, specific ethnic groups, specific faith groups or samples with cross-national background, (b). review studies, qualitative studies, conceptual studies, book reviews, news reports or abstracts of meetings, and (c). studies focused solely on preventive measures that were usually meta-analytic and qualitative in nature. Figure 1 presents the details of the employed screening process, showing that a total of 63 studies out of 2070 were included in our final review.

PRISMA flow chart diagram showing the process of study selection for inclusion in the systematic review on children and adolescents cyberbullying.

Meta-analysis was not conducted as the limited research published within the 5 years revealed little research which reported odds ratio. On the other hand, due to the inconsistency of concepts, measuring instruments and recall periods, considerable variation could be found in research quality ( 23 ). Meta-analysis is not a preferred method.

Coding Scheme

For coding, we created a comprehensive code scheme to include the characteristics. For cyberbullying, we coded five types proposed by Willard ( 24 – 26 ), which included verbal violence, group violence, visual violence, impersonating and account forgery, and other behaviors. Among them, verbal violence is considered one of the most common types of cyberbullying and refers to the behavior of offensive responses, insults, mocking, threats, slander, and harassment. Group violence is associated with preventing others from joining certain groups or isolating others, forcing others to leave the group. Visual violence relates to the release and sharing of embarrassing photos and information without the owners' consent. Impersonating and account forgery refers to identity theft, stealing passwords, violating accounts and the creation of fake accounts to fraudulently present the behavior of others. Other behaviors include disclosure of privacy, sexual harassment, and cyberstalking. To comprehensively examine cyberbullying, we coded cyberbullying behaviors from both the perspectives of cyberbullying perpetrators and victims, if mentioned in the studies.

In relation to risk factors, we drew insights from the general aggression model, which contributes to the understanding of personal and situational factors in the cyberbullying of children and adolescents. We chose the general aggression model because (a) it contains more situational factors than other models (e.g., social ecological models) - such as school climate ( 9 ), and (b) we believe that the general aggression model is more suitable for helping researchers conduct a systematic review of cyberbullying risk and protective factors. This model provides a comprehensive framework that integrates domain specific theories of aggression, and has been widely applied in cyberbullying research ( 27 ). For instance, Kowalski and colleagues proposed a cyberbullying encounter through the general aggression model to understand the formation and development process of youth cyberbullying related to both victimization and perpetration ( 9 ). Victims and perpetrators enter the cyberbullying encounter with various individual characteristics, experiences, attitudes, desires, personalities, and motives that intersect to determine the course of the interaction. Correspondingly, the antecedents pertaining to cyberbullying are divided into two broad categories, personal factors and situational factors. Personal factors refer to individual characteristics, such as gender, age, motivation, personality, psychological states, socioeconomic status and technology use, values and perceptions, and other maladaptive behaviors. Situational factors focus on the provocation/support, parental involvement, school climate, and perceived anonymity. Consequently, our coders related to risk factors consisting of personal factors and situational factors from the perspectives of both cyberbullying perpetrators and victims.

We extracted information relating to individual papers and sample characteristics, including authors, year of publication, country, article type, sampling procedures, sample characteristics, measures of cyberbullying, and prevalence and risk factors from both cyberbullying perpetration and victimization perspectives. The key words extraction and coding work were performed twice by two trained research assistants in health informatics. The consistency test results are as follows: the Kappa value with “personal factors” was 0.932, and the Kappa value with “situational factors” was 0.807. The result shows that the coding consistency was high enough and acceptable. Disagreements were resolved through discussion with other authors.

Quality Assessment of Studies

The quality assessment of the studies is based on the recommended tool for assessing risk of bias, Cochrane Collaboration. This quality assessment tool focused on seven items: random sequence generation, allocation concealment, blinding of participants and personnel, blinding of outcome assessment, incomplete outcome data, selective reporting, and other sources of bias ( 28 ). We assessed each item as “low risk,” “high risk,” and “unclear” for included studies. A study is considered of “high quality” when it meets three or more “low risk” requirements. When one or more main flaw of a study may affect the research results, the study is considered as “low quality.” When a lack of information leads to a difficult judgement, the quality is considered to be “unclear.” Please refer to Appendix 1 for more details.

This comprehensive systematic review comprised a total of 63 studies. Appendices 2 , 3 show the descriptive information of the studies included. Among them, 58 (92%) studies measured two or more cyberbullying behavior types. The sample sizes of the youths range from several hundred to tens of thousands, with one thousand to five thousand being the most common. As for study distribution, the United States of America, Spain and China were most frequently mentioned. Table 1 presents the detail.

Descriptive information of studies included (2015–2019).

Prevalence of Global Cyberbullying

Prevalence across countries.

Among the 63 studies included, 22 studies reported on cyberbullying prevalence and 20 studies reported on prevalence from victimization and perpetration perspectives, respectively. Among the 20 studies, 11 national studies indicated that the prevalence of cyberbullying victimization and cyberbullying perpetration ranged from 14.6 to 52.2% and 6.3 to 32%, respectively. These studies were conducted in the United States of America ( N = 4) ( 29 – 32 ), South Korea ( N = 3) ( 33 – 35 ), Singapore ( N = 1) ( 36 ), Malaysia ( N = 1) ( 37 ), Israel ( N = 1) ( 38 ), and Canada ( N = 1) ( 39 ). Only one of these 11 national studies is from an upper middle income country, and the rest are from highincome countries identified by the World Bank ( 40 ). By combining regional and community-level studies, the prevalence of cyberbullying victimization and cyberbullying perpetration ranged from 13.99 to 57.5% and 6.0 to 46.3%, respectively. Spain reported the highest prevalence of cyberbullying victimization (57.5%) ( 41 ), followed by Malaysia (52.2%) ( 37 ), Israel (45%) ( 42 ), and China (44.5%) ( 43 ). The lowest reported victim rates were observed in Canada (13.99%) and South Korea (14.6%) ( 34 , 39 ). The reported prevalence of cyberbullying victimization in the United States of America ranged from 15.5 to 31.4% ( 29 , 44 ), while in Israel, rates ranged from 30 to 45% ( 26 , 42 ). In China, rates ranged from 6 to 46.3% with the country showing the highest prevalence of cyberbullying perpetration (46.30%) ( 15 , 43 , 45 , 46 ). Canadian and South Korean studies reported the lowest prevalence of cyberbullying perpetration at 7.99 and 6.3%, respectively ( 34 , 39 ).

A total of 10 studies were assessed as high quality studies. Among them, six studies came from high income countries, including Canada, Germany, Italy, Portugal, and South Korea ( 13 , 34 , 39 , 46 – 48 ). Three studies were from upper middle income countries, including Malaysia and China ( 37 , 43 ) and one from a lower middle income country, Nigeria ( 49 ). Figures 2 , ​ ,3 3 describe the prevalence of cyberbullying victimization and perpetration respectively among high quality studies.

The prevalence of cyberbullying victimization of high quality studies.

The prevalence of cyberbullying perpetration of high quality studies.

Prevalence of Various Cyberbullying Behaviors

For the prevalence of cyberbullying victimization and perpetration, the data were reported in 18 and 14 studies, respectively. Figure 4 shows the distribution characteristics of the estimated value of prevalence of different cyberbullying behaviors with box plots. The longer the box, the greater the degree of variation of the numerical data and vice versa. The rate of victimization and crime of verbal violence, as well as the rate of victimization of other behaviors, such as cyberstalking and digital dating abuse, has a large degree of variation. Among the four specified types of cyberbullying behaviors, verbal violence was regarded as the most commonly reported behaviors in both perpetration and victimization rates, with a wide range of prevalence, ranging from 5 to 18%. Fewer studies reported the prevalence data for visual violence and group violence. Studies also showed that the prevalence of impersonation and account forgery were within a comparatively small scale. Specific results were as follows.

Cyberbullying prevalence across types (2015–2019).

Verbal Violence

A total of 13 studies reported verbal violence prevalence data ( 15 , 26 , 34 , 37 – 39 , 42 , 43 , 47 , 48 , 50 , 51 ). Ten studies reported the prevalence of verbal violence victimization ranging from 2.8 to 47.5%, while seven studies claimed perpetration prevalence ranging from 1.5 to 31.8%. Malaysia reported the highest prevalence of verbal violence victimization (47.5%) ( 37 ), followed by China (32%) ( 43 ). China reported that the prevalence of verbal violence victimization ranged from 5.1 to 32% ( 15 , 43 ). Israel reported that the prevalence of verbal violence victimization ranged from 3.4 to 18% ( 26 , 38 , 42 ). For perpetration rate, Malaysia reported the highest level at 31.8% ( 37 ), while a study for Spain reported the lowest, ranging from 3.2 to 6.4% ( 51 ).

Group Violence

The prevalence of group violence victimization was explored within 4 studies and ranged from 5 to 17.8% ( 26 , 34 , 42 , 43 ), while perpetration prevalence was reported in three studies, ranging from 10.1 to 19.07% ( 34 , 43 , 47 ). An Israeli study suggested that 9.8% of respondents had been excluded from the Internet, while 8.9% had been refused entry to a group or team ( 26 ). A study in South Korea argued that the perpetration prevalence of group violence was 10.1% ( 34 ), while a study in Italy reported that the rate of online group violence against others was 19.07% ( 47 ).

Visual Violence

The prevalence of visual violence victimization was explored within three studies and ranged from 2.6 to 12.1% ( 26 , 34 , 43 ), while the perpetration prevalence reported in four studies ranged from 1.7 to 6% ( 34 , 43 , 47 , 48 ). For victimization prevalence, a South Korean study found that 12.1% of respondents reported that their personal information was leaked online ( 34 ). An Israel study reported that the prevalence of outing the picture was 2.6% ( 26 ). For perpetration prevalence, a South Korean study found that 1.7% of respondents had reported that they had disclosed someone's personal information online ( 34 ). A German study reported that 6% of respondents had written a message (e.g., an email) to somebody using a fake identity ( 48 ).

Impersonating and Account Forgery

Four studies reported on the victimization prevalence of impersonating and account forgery, ranging from 1.1 to 10% ( 15 , 42 , 43 ), while five studies reported on perpetration prevalence, with the range being from 1.3 to 9.31% ( 15 , 43 , 47 , 48 , 51 ). In a Spanish study, 10% of respondents reported that their accounts had been infringed by others or that they could not access their account due to stolen passwords. In contrast, 4.5% of respondents reported that they had infringed other people's accounts or stolen passwords, with 2.5% stating that they had forged other people's accounts ( 51 ). An Israeli study reported that the prevalence of being impersonated was 7% ( 42 ), while in China, a study reported this to be 8.6% ( 43 ). Another study from China found that 1.1% of respondents had been impersonated to send dating-for-money messages ( 15 ).

Other Behaviors

The prevalence of disclosure of privacy, sexual harassment, and cyberstalking were also explored by scholars. Six studies reported the victimization prevalence of other cyberbullying behaviors ( 13 , 15 , 34 , 37 , 42 , 43 ), and four studies reported on perpetration prevalence ( 34 , 37 , 43 , 48 ). A study in China found that 1.2% of respondents reported that their privacy had been compromised without permission due to disputes ( 15 ). A study from China reported the prevalence of cyberstalking victimization was 11.9% ( 43 ), while a Portuguese study reported that this was 62% ( 13 ). In terms of perpetration prevalence, a Malaysian study reported 2.7% for sexual harassment ( 37 ).

Risk and Protective Factors of Cyberbullying

In terms of the risk factors associated with cyberbullying among children and adolescents, this comprehensive review highlighted both personal and situational factors. Personal factors referred to age, gender, online behavior, race, health conditions, past experiences of victimization, and impulsiveness, while situational factors consisted of parent-child relationship, interpersonal relationships, and geographical location. In addition, protective factors against cyberbullying included: empathy and emotional intelligence, parent-child relationship, and school climate. Table 2 shows the risk and protective factors for child and adolescent cyberbullying.

Risk and protective factors of cyberbullying among children and adolescents.

In terms of the risk factors associated with cyberbullying victimization at the personal level, many studies evidenced that females were more likely to be cyberbullied than males ( 13 , 26 , 29 , 38 , 43 , 52 , 54 , 55 , 58 ). Meanwhile, adolescents with mental health problems ( 61 ), such as depression ( 33 , 62 ), borderline personality disorder ( 63 ), eating disorders ( 41 ), sleep deprivation ( 56 ), and suicidal thoughts and suicide plans ( 64 ), were more likely to be associated with cyberbullying victimization. As for Internet usage, researchers agreed that youth victims were probably those that spent more time online than their counterparts ( 32 , 36 , 43 , 45 , 48 , 49 , 60 ). For situational risk factors, some studies have proven the relationship between cyberbullying victims and parental abuse, parental neglect, family dysfunction, inadequate monitoring, and parents' inconsistency in mediation, as well as communication issues ( 33 , 64 , 68 , 73 ). In terms of geographical location, some studies have reported that youths residing in city locations are more likely to be victims of cyberbullying than their peers from suburban areas ( 61 ).

Regarding the risk factors of cyberbullying perpetration at the personal level, it is generally believed that older teenagers, especially those aged over 15 years, are at greater risk of becoming cyberbullying perpetrators ( 55 , 67 ). When considering prior cyberbullying experiences, evidence showed that individuals who had experienced cyberbullying or face-to-face bullying tended to be aggressors in cyberbullying ( 35 , 42 , 49 , 51 , 55 ); in addition, the relationship between impulsiveness and cyberbullying perpetration was also explored by several pioneering scholars ( 55 , 72 , 80 ). The situational factors highlight the role of parents and teachers in cyberbullying experiences. For example, over-control and authoritarian parenting styles, as well as inharmonious teacher-student relationships ( 61 ) are perceived to lead to cyberbullying behaviors ( 74 , 75 ). In terms of differences in geographical locations, students residing in cities have a higher rate of online harassment than students living in more rural locations ( 49 ).

In terms of the protective factors in child and adolescent cyberbullying, scholars have focused on youths who have limited experiences of cyberbullying. At the personal level, high emotional intelligence, an ability for emotional self-control and empathy, such as cognitive empathy ability ( 44 , 55 ), were associated with lower rates of cyberbullying ( 57 ). At the situational level, a parent's role is seen as critical. For example, intimate parent-child relationships ( 46 ) and open active communication ( 19 ) were demonstrated to be related to lower experiences of cyberbullying and perpetration. Some scholars argued that parental supervision and monitoring of children's online activities can reduce their tendency to participate in some negative activities associated with cyberbullying ( 31 , 46 , 73 ). They further claimed that an authoritative parental style protects youths against cyberbullying ( 43 ). Conversely, another string of studies evidenced that parents' supervision of Internet usage was meaningless ( 45 ). In addition to conflicting roles of parental supervision, researchers have also looked into the role of schools, and posited that positive school climates contribute to less cyberbullying experiences ( 61 , 79 ).

Some risk factors may be protective factors under another condition. Some studies suggest that parental aggressive communication is related to severe cyberbullying victims, while open communication is a potential protective factor ( 19 ). Parental neglect, parental abuse, parental inconsistency in supervision of adolescents' online behavior, and family dysfunction are related to the direct or indirect harm of cyberbullying ( 33 , 68 ). Parental participation, a good parental-children relationship, communication and dialogue can enhance children's school adaptability and prevent cyberbullying behaviors ( 31 , 74 ). When parental monitoring reaches a balance between control and openness, it could become a protective factor against cyberbullying, and it could be a risk factor, if parental monitoring is too low or over-controlled ( 47 ).

Despite frequent discussion about the risk factors associated with cyberbullying among children and adolescents, some are still deemed controversial factors, such as age, race, gender, and the frequency of suffering on the internet. For cyberbullying victims, some studies claim that older teenagers are more vulnerable to cyberbullying ( 15 , 38 , 52 , 53 ), while other studies found conflicting results ( 26 , 33 ). As for student race, Alhajji et al. argued that non-white students were less likely to report cyberbullying ( 29 ), while Morin et al. observed no significant correlation between race and cyberbullying ( 52 ). For cyberbullying perpetration, Alvarez-Garcia found that gender differences may have indirect effects on cyberbullying perpetration ( 55 ), while others disagreed ( 42 , 61 , 68 – 70 ). Specifically, some studies revealed that males were more likely to become cyberbullying perpetrators ( 34 , 39 , 56 ), while Khurana et al. presented an opposite point of view, proposing that females were more likely to attack others ( 71 ). In terms of time spent on the Internet, some claimed that students who frequently surf the Internet had a higher chance of becoming perpetrators ( 49 ), while others stated that there was no clear and direct association between Internet usage and cyberbullying perpetration ( 55 ).

In addition to personal and situational factors, scholars have also explored other specific factors pertaining to cyberbullying risk and protection. For instance, mindfulness and depression were found to be significantly related to cyber perpetration ( 76 ), while eating disorder psychopathology in adolescents was associated with cyber victimization ( 41 ). For males who were familiar with their victims, such as family members, friends and acquaintances, they were more likely to be cyberstalking perpetrators than females or strangers, while pursuing desired closer relationships ( 13 ). In the school context, a lower social likability in class was identified as an indirect factor for cyberbullying ( 48 ).

This comprehensive review has established that the prevalence of global childhood and adolescent victimization from cyberbullying ranges from 13.99 to 57.5%, and that the perpetration prevalence ranges from 6.0 to 46.3%. Across the studies included in our research, verbal violence is observed as one of the most common acts of cyberbullying, including verbal offensive responses, insults, mocking, threats, slander, and harassment. The victimization prevalence of verbal violence is reported to be between 5 and 47.5%, and the perpetration prevalence is between 3.2 and 26.1%. Personal factors, such as gender, frequent use of social media platforms, depression, borderline personality disorder, eating disorders, sleep deprivation, and suicidal tendencies, were generally considered to be related to becoming a cyberbullying victim. Personal factors, such as high school students, past experiences, impulse, improperly controlled family education, poor teacher-student relationships, and the urban environment, were considered risk factors for cyberbullying perpetration. Situational factors, including parental abuse and neglect, improper monitoring, communication barriers between parents and children, as well as the urban environment, were also seen to potentially contribute to higher risks of both cyberbullying victimization and perpetration.

Increasing Prevalence of Global Cyberbullying With Changing Social Media Landscape and Measurement Alterations

This comprehensive review suggests that global cyberbullying rates, in terms of victimization and perpetration, were on the rise during the 5 year period, from 2015 to 2019. For example, in an earlier study conducted by Modecki et al. the average cyberbullying involvement rate was 15% ( 81 ). Similar observations were made by Hamm et al. who found that the median rates of youth having experienced bullying or who had bullied others online, was 23 and 15.2%, respectively ( 82 ). However, our systematic review summarized global children and adolescents cyberbullying in the last 5 years and revealed an average cyberbullying perpetration rate of 25.03%, ranging from 6.0 to 46.3%, while the average victimization was 33.08%, ranging from 13.99 to 57.5%. The underlying reason for increases may be attributed to the rapid changing landscape of social media and, in recent years, the drastic increase in Internet penetration rates. With the rise in Internet access, youths have greater opportunities to participate in online activities, provided by emerging social media platforms.

Although our review aims to provide a broader picture of cyberbullying, it is well-noted in extant research that difficulties exist in accurately estimating variations in prevalence in different countries ( 23 , 83 ). Many reasons exist to explain this. The first largely relates poor or unclear definition of the term cyberbullying; this hinders the determination of cyberbullying victimization and perpetration ( 84 ). Although traditional bullying behavior is well-defined, the definition cannot directly be applied to the virtual environment due to the complexity in changing online interactions. Without consensus on definitions, measurement and cyberbullying types may vary noticeably ( 83 , 85 ). Secondly, the estimation of prevalence of cyberbullying is heavily affected by research methods, such as recall period (lifetime, last year, last 6 months, last month, or last week etc.), demographic characteristics of the survey sample (age, gender, race, etc.), perspectives of cyberbullying experiences (victims, perpetrators, or both victim and perpetrator), and instruments (scales, study-specific questions) ( 23 , 84 , 86 ). The variety in research tools and instruments used to assess the prevalence of cyberbullying can cause confusion on this issue ( 84 ). Thirdly, variations in economic development, cultural backgrounds, human values, internet penetration rates, and frequency of using social media may lead to different conclusions across countries ( 87 ).

Acknowledging the Conflicting Role of the Identified Risk Factors With More Research Needed to Establish the Causality

Although this review has identified many personal and situational factors associated with cyberbullying, the majority of studies adopted a cross-sectional design and failed to reveal the causality ( 21 ). Nevertheless, knowledge on these correlational relationships provide valuable insights for understanding and preventing cyberbullying incidents. In terms of gender differences, females are believed to be at a higher risk of cyberbullying victimization compared to males. Two reasons may help to explain this. First, the preferred violence behaviors between two genders. females prefer indirect harassment, such as the spreading of rumors, while males tend toward direct bullying (e.g., assault) ( 29 ) and second, the cultural factors. From the traditional gender perspective, females tended to perceive a greater risk of communicating with others on the Internet, while males were more reluctant to express fear, vulnerability and insecurity when asked about their cyberbullying experiences ( 46 ). Females were more intolerant when experiencing cyberstalking and were more likely to report victimization experiences than males ( 13 ). Meanwhile, many researchers suggested that females are frequent users of emerging digital communication platforms, which increases their risk of unpleasant interpersonal contact and violence. From the perspective of cultural norms and masculinity, the reporting of cyberbullying is also widely acknowledged ( 37 ). For example, in addition, engaging in online activities is also regarded as a critical predictor for cyberbullying victimization. Enabled by the Internet, youths can easily find potential victims and start harassment at any time ( 49 ). Participating in online activities directly increases the chance of experiencing cyberbullying victimization and the possibility of becoming a victim ( 36 , 45 ). As for age, earlier involvement on social media and instant messaging tools may increase the chances of experiencing cyberbullying. For example, in Spain, these tools cannot be used without parental permission before the age of 14 ( 55 ). Besides, senior students were more likely to be more impulsive and less sympathetic. They may portray more aggressive and anti-social behaviors ( 55 , 72 ); hence senior students and students with higher impulsivity were usually more likely to become cyberbullying perpetrators.

Past experiences of victimization and family-related factors are another risk for cyberbullying crime. As for past experiences, one possible explanation is that young people who had experienced online or traditional school bullying may commit cyberbullying using e-mails, instant messages, and text messages for revenge, self-protection, or improving their social status ( 35 , 42 , 49 , 55 ). In becoming a cyberbullying perpetrator, the student may feel more powerful and superior, externalizing angry feelings and relieving the feelings of helplessness and sadness produced by past victimization experiences ( 51 ). As for family related factors, parenting styles are proven to be highly correlated to cyberbullying. In authoritative families, parents focus on rational behavioral control with clear rules and a high component of supervision and parental warmth, which have beneficial effects on children's lifestyles ( 43 ). Conversely, in indulgent families, children's behaviors are not heavily restricted and parents guide and encourage their children to adapt to society. The characteristics of this indulgent style, including parental support, positive communication, low imposition, and emotional expressiveness, possibly contribute to more parent-child trust and less misunderstanding ( 75 ). The protective role of warmth/affection and appropriate supervision, which are common features of authoritative or indulgent parenting styles, mitigate youth engagement in cyberbullying. On the contrary, authoritarian and neglectful styles, whether with excessive or insufficient control, are both proven to be risk factors for being a target of cyberbullying ( 33 , 76 ). In terms of geographical location, although several studies found that children residing in urban areas were more likely to be cyberbullying victims than those living in rural or suburban areas, we cannot draw a quick conclusion here, since whether this difference attributes to macro-level differences, such as community safety or socioeconomic status, or micro-level differences, such as teacher intervention in the classroom, courses provided, teacher-student ratio, is unclear across studies ( 61 ). An alternative explanation for this is the higher internet usage rate in urban areas ( 49 ).

Regarding health conditions, especially mental health, some scholars believe that young people with health problems are more likely to be identified as victims than people without health problems. They perceive health condition as a risk factor for cyberbullying ( 61 , 63 ). On the other hand, another group of scholars believe that cyberbullying has an important impact on the mental health of adolescents which can cause psychological distress consequences, such as post-traumatic stress mental disorder, depression, suicidal ideation, and drug abuse ( 70 , 87 ). It is highly possible that mental health could be risk factors, consequences of cyberbullying or both. Mental health cannot be used as standards, requirements, or decisive responses in cyberbullying research ( 13 ).

The Joint Effort Between Youth, Parents, Schools, and Communities to Form a Cyberbullying-Free Environment

This comprehensive review suggests that protecting children and adolescents from cyberbullying requires joint efforts between individuals, parents, schools, and communities, to form a cyberbullying-free environment. For individuals, young people are expected to improve their digital technology capabilities, especially in the use of social media platforms and instant messaging tools ( 55 ). To reduce the number of cyberbullying perpetrators, it is necessary to cultivate emotional self-regulation ability through appropriate emotional management training. Moreover, teachers, counselors, and parents are required to be armed with sufficient knowledge of emotional management and to develop emotional management capabilities and skills. In this way, they can be alert to the aggressive or angry emotions expressed by young people, and help them mediate any negative emotions ( 45 ), and avoid further anti-social behaviors ( 57 ).

For parents, styles of parenting involving a high level of parental involvement, care and support, are desirable in reducing the possibility of children's engagement in cyberbullying ( 74 , 75 ). If difficulties are encountered, open communication can contribute to enhancing the sense of security ( 73 ). In this vein, parents should be aware of the importance of caring, communicating and supervising their children, and participate actively in their children's lives ( 71 ). In order to keep a balance between control and openness ( 47 ), parents can engage in unbiased open communication with their children, and reach an agreement on the usage of computers and smart phones ( 34 , 35 , 55 ). Similarly, it is of vital importance to establish a positive communication channel with children ( 19 ).

For schools, a higher priority is needed to create a safe and positive campus environment, providing students with learning opportunities and ensuring that every student is treated equally. With a youth-friendly environment, students are able to focus more on their academic performance and develop a strong sense of belonging to the school ( 79 ). For countries recognizing collectivist cultural values, such as China and India, emphasizing peer attachment and a sense of collectivism can reduce the risk of cyberbullying perpetration and victimization ( 78 ). Besides, schools can cooperate with mental health agencies and neighboring communities to develop preventive programs, such as extracurricular activities and training ( 44 , 53 , 62 ). Specifically, school-based preventive measures against cyberbullying are expected to be sensitive to the characteristics of young people at different ages, and the intersection of race and school diversity ( 29 , 76 ). It is recommended that school policies that aim to embrace diversity and embody mutual respect among students are created ( 26 ). Considering the high prevalence of cyberbullying and a series of serious consequences, it is suggested that intervention against cyberbullying starts from an early stage, at about 10 years old ( 54 ). Schools can organize seminars to strengthen communication between teachers and students so that they can better understand the needs of students ( 61 ). In addition, schools should encourage cyberbullying victims to seek help and provide students with opportunities to report cyberbullying behaviors, such as creating online anonymous calls.

Conclusions and Limitations

The comprehensive study has reviewed related research on children and adolescents cyberbullying across different countries and regions, providing a positive understanding of the current situation of cyberbullying. The number of studies on cyberbullying has surged in the last 5 years, especially those related to risk factors and protective factors of cyberbullying. However, research on effective prevention is insufficient and evaluation of policy tools for cyberbullying intervention is a nascent research field. Our comprehensive review concludes with possible strategies for cyberbullying prevention, including personal emotion management, digital ability training, policy applicability, and interpersonal skills. We highlight the important role of parental control in cyberbullying prevention. As for the role of parental control, it depends on whether children believe their parents are capable of adequately supporting them, rather than simply interfering in their lives, restricting their online behavior, and controlling or removing their devices ( 50 ). In general, cyberbullying is on the rise, with the effectiveness of interventions to meet this problem still requiring further development and exploration ( 83 ).

Considering the overlaps between cyberbullying and traditional offline bullying, future research can explore the unique risk and protective factors that are distinguishable from traditional bullying ( 86 ). To further reveal the variations, researchers can compare the outcomes of interventions conducted in cyberbullying and traditional bullying preventions simultaneously, and the same interventions only targeting cyberbullying ( 88 ). In addition, cyberbullying also reflects a series of other social issues, such as personal privacy and security, public opinion monitoring, multinational perpetration and group crimes. To address this problem, efforts from multiple disciplines and novel analytical methods in the digital era are required. As the Internet provides enormous opportunities to connect young people from all over the world, cyberbullying perpetrators may come from transnational networks. Hence, cyberbullying of children and adolescents, involving multiple countries, is worth further attention.

Our study has several limitations. First, national representative studies are scarce, while few studies from middle and low income countries were included in our research due to language restrictions. Many of the studies included were conducted in schools, communities, provinces, and cities in high income countries. Meanwhile, our review only focused on victimization and perpetration. Future studies should consider more perspectives, such as bystanders and those with the dual identity of victim/perpetrator, to comprehensively analyze the risk and protective factors of cyberbullying.

Data Availability Statement

Author contributions.

SH, CZ, RE, and WZ conceived the study and developed the design. WZ analyzed the result and supervised the study. CZ and SH wrote the first draft. All authors contributed to the article and approved the submitted version.

Conflict of Interest

The authors declare that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest.

Supplementary Material

The Supplementary Material for this article can be found online at: https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fpubh.2021.634909/full#supplementary-material

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• Published: 29 April 2024

Problematic social media use mediates the effect of cyberbullying victimisation on psychosomatic complaints in adolescents

• Prince Peprah 1 , 2 ,
• Michael Safo Oduro 3 ,
• Godfred Atta-Osei 4 ,
• Isaac Yeboah Addo 5 , 6 ,
• Anthony Kwame Morgan 7 &
• Razak M. Gyasi 8 , 9  

Scientific Reports volume  14 , Article number:  9773 ( 2024 ) Cite this article

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• Public health
• Risk factors

Adolescent psychosomatic complaints remain a public health issue globally. Studies suggest that cyberbullying victimisation, particularly on social media, could heighten the risk of psychosomatic complaints. However, the mechanisms underlying the associations between cyberbullying victimisation and psychosomatic complaints remain unclear. This cross-cultural study examines the mediating effect of problematic social media use (PSMU) on the association between cyberbullying victimisation and psychosomatic complaints among adolescents in high income countries. We analysed data on adolescents aged 11–16.5 years (weighted N = 142,298) in 35 countries participating in the 2018 Health Behaviour in School-aged Children (HBSC) study. Path analysis using bootstrapping technique tested the hypothesised mediating role of PSMU. Results from the sequential binary mixed effects logit models showed that adolescents who were victims of cyberbullying were 2.39 times significantly more likely to report psychosomatic complaints than those who never experienced cyberbullying (AOR = 2.39; 95%CI = 2.29, 2.49). PSMU partially mediated the association between cyberbullying victimisation and psychosomatic complaints accounting for 12% ( \(\beta\)  = 0.01162, 95%CI = 0.0110, 0.0120) of the total effect. Additional analysis revealed a moderation effect of PSMU on the association between cyberbullying victimisation and psychosomatic complaints. Our findings suggest that while cyberbullying victimisation substantially influences psychosomatic complaints, the association is partially explained by PSMU. Policy and public health interventions for cyberbullying-related psychosomatic complaints in adolescents should target safe social media use.

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Introduction.

Adolescence is noted to be a critical developmental stage, with many problems, including loneliness 1 , poor friendships, an adverse class climate, school pressure 2 , suicidal ideation and attempts, and psychosomatic complaints 3 . Psychosomatic complaint is a combination of physical ailments (i.e., headaches, stomach aches, fatigue, and muscle pain) caused or exacerbated by psychological factors such as stress, irritability, anxiety, or emotional distress 4 , 5 . Psychosomatic complaints are common among adolescents, and recent estimates indicate that the global prevalence of psychosomatic complaints ranges between 10 and 50% 6 . Also, an increase in self-reported psychosomatic complaints and related mental health complaints have been reported in adolescents from high-income countries 7 , 8 . The high prevalence of psychosomatic complaints is of concern as psychosomatic complaints have severe implications for multiple detrimental health outcomes, healthcare expenditure, and quality of life of young people 9 . Thus, it is of utmost importance to identify the proximate risk factors for psychosomatic complaints among young people to aid in developing targeted interventions to reduce the incidence of psychosomatic complaints, mainly in high-income countries.

While extant research has identified risk factors for psychosomatic complaints, including malnutrition, low physical activity, and poor parental guidance 10 , 11 , 12 , one understudied but potentially important risk factor is cyberbullying victimisation. Cyberbullying victimisation is an internet-based aggressive and intentional act of continually threatening, harassing, or embarrassing individuals who cannot defend themselves using electronic contact forms such as emails, text messages, images, and videos 13 , 14 . Indeed, being typical of interpersonal interactions, cyberbullying victimisation has shown a rising trend, particularly during adolescence 15 . International literature has shown the prevalence of cyberbullying victimisation to be between 12 and 72% among young people 14 , 16 . It may be hypothesised that cyberbullying victimisation potentially increases the risk of psychosomatic complaints through factors such as problematic social media use (PSMU) 17 , 18 . However, studies are needed to identify whether and the extent to which such factors mediate the potential association of cyberbullying victimisation with psychosomatic complaints among young people.

Given this background, the present study aimed to investigate the association between cyberbullying victmisation and psychosomatic complaints in 142,298 young people aged 11–16.5 years from 35 high-income countries. A further aim was to quantify how PSMU mediates the association between cyberbullying victimisation and psychosomatic complaints.

Cyberbullying victimisation and adolescents’ psychosomatic complaints

Research has consistently shown that cyberbullying victimisation significantly impacts adolescents’ mental health 19 . For example, Kowalski and Limber 20 found that cyberbullying victimisation is associated with increased levels of depression, anxiety, and social anxiety, as well as psychosomatic complaints, such as fatigue and muscle tension. Further, studies have shown that cyberbullying victimisation and perpetration can lead to a variety of physical, social, and mental health issues, including substance abuse and suicidal thoughts and attempts 21 , 22 , 23 , 24 . Furthermore, cyberbullying victimisation is strongly associated with suicidal thoughts and attempts, regardless of demographic factors like gender or age 21 , 25 . These findings underscore the urgent need for interventions that address the mental health consequences of cyberbullying, particularly for adolescents, who are most vulnerable to its harmful effects. The findings also suggest that cyberbullying might be a potential underlying predictor of higher psychosomatic disorders among adolescents. This present study, therefore, hypothesises that H1: there is a statistically significant association between cyberbullying victimisation (X) and psychosomatic complaints (Y) (total effect).

The role of adolescents’ PSMU

Problematic Social Media Use (PSMU), a subtype of problematic internet use, refers to the uncontrolled, compulsive or excessive engagement with social media platforms such as Facebook and Twitter, characterised by addictive behaviours like mood alteration, withdrawal symptoms, and interpersonal conflicts. This pattern of social media usage can result in functional impairments and adverse outcomes 26 . Scholars and professionals have shown great concern about the length of time adolescents spend on social media. Studies have observed that (early) adolescence could be a crucial and sensitive developmental stage in which adolescent users might be unable to avoid the harmful impacts of social media use 27 . According to current research, PSMU may increase adolescents’ exposure to cyberbullying victimisation, which can have severe consequences for their mental health 28 , 29 , 30 . Similarly, an association between PSMU and physical/somatic problems, as well as somatic disorders, has been established in many studies 31 , 32 . Hanprathet et al. 33 demonstrated the negative impact of problematic Facebook use on general health, including somatic symptoms, anxiety, insomnia, depression, and social dysfunction. According to Cerutti et al. 34 , adolescents with problematic social media usage have more somatic symptoms, such as stomach pain, headaches, sore muscles, and poor energy, than their counterparts. Hence, inadequate sleep may be associated with PSMU, harming both perceived physical and mental health 35 , 36 . Again, supporting the above evidence, the relationship between PSMU, well-being, and psychological issues have been highlighted in meta-analytic research and systematic reviews 27 , 31 , 37 , 38 . Thus, this study proposes the following hypothesis: H2: there is a specific indirect effect of cyberbullying victimisation (X) on psychosomatic complaints (Y) through PSMU (M1) (indirect effect a 1 b 1 ).

Study, sample, and procedures

This study used data from the 2018 Health Behaviour in School-aged Children (HBSC) survey conducted in 35 countries and regions across Europe and Canada during the 2017–2018 academic year 39 . The HBSC research team/network is an international alliance of researchers collaborating on a cross-national survey of school students. The HBSC collects data every four years on 11-, 13- and 15- year-old adolescent boys’ and girls’ health and well-being, social environments, and health behaviours. The sampling procedure for the 2018 survey followed international guidelines 40 , 41 . A systematic sampling method was used to identify schools in each region from the complete list of both public and private schools. Participants were recruited through a cluster sampling approach, using the school class as the primary sampling unit 42 . Some countries oversampled subpopulations (e.g., by geography and ethnicity), and standardised weights were created to ensure representativeness of the population of 11, 13, and 15 years 43 . Questionnaires were translated based on a standard procedure to allow comparability between the participating countries. Our analysis used data from 35 countries and regions with complete data on cyberbullying victimisation, PSMU, and psychosomatic complaints. The study complies with ethical standards in each country and follows ethical guidelines for research and data protection from the World Health Organisation and the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development. Depending on the country, active or passive consent was sought from parents or legal guardians and students which was checked by teachers to participate in the study. The survey was conducted anonymously and participation in the study was voluntary for schools and students. Schools, children and adolescents could refuse to participate or withdraw their consent until the day of the survey. Moreover, all participating students were free to cease filling out the questionnaire at any moment, or to answer only selected questions. More detailed information on the methodology of the HBSC study including ethics and data protection can be found elsewhere 44 , 45 .

Outcome variable: psychosomatic complaints

Psychosomatic complaints was assessed by one collective item asking students how often they had experienced the following complaints over the past six months: headache, stomach aches, feeling low, irritability or bad mood, feeling nervous, dizziness, abdominal pain, sleep difficulty, and backache. Response options included: about every day, more than once a week, about every week, about every month, and rarely or never. This scale has sufficient test–retest reliability and validity 46 , good internal consistency (Cronbach’s a = 0.82) 47 , and has been applied in several multiple country analyses 48 , 49 . The scale is predictive of emotional problems and suicidal ideation in adolescents 50 , 51 . For our analysis, the scale was dichotomised with two or more complaints several times a week or daily coded as having psychosomatic complaints 47 , 49 .

Exposure variable: Cyberbullying victimisation

Cyberbullying victimisation is the exposure variable in this study. Thus, the exposure variable pertains to only being a victim of cyberbullying and does not include perpetration of cyberbullying. Students were first asked to read and understand a short definition of cyberbullying victimisation. They were then asked how often they were bullied over the past two months (e.g., someone sending mean instant messages, emails, or text messages about you; wall postings; creating a website making fun of you; posting unflattering or inappropriate pictures of you online without your permission or sharing them with others). Responses included: “ I have not   been  cyberbullied”, “once or twice”, “two or three times a month”, “about once a week”, and “several times a week”. These were dichotomised into “never" or “once or more". This measure of bullying victimisation has been validated across multiple cultural settings 43 , 52 , 53 , 54 .

Mediating variable

Problematic social media use (PSMU) was assessed with the Social Media Disorder Scale (Cronbach’s a = 0.89) 55 . The scale contains nine dichotomous (yes/no) items describing addiction-like symptoms, including preoccupation with social media, dissatisfaction about lack of time for social media, feeling bad when not using social media, trying but failing to spend less time using social media, neglecting other duties to use social media, frequent arguments over social media, lying to parents or friends about social media use, using social media to escape from negative feelings, and having a severe conflict with family over social media use. In this study, the endorsement of six or more items indicated PSMU as evidence suggests that a threshold of six or more is an indicative of PSMU 54 , 56 . This scale has been used across cultural contexts 43 , 52 , 54 .

Informed by previous studies 43 , 54 , 57 , the analysis controlled for theoretically relevant confounders, including sex (male/female) and age. Family affluence/socio-economic class was assessed using the Relative Family Affluence Scale, a validated six-item measure of material assets in the home, such as the number of vehicles, bedroom sharing, computer ownership, bathrooms at home, dishwashers at home, and family vacations) 56 , 58 . Finally, parental and peer support were measured using an eight item-measure 59 . Responses were recorded on a 7-point Likert scale (ranging from 0 indicating very strongly disagree to 6 indicating very strongly agree).

Statistical analysis

Region-specific descriptive statistics were calculated to describe the sample. Next, Pearson’s Chi-squared association test with Yates’ continuity correction was performed to examine plausible associations between psychosomatic complaints and other categorical study variables. Also, to account for the regional clustering or unobserved heterogeneity observed in the analytic sample, sequential mixed effect binary logit models with the inclusion of a random intercept were fitted to further examine the associations between psychosomatic complaints and cyberbullying victimisation as well as other considered covariates. Furthermore, a parallel mediator model was fitted to evaluate the specified hypothesis and understand the potential mechanism linking cyberbullying victimisation and psychosomatic complaints. More specifically, cyberbullying victimisation (X) was modelled to directly influence psychosomatic complaints (Y) and indirectly via PSMU (M). Since core variables were binary, paths could be estimated with a sequence of three logit equations: 60 , 61

where, \({i}_{1}\) , \({i}_{2}\) , and \({i}_{3}\) represent the intercept in the respective equations. The path coefficient, c, in Eq. ( 1 ) represents the total effect of predictor X on outcome Y . In Eq. ( 2 ), the path coefficient a denotes the effect of predictor X on the mediator M . Also, the c' parameter in Eq. ( 3 ) represents the direct effect of the predictor X on the response Y , adjusting for the mediator M . Lastly, the path coefficient b coefficient in Eq. ( 3 ) represents the indirect effect of the mediator M on the outcome Y , when adjusting for the predictor X . These logit models provide effect estimates on the log-odds scale, and thus can be transformed into odds ratios. Each model was adjusted for the potential confounding variables.

All statistical analyses were performed using R Software (v4.1.2; R Core Team 2021) with \(\alpha\)  =  0.05 as the significance level. More specifically, the package “mediation” in R 62 was used for the mediation analysis to estimate direct, indirect, and total effects. Inference is based on a non-parametric, 95% bias-corrected and accelerated (BCa) bootstrapped confidence interval 63 , 64 . Bootstrapping for indirect effects was set at 1000 samples, and once the 95% bootstrapped CI of the mediation effects did not include zero (0), it was deemed statistically significant. We also conducted further analysis by including an interaction between cyberbullying victimisation and PSMU to obtain insights analogous to the mediation model.

Ethics approval and consent to participate

The research was exclusively based on data sourced from the World Bank, which adheres to rigorous ethical standards in its data collection processes. Therefore, no separate ethical approval was sought or deemed necessary. Ethical approval was not required for this study since the data used for this study are secondary data. Necessary permissions and survey data were obtained from the World Bank. The World Bank data collection process upheld ethical standards and relevant guidelines in the research process including informed consent from all subjects and/or their legal guardian(s).

Preliminary analyses

The final analytic sample comprised complete information on 142,298 adolescents from 35 high-income countries (Table 1 ). The median age of the sample was 13.6 years. Most participants resided in Wales (6.26%) and the Czech Republic (6.16%). Notably, the prevalence of cyberbullying victimisation was 26.2%, and the majority (53%) were females. As observed in Table 2 , 84.6% of the participants self-reported high levels of psychosomatic complaints. Furthermore, among the participants who experienced PSMU, about 81.16% reported high levels of psychosomatic complaints. About 84.47% of the participants indicated receiving parental and peer support (see Table 2 ).

Main analyses

Results from the sequential binary mixed effects logit model are shown in Table 3 . In the first step, we included only cyberbullying victimisation in the model. We found that cyberbullying victims were 2.430 times more likely to report psychosomatic complaints than those who were not cyberbullied (OR = 2.430; 95%CI = 2.330, 2.530). The second step included sex, PSMU, parental and peer support, and family affluence as covariates. We found that cyber bullying victims were 2.390 times significantly more likely to report psychosomatic complaints than those who never experienced cyberbullying (AOR = 2.390; 95%CI = 2.29, 2.49). Additionally, the third model, which is an additional analysis involved the inclusion of an interaction between and cyberbullying victimisation and PSMU. The results showed that PSMU moderates the association between cyberbullying victimisation and psychosomatic complaints. Adolescents who were cyberbullied but did not report PSMU had reduced odds of psychosomatic complaints compared to those with PSMU (AOR = 1.220; 95%CI = 1.110–1.350). Furthermore, a caterpillar plot of empirical Bayes residuals of the models for the random intercept, region/country is obtained and shown in Fig.  1 . This represents individual effects for each country and offers additional insights into the extent of psychosomatic complaints heterogeneity across different countries. The plots visually demonstrates that regional variation for psychosomatic complaints does exist.

A caterpillar plot of empirical Bayes residuals of the models for the random intercept, region/country. This represents individual effects for each region/country. Region or country abbreviations in the figure are as follows: [AL] Albania, [AZ] Azerbaijan, [AT] Austria, [BE-VLG] Vlaamse Gewest (Belgium), [BE-WAL] Wallone, Région (Belgium), [CA] Canada, [CZ] Czech Republic, [DE] Germany, [EE] Estonia, [CA] Canada, [ES] Spain, [FR] France, [GB-ENG] England, [GB-SCT] Scotland, [GB-WLS] Wales, [GE] Georgia, [GR] Greece, [HR] Croatia, [HU] Hungary, [IE] Ireland, [IL] Israel, [IS] Iceland, [IT] Italy, [KZ] Kazakhstan, [LT] Lithuania, [LU] Luxembourg, [MD] Moldova, [MT] Malta, [NL] Netherlands, [PT] Portugal, [RO] Romania, [RS] Serbia, [RU] Russia, [SE] Sweden, [SI] Slovenia, [TR] Turkey, [LU] Luxembourg and [UA] Ukraine.

Figure  2 shows the adjusted parallel mediation results. The effect of cyberbullying victimisation on psychosomatic complaints was significantly mediated by PSMU. The paths from cyberbullying victimisation to PSMU (a: \(\beta\) =0.648, p < 0.001), PSMU to psychosomatic complaints (b: \(\beta\) =0.889, p < 0.001), and that of cyberbullying victimisation to 0.8069 (c′: \(\beta\) =0.051, p < 0.001) were also statistically significant.

A parallel mediation model of the influence of PSMU on the association between Cyberbullying Victimisation and Psychosomatic Complaints. a = path coefficient of the effect of exposure on the mediator. b = path coefficient of the effect of the mediator on the outcome. c’ = path coefficient of the direct effect of the exposure on outcome. CV, cyberbullying victimisation. PC, psychosomatic complaints.

Bootstrapping test of mediating effects

The total, direct, and indirect effects of the mediation model based on nonparametric bootstrap are presented in Table 4 . We observe that the estimated CI did not include zero (0) for any effects. This observation suggests a statistically significant indirect effect of cyberbullying victimisation on psychosomatic complaints via PSMU ( \(\beta\)  = 0.01162, 95%CI = 0.0110, 0.0120), yielding 12% of the total effect.

Key findings

This cross-cultural study examined the direct and indirect associations of cyberbullying victimisation with psychosomatic complaints via PSMU among adolescents. The results showed that cyberbullying victimisation independently influenced the experience of psychosomatic complaints. Specifically, adolescents who were victims of cyberbullying were more than two times more likely to report psychosomatic complaints. Crucially, our mediation analyses indicated that PSMU explain approximately 12% of the association between cyberbullying victimisation and psychosomatic complaints. In a further analysis, PSMU moderated the association between cyberbullying victimisation and psychosomatic complaints. This study is the first to examine the direct and indirect associations between cyberbullying victimisation and psychosomatic complaints through PSMU in adolescents across multiple high-income countries.

Interpretation of the findings

Our results confirmed the first hypothesis that there is a statistically significant direct association between cyberbullying victimisation and psychosomatic complaints. Thus, we found that cyberbullying independently directly affected the adolescents' experience of psychosomatic complaints. Previous studies have mainly focused on the direct effect of traditional face-to-face bullying on psychosomatic complaints 20 , 65 or compared the impact of traditional face-to-face bullying to cyberbullying concerning mental health 19 , 66 , 67 , 68 , 69 . A systematic review of traditional bullying and cyberbullying victimisation offers a comprehensive synthesis of the consequences of cyberbullying on adolescent health 19 . Another review suggested that cyberbullying threatened adolescents’ well-being and underscored many studies that have demonstrated effective relationships between adolescents’ involvement in cyberbullying and adverse health outcomes 70 . Other population-based cross-sectional studies have similarly shown that victims of cyberbullying experience significant psychological distress and feelings of isolation, which can further exacerbate their physical and mental health challenges 22 , 71 , 72 . The present study builds on the previously published literature by highlighting the effect of cyberbullying victimisation on adolescent psychosomatic complaints and the extent to which the association is mediated by PSMU.

Consistent with the second hypothesis, we found that PSMU mediated about 12% of the association between cyberbullying victimisation and psychosomatic complaints in this sample. While studies on the mediational role of PSMU in the relationship between cyberbullying victimisation and psychosomatic complaints are limited, evidence shows significant interplay among PSMU, cyberbullying victimisation, and psychosomatic complaints. For example, a study of over 58,000 young people in Italy found that PSMU was associated with increased levels of multiple somatic and psychological symptoms, such as anxiety and depression. 73 Another study of 1707 adolescents in Sweden found that cyberbullying victimisation was associated with increased depressive symptoms and the lowest level of subjective well-being 74 .

Other possible mediators of the cyberbullying victimisation-psychosomatic complaints association may include low self-esteem, negative body image, emotion regulation difficulties, social support, and personality traits such as neuroticism and impulsivity 20 , 67 , 72 , 75 , 76 . For example, Schneider et al. 75 have shown that emotional distress could increase psychosomatic symptoms such as headaches, stomach aches, and muscle tension. In addition, social isolation can lead to social withdrawal and a decreased sense of belonging 78 , 79 . Therefore, it is essential to explore these variables further and develop effective interventions and prevention strategies to address these interrelated factors and reduce their negative impact on adolescent health and well-being.

In a further analysis, the results show that PSMU does not only mediate but also moderate the association between cyberbullying victimisation and psychosomatic complaints among adolescents. Specifically, cyberbullied adolescents with no report of PSMU had reduced likelihoods of experiencing psychosomatic complaints compared to those with PSMU. This result is interesting and could be due to several factors. First, individuals with PSMU may already be experiencing heightened levels of psychological distress due to their excessive social media use, making them more vulnerable to the negative effects of cyberbullying 80 , 81 , 82 . For instance, excessive time spent on social media, particularly in activities such as comparing oneself to others or seeking validation through likes and comments, has been linked to increased psychological distress 83 , 84 . Conversely, the finding that cyberbullied adolescents without PSMU had reduced likelihoods of experiencing psychosomatic complaints compared to those with PSMU suggests a protective effect of lower social media use. Adolescents who are not excessively engaged with social media may have fewer opportunities for exposure to cyberbullying and may also have healthier coping strategies in place to deal with any instances of online victimisation 43 , 85 , 86 .

The results suggest that professionals in the fields of education, counselling, and healthcare should prioritise addressing the issue of cyberbullying victimisation when assessing the physical and psychological health of adolescents. Evidently, adolescents who experience cyberbullying require support. Thus, proactive measures are essential, and support could be provided by multiple professional communities that serve adolescents and young people in society, such as educational, behavioural health, and medical professionals. Sensitive inquiry regarding cyberbullying experiences is necessary when addressing adolescent health issues such as depression, substance use, suicidal ideation, and somatic concerns 19 . Our findings underscore the need for comprehensive, school-based programs focused on cyberbullying victimisation prevention and intervention.

Strengths and limitations

The study's main strength lies in the use of a large sample size representing multiple countries in high income countries. This large sample size improved the representativeness and veracity of our findings. The complex research approach helps advance our understanding of the interrelationships between cyberbullying victimisation, PSMU, and psychosomatic complaints among adolescents. However, the study has its limitations. First, the cross-sectional design does not allow directionality and causal inferences. Second, retrospective self-reporting for the critical study variables could lead to recall and social desirability biases. Third, the presence of residual and unobserved confounders, despite adjusting for some covariates, can be considered a limitation of this study. Further research is needed to confirm these findings and better understand how PSMU mediates the relationship between cyberbullying victimisation and psychosomatic complaints.

Conclusions

This study has provided essential insights into the interrelationships between cyberbullying victimisation, PSMU, and psychosomatic complaints among adolescents in high income countries. The findings suggest that cyberbullying is directly associated with psychosomatic complaints and that PSMU significantly and partially mediates this association. This study also highlights the importance of addressing cyberbullying victimisation and its negative impact on adolescent health and emphasises the need to address PSMU. Overall, the study underscores the importance of promoting healthy online behaviour and providing appropriate support for adolescents who experience cyberbullying victimisation. Further studies will benefit from longitudinal data to confirm our findings.

Data availability

The data that support the findings of this study are available from the World Bank, but restrictions apply to the availability of these data, which were used under license for the current study and so are not publicly available. Data are, however, available from the corresponding author ([email protected]) upon reasonable request and with permission of the World Bank.

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We thank the 2017/2018 HBSC survey team/network, the coordinator and the Data Bank Manager for granting us access to the datasets. We duly acknowledge all school children who participated in the surveys.

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Peprah, P., Oduro, M.S., Atta-Osei, G. et al. Problematic social media use mediates the effect of cyberbullying victimisation on psychosomatic complaints in adolescents. Sci Rep 14 , 9773 (2024). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-024-59509-2

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Cyberbullying detection and machine learning: a systematic literature review

• Published: 24 July 2023
• Volume 56 , pages 1375–1416, ( 2023 )

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The rise in research work focusing on detection of cyberbullying incidents on social media platforms particularly reflect how dire cyberbullying consequences are, regardless of age, gender or location. This paper examines scholarly publications (i.e., 2011–2022) on cyberbullying detection using machine learning through a systematic literature review approach. Specifically, articles were sought from six academic databases (Web of Science, ScienceDirect, IEEE Xplore, Association for Computing Machinery, Scopus, and Google Scholar), resulting in the identification of 4126 articles. A redundancy check followed by eligibility screening and quality assessment resulted in 68 articles included in this review. This review focused on three key aspects, namely, machine learning algorithms used to detect cyberbullying, features, and performance measures, and further supported with classification roles, language of study, data source and type of media. The findings are discussed, and research challenges and future directions are provided for researchers to explore.

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Balakrisnan, V., Kaity, M. Cyberbullying detection and machine learning: a systematic literature review. Artif Intell Rev 56 (Suppl 1), 1375–1416 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10462-023-10553-w

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BULLYING IN SOCIAL MEDIA: AN EFFECT STUDY OF CYBER BULLYING ON THE YOUTH

2017, Pakistan Journal of Criminology

This research study seeks to investigatethe bullying in social media and its effects on youth to extract the factors that have influence on their state of mind, academic performance. The survey research under the umbrella of Online Disinhibition Effect approach revealed that the youngsters, both girls and boys, in Pakistan get involved as well as becomes a target via cyber bullying. Moreover, the study concluded that cyber bullying affects the psyche of youth that result in negative consequences on academic performance, emotional disturbance and gaps in relationship. The results showed that there is also a significant gender difference and girls are more likely to be sufferers and more affected via cyber bullying as compared to boys.

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Aiman Khursheed

The purpose of this study was to examine the effects of cyber bullying on girls of University of Sindh, Jamshoro. There are many victims who were facing many problems due to extra and frequent use of Internet. Mostly girls have been targeted in the field of social media. The study focused only the girl students of university of Sindh, Jamshoro. Study showed that how cybercrimes effects on a girl’s students life, for this selection of respondents was very important, researcher conduct survey with 100 girl students from faculty of social sciences, University of Sindh, Jamshoro. The researcher after analyzing data found out that the girl students always use social media for communication purpose, and also interested in educating themselves by using of social media applications regarding harassment and bullying. The study has concluded that majority of the girl students believe that social media has created problems in their daily life. Further, study found that majority of the girls wa...

Global Regional Review

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While forms of traditional bullying have been declining over the past two decades, cyber bullying has emerged as a modern form of bullying in recent times. Previous research studies have not been developed much on the issue of cyber bullying. The current study reviews the relevant research studies as the excessive usage of social media and by young people and different themes have been carried out from the help of the existing literature. The present study has synthesised current literature on: i) prevalence of cyber bullying among adolescents ii) huge level of cyber bullying occurrences in educational institutions iii) people who are more prone to be the victims and perpetrators iv) effects of cyber bullying on adolescence v) preventive measures for the wellbeing of Pakistani adolescents. In this article, the researcher reviews the literature related to cyber bullying conducted between the years from 2000 to 2019.

International Journal of Social Science and Human Research

Tabassum Fatima

Bullying on various social media platforms is a new societal issue that has gotten a lot of attention from academics. It has been recognized as a serious health issue among adolescents. Cyber bullying can take many different forms. It doesn&#39;t always imply breaking into someone&#39;s accounts or pretending to be someone else. It also includes making disparaging remarks about someone or circulating rumors in order to slander them. Because everyone is engrossed in social media, it is quite easy for anyone to abuse their access. The present study is an attempt to analyze various aspects of bullying on social media among senior secondary school students. The study has also taken into consideration the type of school (government and private) and gender variables which was carried out on the sample of 305 senior secondary school adolescents of Aligarh district. The study has revealed mixed results which have been interpreted with some suggestive measures.

Dr. Majid Sadeeq

Most of the research on cyber bullying available on the internet is of foreign origin. Research studies on this constant on Indian population are required. Thus calls for a narrative review of the available literature in foreign as well as Indian context. This present study tried to meet this requirement by presenting a narrative review on cyber bullying construct literature. Electronic data bases like Eric, Proquest, google scholar, J-gate, Eric were used as the data sources. Literature in the form of research articles and reviews articles were searched the words with the exact key words “cyber bullying” and “Indian” in the title was selected for study and literature on related key words was strictly ignored. The literature included research articles citing the first recorded case of bullying to certain latest finding in this subject in recent times. The study found that the use of technology is in rise in Indian, with the Indian youth spending at least an hour or two on the social networking sites being venerable to cyber bullying and suffering in due course owing to poor awareness and bad implementation ofcyber laws.

IRA-International Journal of Management & Social Sciences (ISSN 2455-2267)

Sulakshana Khatoniyar

International Journal of Innovative Research and Development

Usman Saadu

IOSR Journals

This paper attempted to explore the impact of cyber-bullying on the females. This study was conducted at Kushtia district in Bangladesh from June 2020 to February 2021. 60 females were selected from two upazillas, Kushtia Sadar and Kumarkhali (30 from Kushtia Sadar Upazilla and 30 from Kumarkhali Upazilla). Questionnaire and in-depth individual interview were used as the instruments for collecting quantitative and qualitative data adopting a mixed method approach (Both quantitative and qualitative). Quantitative data were collected from 60 females aged 15-25 years through a set of questionnaire and qualitative data of this study were collected from 6 females through in-depth face to face interview. Articles, journals and research papers were the sources of secondary data of this study. Quantitative data were first coded and analyzed, and then, qualitative data analysis was done through content analysis. After interpretation of data, the findings of this study were presented in tables and charts using numbers and percentages. The study revealed that cyber-bullying had negative impacts on the females.

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The developments in mobile technologies and the spread of 4G and 5G internet infrastructures increase internet usage day by day. Especially in early 2020, due to the COVID-19 pandemic, which affected the whole world, the transfer of face-to-face activities to the online environment has accelerated the widespread use of the internet. Despite the risk of COVID-19, face-to-face education has started to be done online on e-learning platforms. Thus, almost all of the students, from preschool level to higher education level, started to spend more time on the internet. This situation has also increased the possibility of students encountering negative behaviors and threats in the internet environment. In this study, the cyber bullying status of university students was investigated and it was examined whether there was a relationship between students' cyber bullying levels and various variables such as gender, age and family income. As a result of the research, it was determined that the students' level of cyber bullying in general was low. In addition, it was concluded that the cyber bullying status of the students did not differ statistically according to gender, family income, internet and social media usage. In future studies, the situation of being a cyber-bully or cyber victim of university students from different regions can be investigated according to their faculties and departments.

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Humaira Jami

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Collisions and perceptions of cyberbullying: comparison of intergenerational experiences.

1. Introduction

1.1. cyberbullying and bullying, 1.2. cyberbullying and age groups, 1.3. aggressors: behavioral strategies and motives, 1.4. victims: prevalence, emotional distress, consequences and social support, 1.5. bystanders: behavioral strategies, 1.6. parents’ awareness, 1.7. current study, 2. materials and methods, 2.1. procedures, 2.2. participants, 2.3. measures, 2.3.1. experiencing cyberbullying, 2.3.2. aggressors, 2.3.3. victims, 2.3.4. bystanders, 2.4. data analyses, 3.1. the ratio of bullying to cyberbullying, 3.2. encountering cyberbullying situations: age characteristics, 3.3. aggressors in a cyberbullying situation, 3.3.1. the nature of the aggressors’ social relations with a victim of cyberbullying, 3.3.2. motivations for cyberbullying, 3.3.3. strategies of the cyberbullies’ behavior, 3.4. cyberbullying victims, 3.4.1. prevalence of victimization, 3.4.2. the strength and duration of the victim’s emotional response, 3.4.3. seeking social support, 3.4.4. the consequences of cyberbullying, 3.5. cyberbullying bystanders, 4. discussions, 4.1. the prevalence of cyberbullying and its correlation with bullying, 4.2. cyberbullies, 4.2.1. the nature of the aggressors’ social relative to the victim, 4.2.2. the aggressor’s motives, 4.2.3. the aggressor’s behavioral strategies, 4.3. victims, 4.3.1. emotional impact and consequences for victims of cyberbullying, 4.3.2. the specifics of seeking social support, 4.4. bystanders, 4.5. parents, 4.6. limitations and future directions, 5. practical implications, 6. conclusions, author contributions, institutional review board statement, informed consent statement, data availability statement, acknowledgments, conflicts of interest.

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Soldatova, G.; Chigarkova, S.; Rasskazova, E. Collisions and Perceptions of Cyberbullying: Comparison of Intergenerational Experiences. Int. J. Environ. Res. Public Health 2024 , 21 , 1148. https://doi.org/10.3390/ijerph21091148

Soldatova G, Chigarkova S, Rasskazova E. Collisions and Perceptions of Cyberbullying: Comparison of Intergenerational Experiences. International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health . 2024; 21(9):1148. https://doi.org/10.3390/ijerph21091148

Soldatova, Galina, Svetlana Chigarkova, and Elena Rasskazova. 2024. "Collisions and Perceptions of Cyberbullying: Comparison of Intergenerational Experiences" International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health 21, no. 9: 1148. https://doi.org/10.3390/ijerph21091148

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• Published: 14 January 2023

Prevalence and related risks of cyberbullying and its effects on adolescent

• Gassem Gohal 1 ,
• Ahmad Alqassim 2 ,
• Ebtihal Eltyeb 1 ,
• Ahmed Rayyani 3 ,
• Bassam Hakami 3 ,
• Abdullah Al Faqih 3 ,
• Abdullah Hakami 3 ,
• Almuhannad Qadri 3 &
• Mohamed Mahfouz 2  

BMC Psychiatry volume  23 , Article number:  39 ( 2023 ) Cite this article

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Cyberbullying is becoming common in inflicting harm on others, especially among adolescents. This study aims to assess the prevalence of cyberbullying, determine the risk factors, and assess the association between cyberbullying and the psychological status of adolescents facing this problem in the Jazan region, Saudi Arabia.

A cross-sectional study was conducted on 355 students, aged between 12–18 years, through a validated online questionnaire to investigate the prevalence and risk factors of cyberbullying and assess psychological effects based on cyberbullying questionnaire and Mental Health Inventory-5 (MHI-5) questions.

The participants in this study numbered 355; 68% of participants were females compared to 32% were males. Approximately 20% of the participants spend more than 12 h daily on the Internet, and the estimated overall prevalence of cyberbullying was 42.8%, with the male prevalence slightly higher than females. In addition, 26.3% of the participants were significantly affected in their academic Performance due to cyberbullying. Approximately 20% of all participants considered leaving their schools, 19.7% considered ceasing their Internet use, and 21.1% considered harming themselves due to the consequences of cyberbullying. There are essential links between the frequency of harassment, the effect on academic Performance, and being a cyber victim.

Conclusions

Cyberbullying showed a high prevalence among adolescents in the Jazan region with significant associated psychological effects. There is an urgency for collaboration between the authorities and the community to protect adolescents from this harmful occurrence.

Peer Review reports

Introduction

Cyberbullying is an intentional, repeated act of harm toward others through electronic tools; however, there is no consensus to define it [ 1 , 2 , 3 ]. With the surge in information and data sharing in the emerging digital world, a new era of socialization through digital tools, and the popularization of social media, cyberbullying has become more frequent than ever and occurs when there is inadequate adult supervision [ 4 , 5 ]. A large study that looked at the incidence of cyberbullying among adolescents in England found a prevalence of 17.9%, while one study conducted in Saudi Arabia found a prevalence of 20.97% [ 6 , 7 ]. Cyberbullying can take many forms, including sending angry, rude, or offensive messages; intimidating, cruel, and possibly false information about a person to others; sharing sensitive or private information (outing); and exclusion, which involves purposefully leaving someone out of an online group [ 8 ]. Cyberbullying is influenced by age, sex, parent–child relationships, and time spent on the Internet [ 9 , 10 ]. Although some studies have found that cyberbullying continues to increase in late adolescence, others found that cyberbullying tends to peak at 14 and 15 years old before decreasing through the remaining years of adolescence [ 11 , 12 , 13 ].

The COVID-19 epidemic has impacted the prevalence of cyberbullying since social isolation regulations have reduced face-to-face interaction, leading to a significant rise in the use of social networking sites and online activity. As a result, there was a higher chance of experiencing cyberbullying [ 14 ].

Unlike traditional Bullying, which usually only occurs in school and is mitigated at home, victims of cyberbullying can be contacted anytime and anywhere. Parents and teachers are seen as saviors in cases of traditional Bullying. Simultaneously, in cyberbullying, children tend to be reluctant to tell adults for fear of losing access to their phones and computers, so they usually hide the cyberbullying incident [ 15 ]. Reports show that cyberbullying is a form of harm not easily avoided by the victim. In addition, in the cyber form of Bullying, identification of the victim and the perpetrator is generally challenging compared to traditional Bullying; this makes an accurate estimation of the problem widely contested [ 16 , 17 ].

There is growing evidence that is cyberbullying causes more significant levels of depression, anxiety, and loneliness than traditional forms of Bullying. A meta-analysis examining the association between peer victimization, cyberbullying, and suicide in children and adolescents indicates that cyberbullying is more intensely related to suicidal ideation than traditional Bullying [ 18 ]. Moreover, the significant problem is that cyberbullying impacts adolescent due to its persistence and recurrence. A recent report in Saudi Arabia indicated a growing rise in cyberbullying in secondary schools and higher education, from 18% to approximately 27% [ 19 ]. In primary schools and kindergartens in Saudi Arabia, we were not surprised to find evidence that children were unaware that cyberbullying is illegal. Although the study showed an adequate awareness of the problem in our country, Saudi Arabia, there were relatively significant misconceptions [ 20 ].

Adolescents' emotional responses to cyberbullying vary in severity and quality. However, anger, sadness, concern, anxiety, fear, and depression are most common among adolescent cyber victims [ 21 ]. Moreover, cyberbullying may limit students' academic Performance and cause higher absenteeism rates [ 22 ]. Consequently, this study aims to assess the prevalence of cyberbullying, determine the risk factors, and establish the association between cyberbullying and the psychological status of adolescents. We believe our study will be an extension of and significantly add to the literature regarding the nature and extent of cyberbullying in the Jazan region of Saudi Arabia.

A descriptive cross-sectional study was carried out in the Jazan region, a province of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. It is located on the tropical Red Sea coast of southwestern Saudi Arabia.

Design and participants

A descriptive cross-sectional study was carried out in the Jazan region, a province of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. It is located on the tropical Red Sea coast of southwestern Saudi Arabia. The study targeted adolescents (12–18 years old) who use the Internet to communicate in the Jazan region. The main inclusion criteria are adolescents between 12–18 years who use the Internet and agree to participate; however, it excludes adolescents not matching the inclusion criteria or those refusing to participate in the study. If participants were under 16, the parent and/or legal guardian should be notified. A sample of participants was estimated for this study, and the ideal sample size was calculated to be 385 using the Cochran formula, n  = (z) 2 p (1 – p) / d 2 . Where: p = prevalence of cyberbullying 50%, z = a 95% confidence interval, d = error of not more than 5%. A convenience sample was used to recruit the study participants. A self-administrated online questionnaire was used to collect the study information from May to December 2021.

The ethical approval for this study was obtained from The Institute Review Board (IRB) of Jazan University (Letter v.1 2019 dated 08/04/2021). Informed consent was acquired from all participants and was attached to the beginning of the form and mandatory to be read and checked before the participant proceeded to the first part of the questionnaire. For the participants under 16, informed consent was obtained from a parent and legal guardian.

Procedure of data collection and study measures

An Arabic self-administrated online questionnaire was used for this research. This anonymous online survey instrument was based on (Google Forms). The study team distributed the questionnaire to the participants through school teachers. The research team prepared the study questionnaire and chose the relevant cyberbullying scale questions from similar studies [ 5 , 6 ]. The questionnaire was translated by two bilingual professionals to ensure the accuracy and appropriateness of the instrument wording. A panel of experts then discussed and assessed the validity and suitability of the instrument for use on adolescents. The panel also added and edited a few questions to accommodate the local culture of Saudi students. It was validated with a pilot study that included 20 participants. The questionnaire was divided into three main sections. The first part of the questionnaire contains the basic participant information, including gender, age, nationality, school grade, residence, and information about family members and the mother's occupation and education. The mother's level of education was considered as it found that mothers' low levels of education specifically had a detrimental impact on the cyberbullying process [ 23 ]. The second section explores the participant's definition of cyberbullying, questions regarding exposure to cyberbullying as a victim or by bullying another person, and questions considering the possible risk factors behind cyberbullying. The last section explores how cyberbullying affects adolescents psychologically based on the standardized questionnaire Mental Health Inventory-5 (MHI-5). MHI-5 is a well-known, valid, reliable, and brief international instrument for assessing mental health in children and adolescents (such as satisfaction, interest in, and enjoyment of life) and negative aspects (such as anxiety and depression) [ 24 ]. It is composed of five questions, as shown in Table 1 . There are six options available for each question, ranging from "all the time" (1 point) to "none of the time" (6 points); therefore, the adolescent's score varies between five and 30. These questions assess both negative and positive qualities of mental health, as well as questions about anxiety and depression. By adding all the item scores and converting this score to a scale ranging from 0 to 100, the final MHI-5 score is determined, with lower scores indicating more severe depressive symptoms. The value for which the sum of sensitivity and specificity was utilized to establish the ideal cut-off score for MHI-5 in many similar studies was reviewed to reach an optimal conclusion. Therefore, we considered all cut-off values with associated sensitivities and specificities of various MHI-5 cut-off points previously employed among adolescents in similar studies and compared them to conclude that MHI-5 = 70 as our cut points. So the presence of depressive symptoms is considered with an MHI-5 cut-off score of ≤ 70 [ 25 ].

The Questionnaires were initially prepared in English and then translated into Arabic. A native speaker with fluency in English (with experience in translation) converted the questionnaire from the initial English version into Arabic. Then, we performed a pilot study among 20 participants to ensure the readability and understandability of the questionnaire questions. We also assessed the internal consistency of the questionnaire based on Cronbach’s alpha, which produced an acceptable value of 0.672. The internal consistency for Mental Health Inventory-5 (MHI-5) was reported at 0.557. In order to assess the factor structure of the Arabic-translated version of the (MHI-5) questionnaire, a factor analysis was conducted. The factor loading of the instrument is shown in Table 1 . Using principal component analysis and the varimax rotation method, we found a one-component solution explaining 56.766% of the total variance. All items loaded on the first factor ranged from (0.688 to 0.824), which confirms that a single factor has explained all the items of the scale. In addition, Bartlett’s test of sphericity was found significant ( p  < 0.001).

Data presentation & statistical analysis

Simple tabulation frequencies were used to give a general overview of the data. The prevalence of cyberbullying was presented using 95% C.I.s, and the Chi-squared test was performed to determine the associations between individual categorical variables and Mental Health. The univariate and multivariate logistic regression model was derived, and unadjusted and adjusted odds ratios (OR) and their 95% confidence intervals (C.I.s) were calculated. A P -value of 0.05 or less was used as the cut-off level for statistical significance. The statistical analysis was completed using SPSS ver. 25.0 (SPSS Inc. Chicago, IL, USA) software.

The distributed survey targeted approximately 385 students, but the precise number of respondents to the questionnaire was 355 (92% response rate), with 68% of female students responding, compared to 32% of male students. More than half of the respondents were secondary school students, with a nearly equal mix of respondents living in cities and rural areas. Table 2 demonstrates that 20% of the participants spend more than 12 h daily on the Internet and electronic gadgets, while only 13% spend less than two hours.

As demonstrated in Table 3 , the total prevalence of cyberbullying was estimated to be 42.8%, with male prevalence somewhat higher than female prevalence. Additional variables, such as the number of hours spent on the Internet, did not affect the prevalence. Table 4 shows the pattern and experience of being cyberbullied across mental health levels, as measured by the MHI-5.

Academic Performance was significantly affected due to cyberbullying in 26.3% of the participants. Furthermore, approximately 20% of all participants considered leaving their schools for this reason. Moreover, 19.7% of the participants thought of stopping using the Internet and electronic devices, while 21.1% considered harming themselves due to the effects of cyberbullying. Regarding associations between various variables and psychological effects using the MHI-5, there are significant associations between whether the participant has been a cyber victim before (cOR 2.8), the frequency of harassment (cOR 1.9), academic Performance (cOR 6.5), and considering leaving school as a result of being a cyber victim (cOR 3.0). In addition, by using univariate logistic regression analysis, there are significant associations between the psychological effects and the participant's thoughts of getting rid of a bully (cOR 2.8), thinking to stop using electronic devices (cOR 3.0), and considering hurting themselves as the result of cyberbullying (cOR 6.4). In addition, the use of the multivariate logistic regression analysis showed that frequency of harassment was the only statistically significant predictor of mental health among adolescents (aOR 2.8). Other variables continue to have higher (aORs) but without statistical significance. All these results are demonstrated in Table 4 .

Cyberbullying prevalence rates among adolescents vary widely worldwide, ranging from 10% to more than 70% in many studies. This variation results from certain factors, specifically gender involvement, as a decisive influencing factor [ 26 , 27 ]. Our study found a prevalence of 42.8% (95% confidence interval (CI): 37.7–48), which is higher than the median reported prevalence of cyberbullying of 23.0% in a scoping review that included 36 studies conducted in the United States in adolescents aged 12 to 18 years old [ 28 ]. A systematic review found that cyberbullying ranged from 6.5% to 35.4% [ 3 ]. These two studies gathered data before the COVID-19 pandemic. When compared to recent studies, it was found that cyberbullying increased dramatically during the COVID-19 era [ 29 , 30 ]. Subsequently, with the massive mandate of world online communication in teaching and learning, young adolescents faced a large amount of cyberspace exposure with all risk-related inquiries. Psychological distress due to COVID-19 and spending far more time on the Internet are vital factors in this problem, which might be a reasonable explanation for our results.

There is insufficient data to compare our findings to the Arab world context, notably Saudi Arabia. Although, according to one study done among Saudi Arabian university students, the prevalence was 17.6%. [ 31 ]. we discovered a considerable discrepancy between this prevalence and our findings, and the decisive explanation is the difference in the target age group studied. Age is a crucial risk factor for cyberbullying, and according to one study, cyberbullying peaks at around 14 and 15 years of age and then declines in late adolescence. Thus, a U-inverted relation exists between prevalence and age [ 11 , 12 , 13 , 32 ].

In our study, males reported being more vulnerable to cyberbullying despite there being more female participants; this inconsistent finding with previous literature requires further investigation. A strong, but not recent, meta-analysis in 2014 reported that, in general, males are likely to cyberbully more than females. Females were more likely to report cyberbullying during early to mid-adolescence than males [ 11 ]. This finding presents a concern for males reporting lower than females’ results in our data and raises some questions about whether cultural or religious conservative values play a role.

Increased Internet hours are another risk factor in this study and were significantly associated with cyberbullying. Specifically, it was likely to be with heavy Internet users (> 12 h/day); a similar result was well documented in one equivalent study [ 3 ]. Notably, while some studies have reported that those living in city areas are more likely to be cyberbullying victims than their counterparts from suburban areas [ 3 ], our observations reported no significant influence of this factor on the prevalence of cyberbullying.

According to a population-based study on cyberbullying and teenage well-being in England, which included 110,000 pupils, traditional Bullying accounted for more significant variability in mental well-being than cyberbullying. It did, however, conclude that both types of Bullying carry a risk of affecting mental health [ 33 ]. We confirmed in this study that multiple occurrences of cyberbullying and the potential for being a victim are risk factors influencing mental health ( P  < 0.001). Moreover, the frequency of harassment also shows a significant, influential effect. The victim's desire to be free from the perpetrator carrying out the cyberbullying is probably an alarming sign and a precursor factor for suicidal ideation; we reported that nearly half of the participants wished they could get rid of the perpetrators. Furthermore, more than 20% of participants considered harming themselves due to cyberbullying; this result is consistent with many studies that linked cyberbullying and self-harm and suicidal thoughts [ 34 , 35 , 36 ].

Adolescence is a particularly vulnerable age for the effects of cyberbullying on mental health. In one Saudi Arabian study, parents felt that cyberbullying is more detrimental than Bullying in the schoolyard and more harmful to their children's mental health. According to them, video games were the most popular social platform for cyberbullying [ 37 ]. Both cross-sectional and longitudinal research shows a significant link between cyberbullying and emotional symptoms, including anxiety and depression [ 38 , 39 ]. Therefore, we employed the MHI-5 to measure the mental impact of cyberbullying on adolescents in this study. Overall, the MHI-5 questionnaire showed relatively high sensitivity in detecting anxiety and depression disorders for general health and quality of life assessments. The questions listed happy times, peacefulness, and sensations of calmness, in addition to episodes of anxiousness, downheartedness, and feelings of depression, as given in Table 1 .

Cyberbullying has been well-documented to affect the academic achievement of the victim adolescents. Therefore, bullied adolescents are likelier to miss school, have higher absence rates, dislike school, and report receiving lower grades. According to one meta-analysis, peer victimization has a significant negative link with academic achievement, as measured by grades, student performance, or instructor ratings of academic achievement [ 40 ]. In our investigation, we reported that up to 20% of participants considered leaving their schools due to the adverse effects of cyberbullying (cOR 3.0) and wished they could stop using the Internet; 26% of participants felt that their school performance was affected due to being cyber victims (cOR 6.5). The results of the univariate analysis showed a high odd ratio related to school performance and a willingness to leave school. This conclusion indicates the likelihood of these impacts specifically with a significant p-value, as shown in Table 5 .

In this study, approximately 88% of the participants were cyber victims compared to only 11% of cyberbullying perpetrators who committed this act on their peers. Mental health affection is well-reported in many studies on cyber victims with higher depression rates than cyberbullying perpetrators [ 41 , 42 ]. However, other studies indicate that cyberbullying victims are not the only ones affected; harm is also extended to involve perpetrators. Cyberbullying perpetrators have high-stress levels, poor school performance, and an increased risk of depression and alcohol misuse. Furthermore, research shows that adolescents who were victims or perpetrators of cyberbullying in their adolescence continue to engage in similar behavior into early adulthood [ 43 , 44 ].

Limitations of the study

Although the current study found a high prevalence and positive connections among variables, it should be emphasized that it was conducted on a determinate sample of respondents, 11 to 18 years old. Therefore, the results could not be generalized for other samples, age groups, and communities from other cultures and contexts. In addition, it was limited to adolescent survey responses, did not include parents' and caretakers' viewpoints, and failed to include other risk factors such as divorce and financial status. We believe future studies should consider parents' perspectives and more analysis of perpetrators' characteristics. Moreover, self-reported tools are susceptible to social desirability bias, which can influence test item responses. As a result, future research should employ a variety of monitoring and evaluation metrics and larger potential populations and age ranges. Another limitation of this analysis is that we cannot make conclusive inferences regarding gender and exact prevalence because male adolescents had a lower response rate than female adolescents, suggesting that males might be more sensitive to disclosing these issues.

Even though experts in the social sciences typically research cyberbullying, it is crucial to investigate it from a clinical perspective because it significantly affects mental health. Adolescents' lives have grown increasingly centered on online communication, which provides several possibilities for psychological outcomes and aggressive actions such as cyberbullying. Stress, anxiety, depressive symptoms, suicidal ideation, and deterioration in school performance are all linked to cyberbullying. Therefore, we emphasize the need for parents and educators to be conscious of these dangers and be the first line of protection for the adolescent by recognizing, addressing, and solving this problem. Furthermore, we urge the responsibility of pediatricians, physicians, and psychiatric consultants to create a comfortable atmosphere for adolescents to disclose and report this problem early and raise awareness of the problem in their communities. Furthermore, practical strategies for dealing with such occurrences involving health, education, and law authorities, should be supported to tackle this problem, which can affect the adolescent mentally and academically. Lastly, to decide how to intervene most effectively, more research must be done on the many methods to assess how schools, communities, and healthcare providers tackle cyberbullying.

Availability of data and materials

The authors ensure that the data supporting the results of this study are available within the article. The raw data for the study will be obtainable from the corresponding author upon reasonable demand.

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Gohal, G., Alqassim, A., Eltyeb, E. et al. Prevalence and related risks of cyberbullying and its effects on adolescent. BMC Psychiatry 23 , 39 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1186/s12888-023-04542-0

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Cyberbullying: What is it and how can you stop it?

Explore the latest psychological science about the impact of cyberbullying and what to do if you or your child is a victim

• Mental Health
• Social Media and Internet

Cyberbullying can happen anywhere with an internet connection. While traditional, in-person bullying is still more common , data from the Cyberbullying Research Center suggest about 1 in every 4 teens has experienced cyberbullying, and about 1 in 6 has been a perpetrator. About 1 in 5 tweens, or kids ages 9 to 12, has been involved in cyberbullying (PDF, 5.57MB) .

As technology advances, so do opportunities to connect with people—but unfettered access to others isn’t always a good thing, especially for youth. Research has long linked more screen time with lower psychological well-being , including higher rates of anxiety and depression. The risk of harm is higher when kids and teens are victimized by cyberbullying.

Here’s what you need to know about cyberbullying, and psychology’s role in stopping it.

What is cyberbullying?

Cyberbullying occurs when someone uses technology to demean, inflict harm, or cause pain to another person. It is “willful and repeated harm inflicted through the use of computers, cell phones, and other electronic devices.” Perpetrators bully victims in any online setting, including social media, video or computer games, discussion boards, or text messaging on mobile devices.

Virtual bullying can affect anyone, regardless of age. However, the term “cyberbullying” usually refers to online bullying among children and teenagers. It may involve name calling, threats, sharing private or embarrassing photos, or excluding others.

One bully can harass another person online or several bullies can gang up on an individual. While a stranger can incite cyberbullying, it more frequently occurs among kids or teens who know each other from school or other social settings. Research suggests bullying often happens both at school and online .

Online harassment between adults can involve different terms, depending on the relationship and context. For example, dating violence, sexual harassment, workplace harassment, and scamming—more common among adults—can all happen on the internet.

How can cyberbullying impact the mental health of myself or my child?

Any form of bullying can negatively affect the victim’s well-being, both at the time the bullying occurs and in the future. Psychological research suggests being victimized by a cyberbully increases stress and may result in anxiety and depression symptoms . Some studies find anxiety and depression increase the likelihood adolescents will become victims to cyberbullying .

Cyberbullying can also cause educational harm , affecting a student’s attendance or academic performance, especially when bullying occurs both online and in school or when a student has to face their online bully in the classroom. Kids and teens may rely on negative coping mechanisms, such as substance use, to deal with the stress of cyberbullying. In extreme cases, kids and teens may struggle with self-harm or suicidal ideation .

How can parents talk to their children about cyberbullying?

Parents play a crucial role in preventing cyberbullying and associated harms. Be aware of what your kids are doing online, whether you check your child’s device, talk to them about their online behaviors, or install a monitoring program. Set rules about who your child can friend or interact with on social media platforms. For example, tell your child if they wouldn’t invite someone to your house, then they shouldn’t give them access to their social media accounts. Parents should also familiarize themselves with signs of cyberbullying , such as increased device use, anger or anxiety after using a device, or hiding devices when others are nearby.

Communicating regularly about cyberbullying is an important component in preventing it from affecting your child’s well-being. Psychologists recommend talking to kids about how to be safe online before they have personal access to the internet. Familiarize your child with the concept of cyberbullying as soon as they can understand it. Develop a game plan to problem solve if it occurs. Cultivating open dialogue about cyberbullying can ensure kids can identify the experience and tell an adult, before it escalates into a more harmful situation.

It’s also important to teach kids what to do if someone else is being victimized. For example, encourage your child to tell a teacher or parent if someone they know is experiencing cyberbullying.

Keep in mind kids may be hesitant to open up about cyberbullying because they’re afraid they’ll lose access to their devices. Encourage your child to be open with you by reminding them they won’t get in trouble for talking to you about cyberbullying. Clearly explain your goal is to allow them to communicate with their friends safely online.

How can I report cyberbullying?

How you handle cyberbullying depends on a few factors, such as the type of bullying and your child’s age. You may choose to intervene by helping a younger child problem solve whereas teens may prefer to handle the bullying on their own with a caregiver’s support.

In general, it’s a good practice to take screenshots of the cyberbullying incidents as a record, but not to respond to bullies’ messages. Consider blocking cyberbullies to prevent future harassment.

Parents should contact the app or website directly about removing bullying-related posts, especially if they reveal private or embarrassing information. Some social media sites suspend perpetrators’ accounts.

If the bullying also occurs at school or on a school-owned device, or if the bullying is affecting a child’s school performance, it may be appropriate to speak with your child’s teacher or school personnel.

What are the legal ramifications of cyberbullying?

In some cases, parents should report cyberbullying to law enforcement. If cyberbullying includes threats to someone’s physical safety, consider contacting your local police department.

What’s illegal can vary from state to state. Any illegal behaviors, such as blackmailing someone to send money, hate crimes, stalking, or posting sexual photos of a minor, can have legal repercussions. If you’re not sure about what’s legal and what’s not, check your state’s laws and law enforcement .

Are big tech companies responsible for promoting positive digital spaces?

In an ideal world, tech companies would prioritize creating safer online environments for young people. Some companies are working toward it already, including partnering with psychologists to better understand how their products affect kids, and how to keep them safe. But going the extra mile isn’t always profitable for technology companies. For now, it’s up to individuals, families, and communities to protect kids’ and teens’ best interest online.

What does the research show about psychology’s role in reducing this issue?

Many studies show preventative measures can drastically reduce cyberbullying perpetration and victimization . Parents and caregivers, schools, and technology companies play a role in educating kids about media literacy and mental health. Psychologists—thanks to their expertise in child and teen development, communication, relationships, and mental health—can also make important contributions in preventing cyberbullying.

Because cybervictimization coincides with anxiety and depression, research suggests mental health clinicians and educators should consider interventions that both address adolescents’ online experiences and support their mental, social, and emotional well-being. Psychologists can also help parents speak to their kids about cyberbullying, along with supporting families affected by it.

You can learn more about cyberbullying at these websites:

• Cyberbullying Research Center
• StopBullying.gov
• Nemours Kids Health

Acknowledgments

APA gratefully acknowledges the following contributors to this publication:

• Sarah Domoff, PhD, associate professor of psychology at Central Michigan University
• Dorothy Espelage, PhD, William C. Friday Distinguished Professor of Education at the University of North Carolina
• Stephanie Fredrick, PhD, NCSP, assistant professor and associate director of the Dr. Jean M. Alberti Center for the Prevention of Bullying Abuse and School Violence at the University at Buffalo, State University of New York
• Brian TaeHyuk Keum, PhD, assistant professor in the Department of Social Welfare at the UCLA Luskin School of Public Affairs
• Mitchell J. Prinstein, PhD, chief science officer at APA
• Susan Swearer, PhD, Willa Cather Professor of School Psychology, University of Nebraska-Lincoln; licensed psychologist

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SYSTEMATIC REVIEW article

Cyberbullying among adolescents and children: a comprehensive review of the global situation, risk factors, and preventive measures.

• 1 School of Political Science and Public Administration, Wuhan University, Wuhan, China
• 2 School of Medicine and Health Management, Tongji Medical College, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan, China
• 3 College of Engineering, Design and Physical Sciences, Brunel University London, Uxbridge, United Kingdom

Background: Cyberbullying is well-recognized as a severe public health issue which affects both adolescents and children. Most extant studies have focused on national and regional effects of cyberbullying, with few examining the global perspective of cyberbullying. This systematic review comprehensively examines the global situation, risk factors, and preventive measures taken worldwide to fight cyberbullying among adolescents and children.

Methods: A systematic review of available literature was completed following PRISMA guidelines using the search themes “cyberbullying” and “adolescent or children”; the time frame was from January 1st, 2015 to December 31st, 2019. Eight academic databases pertaining to public health, and communication and psychology were consulted, namely: Web of Science, Science Direct, PubMed, Google Scholar, ProQuest, Communication & Mass Media Complete, CINAHL, and PsycArticles. Additional records identified through other sources included the references of reviews and two websites, Cyberbullying Research Center and United Nations Children's Fund. A total of 63 studies out of 2070 were included in our final review focusing on cyberbullying prevalence and risk factors.

Results: The prevalence rates of cyberbullying preparation ranged from 6.0 to 46.3%, while the rates of cyberbullying victimization ranged from 13.99 to 57.5%, based on 63 references. Verbal violence was the most common type of cyberbullying. Fourteen risk factors and three protective factors were revealed in this study. At the personal level, variables associated with cyberbullying including age, gender, online behavior, race, health condition, past experience of victimization, and impulsiveness were reviewed as risk factors. Likewise, at the situational level, parent-child relationship, interpersonal relationships, and geographical location were also reviewed in relation to cyberbullying. As for protective factors, empathy and emotional intelligence, parent-child relationship, and school climate were frequently mentioned.

Conclusion: The prevalence rate of cyberbullying has increased significantly in the observed 5-year period, and it is imperative that researchers from low and middle income countries focus sufficient attention on cyberbullying of children and adolescents. Despite a lack of scientific intervention research on cyberbullying, the review also identified several promising strategies for its prevention from the perspectives of youths, parents and schools. More research on cyberbullying is needed, especially on the issue of cross-national cyberbullying. International cooperation, multi-pronged and systematic approaches are highly encouraged to deal with cyberbullying.

Introduction

Childhood and adolescence are not only periods of growth, but also of emerging risk taking. Young people during these periods are particularly vulnerable and cannot fully understand the connection between behaviors and consequences ( 1 ). With peer pressures, the heat of passion, children and adolescents usually perform worse than adults when people are required to maintain self-discipline to achieve good results in unfamiliar situations. Impulsiveness, sensation seeking, thrill seeking, and other individual differences cause adolescents to risk rejecting standardized risk interventions ( 2 ).

About one-third of Internet users in the world are children and adolescents under the age of 18 ( 3 ). Digital technology provide a new form of interpersonal communication ( 4 ). However, surveys and news reports also show another picture in the Internet Age. The dark side of young people's internet usage is that they may bully or suffer from others' bullying in cyberspace. This behavior is also acknowledged as cyberbullying ( 5 ). Based on Olweus's definition, cyberbullying is usually regarded as bullying implemented through electronic media ( 6 , 7 ). Specifically, cyberbullying among children and adolescents can be summarized as the intentional and repeated harm from one or more peers that occurs in cyberspace caused by the use of computers, smartphones and other devices ( 4 , 8 – 12 ). In recent years, new forms of cyberbullying behaviors have emerged, such as cyberstalking and online dating abuse ( 13 – 15 ).

Although cyberbullying is still a relatively new field of research, cyberbullying among adolescents is considered to be a serious public health issue that is closely related to adolescents' behavior, mental health and development ( 16 , 17 ). The increasing rate of Internet adoption worldwide and the popularity of social media platforms among the young people have worsened this situation with most children and adolescents experiencing cyberbullying or online victimization during their lives. The confines of space and time are alleviated for bullies in virtual environments, creating new venues for cyberbullying with no geographical boundaries ( 6 ). Cyberbullying exerts negative effects on many aspects of young people's lives, including personal privacy invasion and psychological disorders. The influence of cyberbullying may be worse than traditional bullying as perpetrators can act anonymously and connect easily with children and adolescents at any time ( 18 ). In comparison with traditional victims, those bullied online show greater levels of depression, anxiety and loneliness ( 19 ). Self-esteem problems and school absenteeism have also proven to be related to cyberbullying ( 20 ).

Due to changes in use and behavioral patterns among the youth on social media, the manifestations and risk factors of cyberbullying have faced significant transformation. Further, as the boundaries of cyberbullying are not limited by geography, cyberbullying may not be a problem contained within a single country. In this sense, cyberbullying is a global problem and tackling it requires greater international collaboration. The adverse effects caused by cyberbullying, including reduced safety, lower educational attainment, poorer mental health and greater unhappiness, led UNICEF to state that “no child is absolutely safe in the digital world” ( 3 ).

Extant research has examined the prevalence and risk factors of cyberbullying to unravel the complexity of cyberbullying across different countries and their corresponding causes. However, due to variations in cyberbullying measurement and methodologies, no consistent conclusions have been drawn ( 21 ). Studies into inconsistencies in prevalence rates of cyberbullying, measured in the same country during the same time period, occur frequently. Selkie et al. systematically reviewed cyberbullying among American middle and high school students aged 10–19 years old in 2015, and revealed that the prevalence of cyberbullying victimization ranged from 3 to 72%, while perpetration ranged from 1 to 41% ( 22 ). Risk and protective factors have also been broadly studied, but confirmation is still needed of those factors which have more significant effects on cyberbullying among young people. Clarification of these issues would be useful to allow further research to recognize cyberbullying more accurately.

This review aims to extend prior contributions and provide a comprehensive review of cyberbullying of children and adolescents from a global perspective, with the focus being on prevalence, associated risk factors and protective factors across countries. It is necessary to provide a global panorama based on research syntheses to fill the gaps in knowledge on this topic.

Search Strategies

This study strictly employed Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses (PRISMA) guidelines. We consulted eight academic databases pertaining to public health, and communication and psychology, namely: Web of Science, Science Direct, PubMed, Google Scholar, ProQuest, Communication & Mass Media Complete, CINAHL, and PsycArticles. Additional records identified through other sources included the references of reviews and two websites, Cyberbullying Research Center and United Nations Children's Fund. With regard to the duration of our review, since most studies on cyberbullying arose around 2015 ( 9 , 21 ), this study highlights the complementary aspects of the available information about cyberbullying during the recent 5 year period from January 1st, 2015 to December 31st, 2019.

One researcher extracted keywords and two researchers proposed modifications. We used two sets of subject terms to review articles, “cyberbullying” and “child OR adolescent.” Some keywords that refer to cyberbullying behaviors and young people are also included, such as threat, harass, intimidate, abuse, insult, humiliate, condemn, isolate, embarrass, forgery, slander, flame, stalk, manhunt, as well as teen, youth, young people and student. The search formula is (cyberbullying OR cyber-bullying OR cyber-aggression OR ((cyber OR online OR electronic OR Internet) AND (bully * OR aggres * OR violence OR perpetrat * OR victim * OR threat * OR harass * OR intimidat * OR * OR insult * OR humiliate * OR condemn * OR isolate * OR embarrass * OR forgery OR slander * OR flame OR stalk * OR manhunt))) AND (adolescen * OR child OR children OR teen? OR teenager? OR youth? OR “young people” OR “elementary school student * ” OR “middle school student * ” OR “high school student * ”). The main search approach is title search. Search strategies varied according to the database consulted, and we did not limit the type of literature for inclusion. Journals, conference papers and dissertations are all available.

Specifically, the inclusion criteria for our study were as follows: (a). reported or evaluated the prevalence and possible risk factors associated with cyberbullying, (b). respondents were students under the age of 18 or in primary, junior or senior high schools, and (c). studies were written in English. Exclusion criteria were: (a). respondents came from specific groups, such as clinical samples, children with disabilities, sexual minorities, specific ethnic groups, specific faith groups or samples with cross-national background, (b). review studies, qualitative studies, conceptual studies, book reviews, news reports or abstracts of meetings, and (c). studies focused solely on preventive measures that were usually meta-analytic and qualitative in nature. Figure 1 presents the details of the employed screening process, showing that a total of 63 studies out of 2070 were included in our final review.

Figure 1 . PRISMA flow chart diagram showing the process of study selection for inclusion in the systematic review on children and adolescents cyberbullying.

Meta-analysis was not conducted as the limited research published within the 5 years revealed little research which reported odds ratio. On the other hand, due to the inconsistency of concepts, measuring instruments and recall periods, considerable variation could be found in research quality ( 23 ). Meta-analysis is not a preferred method.

Coding Scheme

For coding, we created a comprehensive code scheme to include the characteristics. For cyberbullying, we coded five types proposed by Willard ( 24 – 26 ), which included verbal violence, group violence, visual violence, impersonating and account forgery, and other behaviors. Among them, verbal violence is considered one of the most common types of cyberbullying and refers to the behavior of offensive responses, insults, mocking, threats, slander, and harassment. Group violence is associated with preventing others from joining certain groups or isolating others, forcing others to leave the group. Visual violence relates to the release and sharing of embarrassing photos and information without the owners' consent. Impersonating and account forgery refers to identity theft, stealing passwords, violating accounts and the creation of fake accounts to fraudulently present the behavior of others. Other behaviors include disclosure of privacy, sexual harassment, and cyberstalking. To comprehensively examine cyberbullying, we coded cyberbullying behaviors from both the perspectives of cyberbullying perpetrators and victims, if mentioned in the studies.

In relation to risk factors, we drew insights from the general aggression model, which contributes to the understanding of personal and situational factors in the cyberbullying of children and adolescents. We chose the general aggression model because (a) it contains more situational factors than other models (e.g., social ecological models) - such as school climate ( 9 ), and (b) we believe that the general aggression model is more suitable for helping researchers conduct a systematic review of cyberbullying risk and protective factors. This model provides a comprehensive framework that integrates domain specific theories of aggression, and has been widely applied in cyberbullying research ( 27 ). For instance, Kowalski and colleagues proposed a cyberbullying encounter through the general aggression model to understand the formation and development process of youth cyberbullying related to both victimization and perpetration ( 9 ). Victims and perpetrators enter the cyberbullying encounter with various individual characteristics, experiences, attitudes, desires, personalities, and motives that intersect to determine the course of the interaction. Correspondingly, the antecedents pertaining to cyberbullying are divided into two broad categories, personal factors and situational factors. Personal factors refer to individual characteristics, such as gender, age, motivation, personality, psychological states, socioeconomic status and technology use, values and perceptions, and other maladaptive behaviors. Situational factors focus on the provocation/support, parental involvement, school climate, and perceived anonymity. Consequently, our coders related to risk factors consisting of personal factors and situational factors from the perspectives of both cyberbullying perpetrators and victims.

We extracted information relating to individual papers and sample characteristics, including authors, year of publication, country, article type, sampling procedures, sample characteristics, measures of cyberbullying, and prevalence and risk factors from both cyberbullying perpetration and victimization perspectives. The key words extraction and coding work were performed twice by two trained research assistants in health informatics. The consistency test results are as follows: the Kappa value with “personal factors” was 0.932, and the Kappa value with “situational factors” was 0.807. The result shows that the coding consistency was high enough and acceptable. Disagreements were resolved through discussion with other authors.

Quality Assessment of Studies

The quality assessment of the studies is based on the recommended tool for assessing risk of bias, Cochrane Collaboration. This quality assessment tool focused on seven items: random sequence generation, allocation concealment, blinding of participants and personnel, blinding of outcome assessment, incomplete outcome data, selective reporting, and other sources of bias ( 28 ). We assessed each item as “low risk,” “high risk,” and “unclear” for included studies. A study is considered of “high quality” when it meets three or more “low risk” requirements. When one or more main flaw of a study may affect the research results, the study is considered as “low quality.” When a lack of information leads to a difficult judgement, the quality is considered to be “unclear.” Please refer to Appendix 1 for more details.

This comprehensive systematic review comprised a total of 63 studies. Appendices 2 , 3 show the descriptive information of the studies included. Among them, 58 (92%) studies measured two or more cyberbullying behavior types. The sample sizes of the youths range from several hundred to tens of thousands, with one thousand to five thousand being the most common. As for study distribution, the United States of America, Spain and China were most frequently mentioned. Table 1 presents the detail.

Table 1 . Descriptive information of studies included (2015–2019).

Prevalence of Global Cyberbullying

Prevalence across countries.

Among the 63 studies included, 22 studies reported on cyberbullying prevalence and 20 studies reported on prevalence from victimization and perpetration perspectives, respectively. Among the 20 studies, 11 national studies indicated that the prevalence of cyberbullying victimization and cyberbullying perpetration ranged from 14.6 to 52.2% and 6.3 to 32%, respectively. These studies were conducted in the United States of America ( N = 4) ( 29 – 32 ), South Korea ( N = 3) ( 33 – 35 ), Singapore ( N = 1) ( 36 ), Malaysia ( N = 1) ( 37 ), Israel ( N = 1) ( 38 ), and Canada ( N = 1) ( 39 ). Only one of these 11 national studies is from an upper middle income country, and the rest are from highincome countries identified by the World Bank ( 40 ). By combining regional and community-level studies, the prevalence of cyberbullying victimization and cyberbullying perpetration ranged from 13.99 to 57.5% and 6.0 to 46.3%, respectively. Spain reported the highest prevalence of cyberbullying victimization (57.5%) ( 41 ), followed by Malaysia (52.2%) ( 37 ), Israel (45%) ( 42 ), and China (44.5%) ( 43 ). The lowest reported victim rates were observed in Canada (13.99%) and South Korea (14.6%) ( 34 , 39 ). The reported prevalence of cyberbullying victimization in the United States of America ranged from 15.5 to 31.4% ( 29 , 44 ), while in Israel, rates ranged from 30 to 45% ( 26 , 42 ). In China, rates ranged from 6 to 46.3% with the country showing the highest prevalence of cyberbullying perpetration (46.30%) ( 15 , 43 , 45 , 46 ). Canadian and South Korean studies reported the lowest prevalence of cyberbullying perpetration at 7.99 and 6.3%, respectively ( 34 , 39 ).

A total of 10 studies were assessed as high quality studies. Among them, six studies came from high income countries, including Canada, Germany, Italy, Portugal, and South Korea ( 13 , 34 , 39 , 46 – 48 ). Three studies were from upper middle income countries, including Malaysia and China ( 37 , 43 ) and one from a lower middle income country, Nigeria ( 49 ). Figures 2 , 3 describe the prevalence of cyberbullying victimization and perpetration respectively among high quality studies.

Figure 2 . The prevalence of cyberbullying victimization of high quality studies.

Figure 3 . The prevalence of cyberbullying perpetration of high quality studies.

Prevalence of Various Cyberbullying Behaviors

For the prevalence of cyberbullying victimization and perpetration, the data were reported in 18 and 14 studies, respectively. Figure 4 shows the distribution characteristics of the estimated value of prevalence of different cyberbullying behaviors with box plots. The longer the box, the greater the degree of variation of the numerical data and vice versa. The rate of victimization and crime of verbal violence, as well as the rate of victimization of other behaviors, such as cyberstalking and digital dating abuse, has a large degree of variation. Among the four specified types of cyberbullying behaviors, verbal violence was regarded as the most commonly reported behaviors in both perpetration and victimization rates, with a wide range of prevalence, ranging from 5 to 18%. Fewer studies reported the prevalence data for visual violence and group violence. Studies also showed that the prevalence of impersonation and account forgery were within a comparatively small scale. Specific results were as follows.

Figure 4 . Cyberbullying prevalence across types (2015–2019).

Verbal Violence

A total of 13 studies reported verbal violence prevalence data ( 15 , 26 , 34 , 37 – 39 , 42 , 43 , 47 , 48 , 50 , 51 ). Ten studies reported the prevalence of verbal violence victimization ranging from 2.8 to 47.5%, while seven studies claimed perpetration prevalence ranging from 1.5 to 31.8%. Malaysia reported the highest prevalence of verbal violence victimization (47.5%) ( 37 ), followed by China (32%) ( 43 ). China reported that the prevalence of verbal violence victimization ranged from 5.1 to 32% ( 15 , 43 ). Israel reported that the prevalence of verbal violence victimization ranged from 3.4 to 18% ( 26 , 38 , 42 ). For perpetration rate, Malaysia reported the highest level at 31.8% ( 37 ), while a study for Spain reported the lowest, ranging from 3.2 to 6.4% ( 51 ).

Group Violence

The prevalence of group violence victimization was explored within 4 studies and ranged from 5 to 17.8% ( 26 , 34 , 42 , 43 ), while perpetration prevalence was reported in three studies, ranging from 10.1 to 19.07% ( 34 , 43 , 47 ). An Israeli study suggested that 9.8% of respondents had been excluded from the Internet, while 8.9% had been refused entry to a group or team ( 26 ). A study in South Korea argued that the perpetration prevalence of group violence was 10.1% ( 34 ), while a study in Italy reported that the rate of online group violence against others was 19.07% ( 47 ).

Visual Violence

The prevalence of visual violence victimization was explored within three studies and ranged from 2.6 to 12.1% ( 26 , 34 , 43 ), while the perpetration prevalence reported in four studies ranged from 1.7 to 6% ( 34 , 43 , 47 , 48 ). For victimization prevalence, a South Korean study found that 12.1% of respondents reported that their personal information was leaked online ( 34 ). An Israel study reported that the prevalence of outing the picture was 2.6% ( 26 ). For perpetration prevalence, a South Korean study found that 1.7% of respondents had reported that they had disclosed someone's personal information online ( 34 ). A German study reported that 6% of respondents had written a message (e.g., an email) to somebody using a fake identity ( 48 ).

Impersonating and Account Forgery

Four studies reported on the victimization prevalence of impersonating and account forgery, ranging from 1.1 to 10% ( 15 , 42 , 43 ), while five studies reported on perpetration prevalence, with the range being from 1.3 to 9.31% ( 15 , 43 , 47 , 48 , 51 ). In a Spanish study, 10% of respondents reported that their accounts had been infringed by others or that they could not access their account due to stolen passwords. In contrast, 4.5% of respondents reported that they had infringed other people's accounts or stolen passwords, with 2.5% stating that they had forged other people's accounts ( 51 ). An Israeli study reported that the prevalence of being impersonated was 7% ( 42 ), while in China, a study reported this to be 8.6% ( 43 ). Another study from China found that 1.1% of respondents had been impersonated to send dating-for-money messages ( 15 ).

Other Behaviors

The prevalence of disclosure of privacy, sexual harassment, and cyberstalking were also explored by scholars. Six studies reported the victimization prevalence of other cyberbullying behaviors ( 13 , 15 , 34 , 37 , 42 , 43 ), and four studies reported on perpetration prevalence ( 34 , 37 , 43 , 48 ). A study in China found that 1.2% of respondents reported that their privacy had been compromised without permission due to disputes ( 15 ). A study from China reported the prevalence of cyberstalking victimization was 11.9% ( 43 ), while a Portuguese study reported that this was 62% ( 13 ). In terms of perpetration prevalence, a Malaysian study reported 2.7% for sexual harassment ( 37 ).

Risk and Protective Factors of Cyberbullying

In terms of the risk factors associated with cyberbullying among children and adolescents, this comprehensive review highlighted both personal and situational factors. Personal factors referred to age, gender, online behavior, race, health conditions, past experiences of victimization, and impulsiveness, while situational factors consisted of parent-child relationship, interpersonal relationships, and geographical location. In addition, protective factors against cyberbullying included: empathy and emotional intelligence, parent-child relationship, and school climate. Table 2 shows the risk and protective factors for child and adolescent cyberbullying.

Table 2 . Risk and protective factors of cyberbullying among children and adolescents.

In terms of the risk factors associated with cyberbullying victimization at the personal level, many studies evidenced that females were more likely to be cyberbullied than males ( 13 , 26 , 29 , 38 , 43 , 52 , 54 , 55 , 58 ). Meanwhile, adolescents with mental health problems ( 61 ), such as depression ( 33 , 62 ), borderline personality disorder ( 63 ), eating disorders ( 41 ), sleep deprivation ( 56 ), and suicidal thoughts and suicide plans ( 64 ), were more likely to be associated with cyberbullying victimization. As for Internet usage, researchers agreed that youth victims were probably those that spent more time online than their counterparts ( 32 , 36 , 43 , 45 , 48 , 49 , 60 ). For situational risk factors, some studies have proven the relationship between cyberbullying victims and parental abuse, parental neglect, family dysfunction, inadequate monitoring, and parents' inconsistency in mediation, as well as communication issues ( 33 , 64 , 68 , 73 ). In terms of geographical location, some studies have reported that youths residing in city locations are more likely to be victims of cyberbullying than their peers from suburban areas ( 61 ).

Regarding the risk factors of cyberbullying perpetration at the personal level, it is generally believed that older teenagers, especially those aged over 15 years, are at greater risk of becoming cyberbullying perpetrators ( 55 , 67 ). When considering prior cyberbullying experiences, evidence showed that individuals who had experienced cyberbullying or face-to-face bullying tended to be aggressors in cyberbullying ( 35 , 42 , 49 , 51 , 55 ); in addition, the relationship between impulsiveness and cyberbullying perpetration was also explored by several pioneering scholars ( 55 , 72 , 80 ). The situational factors highlight the role of parents and teachers in cyberbullying experiences. For example, over-control and authoritarian parenting styles, as well as inharmonious teacher-student relationships ( 61 ) are perceived to lead to cyberbullying behaviors ( 74 , 75 ). In terms of differences in geographical locations, students residing in cities have a higher rate of online harassment than students living in more rural locations ( 49 ).

In terms of the protective factors in child and adolescent cyberbullying, scholars have focused on youths who have limited experiences of cyberbullying. At the personal level, high emotional intelligence, an ability for emotional self-control and empathy, such as cognitive empathy ability ( 44 , 55 ), were associated with lower rates of cyberbullying ( 57 ). At the situational level, a parent's role is seen as critical. For example, intimate parent-child relationships ( 46 ) and open active communication ( 19 ) were demonstrated to be related to lower experiences of cyberbullying and perpetration. Some scholars argued that parental supervision and monitoring of children's online activities can reduce their tendency to participate in some negative activities associated with cyberbullying ( 31 , 46 , 73 ). They further claimed that an authoritative parental style protects youths against cyberbullying ( 43 ). Conversely, another string of studies evidenced that parents' supervision of Internet usage was meaningless ( 45 ). In addition to conflicting roles of parental supervision, researchers have also looked into the role of schools, and posited that positive school climates contribute to less cyberbullying experiences ( 61 , 79 ).

Some risk factors may be protective factors under another condition. Some studies suggest that parental aggressive communication is related to severe cyberbullying victims, while open communication is a potential protective factor ( 19 ). Parental neglect, parental abuse, parental inconsistency in supervision of adolescents' online behavior, and family dysfunction are related to the direct or indirect harm of cyberbullying ( 33 , 68 ). Parental participation, a good parental-children relationship, communication and dialogue can enhance children's school adaptability and prevent cyberbullying behaviors ( 31 , 74 ). When parental monitoring reaches a balance between control and openness, it could become a protective factor against cyberbullying, and it could be a risk factor, if parental monitoring is too low or over-controlled ( 47 ).

Despite frequent discussion about the risk factors associated with cyberbullying among children and adolescents, some are still deemed controversial factors, such as age, race, gender, and the frequency of suffering on the internet. For cyberbullying victims, some studies claim that older teenagers are more vulnerable to cyberbullying ( 15 , 38 , 52 , 53 ), while other studies found conflicting results ( 26 , 33 ). As for student race, Alhajji et al. argued that non-white students were less likely to report cyberbullying ( 29 ), while Morin et al. observed no significant correlation between race and cyberbullying ( 52 ). For cyberbullying perpetration, Alvarez-Garcia found that gender differences may have indirect effects on cyberbullying perpetration ( 55 ), while others disagreed ( 42 , 61 , 68 – 70 ). Specifically, some studies revealed that males were more likely to become cyberbullying perpetrators ( 34 , 39 , 56 ), while Khurana et al. presented an opposite point of view, proposing that females were more likely to attack others ( 71 ). In terms of time spent on the Internet, some claimed that students who frequently surf the Internet had a higher chance of becoming perpetrators ( 49 ), while others stated that there was no clear and direct association between Internet usage and cyberbullying perpetration ( 55 ).

In addition to personal and situational factors, scholars have also explored other specific factors pertaining to cyberbullying risk and protection. For instance, mindfulness and depression were found to be significantly related to cyber perpetration ( 76 ), while eating disorder psychopathology in adolescents was associated with cyber victimization ( 41 ). For males who were familiar with their victims, such as family members, friends and acquaintances, they were more likely to be cyberstalking perpetrators than females or strangers, while pursuing desired closer relationships ( 13 ). In the school context, a lower social likability in class was identified as an indirect factor for cyberbullying ( 48 ).

This comprehensive review has established that the prevalence of global childhood and adolescent victimization from cyberbullying ranges from 13.99 to 57.5%, and that the perpetration prevalence ranges from 6.0 to 46.3%. Across the studies included in our research, verbal violence is observed as one of the most common acts of cyberbullying, including verbal offensive responses, insults, mocking, threats, slander, and harassment. The victimization prevalence of verbal violence is reported to be between 5 and 47.5%, and the perpetration prevalence is between 3.2 and 26.1%. Personal factors, such as gender, frequent use of social media platforms, depression, borderline personality disorder, eating disorders, sleep deprivation, and suicidal tendencies, were generally considered to be related to becoming a cyberbullying victim. Personal factors, such as high school students, past experiences, impulse, improperly controlled family education, poor teacher-student relationships, and the urban environment, were considered risk factors for cyberbullying perpetration. Situational factors, including parental abuse and neglect, improper monitoring, communication barriers between parents and children, as well as the urban environment, were also seen to potentially contribute to higher risks of both cyberbullying victimization and perpetration.

Increasing Prevalence of Global Cyberbullying With Changing Social Media Landscape and Measurement Alterations

This comprehensive review suggests that global cyberbullying rates, in terms of victimization and perpetration, were on the rise during the 5 year period, from 2015 to 2019. For example, in an earlier study conducted by Modecki et al. the average cyberbullying involvement rate was 15% ( 81 ). Similar observations were made by Hamm et al. who found that the median rates of youth having experienced bullying or who had bullied others online, was 23 and 15.2%, respectively ( 82 ). However, our systematic review summarized global children and adolescents cyberbullying in the last 5 years and revealed an average cyberbullying perpetration rate of 25.03%, ranging from 6.0 to 46.3%, while the average victimization was 33.08%, ranging from 13.99 to 57.5%. The underlying reason for increases may be attributed to the rapid changing landscape of social media and, in recent years, the drastic increase in Internet penetration rates. With the rise in Internet access, youths have greater opportunities to participate in online activities, provided by emerging social media platforms.

Although our review aims to provide a broader picture of cyberbullying, it is well-noted in extant research that difficulties exist in accurately estimating variations in prevalence in different countries ( 23 , 83 ). Many reasons exist to explain this. The first largely relates poor or unclear definition of the term cyberbullying; this hinders the determination of cyberbullying victimization and perpetration ( 84 ). Although traditional bullying behavior is well-defined, the definition cannot directly be applied to the virtual environment due to the complexity in changing online interactions. Without consensus on definitions, measurement and cyberbullying types may vary noticeably ( 83 , 85 ). Secondly, the estimation of prevalence of cyberbullying is heavily affected by research methods, such as recall period (lifetime, last year, last 6 months, last month, or last week etc.), demographic characteristics of the survey sample (age, gender, race, etc.), perspectives of cyberbullying experiences (victims, perpetrators, or both victim and perpetrator), and instruments (scales, study-specific questions) ( 23 , 84 , 86 ). The variety in research tools and instruments used to assess the prevalence of cyberbullying can cause confusion on this issue ( 84 ). Thirdly, variations in economic development, cultural backgrounds, human values, internet penetration rates, and frequency of using social media may lead to different conclusions across countries ( 87 ).

Acknowledging the Conflicting Role of the Identified Risk Factors With More Research Needed to Establish the Causality

Although this review has identified many personal and situational factors associated with cyberbullying, the majority of studies adopted a cross-sectional design and failed to reveal the causality ( 21 ). Nevertheless, knowledge on these correlational relationships provide valuable insights for understanding and preventing cyberbullying incidents. In terms of gender differences, females are believed to be at a higher risk of cyberbullying victimization compared to males. Two reasons may help to explain this. First, the preferred violence behaviors between two genders. females prefer indirect harassment, such as the spreading of rumors, while males tend toward direct bullying (e.g., assault) ( 29 ) and second, the cultural factors. From the traditional gender perspective, females tended to perceive a greater risk of communicating with others on the Internet, while males were more reluctant to express fear, vulnerability and insecurity when asked about their cyberbullying experiences ( 46 ). Females were more intolerant when experiencing cyberstalking and were more likely to report victimization experiences than males ( 13 ). Meanwhile, many researchers suggested that females are frequent users of emerging digital communication platforms, which increases their risk of unpleasant interpersonal contact and violence. From the perspective of cultural norms and masculinity, the reporting of cyberbullying is also widely acknowledged ( 37 ). For example, in addition, engaging in online activities is also regarded as a critical predictor for cyberbullying victimization. Enabled by the Internet, youths can easily find potential victims and start harassment at any time ( 49 ). Participating in online activities directly increases the chance of experiencing cyberbullying victimization and the possibility of becoming a victim ( 36 , 45 ). As for age, earlier involvement on social media and instant messaging tools may increase the chances of experiencing cyberbullying. For example, in Spain, these tools cannot be used without parental permission before the age of 14 ( 55 ). Besides, senior students were more likely to be more impulsive and less sympathetic. They may portray more aggressive and anti-social behaviors ( 55 , 72 ); hence senior students and students with higher impulsivity were usually more likely to become cyberbullying perpetrators.

Past experiences of victimization and family-related factors are another risk for cyberbullying crime. As for past experiences, one possible explanation is that young people who had experienced online or traditional school bullying may commit cyberbullying using e-mails, instant messages, and text messages for revenge, self-protection, or improving their social status ( 35 , 42 , 49 , 55 ). In becoming a cyberbullying perpetrator, the student may feel more powerful and superior, externalizing angry feelings and relieving the feelings of helplessness and sadness produced by past victimization experiences ( 51 ). As for family related factors, parenting styles are proven to be highly correlated to cyberbullying. In authoritative families, parents focus on rational behavioral control with clear rules and a high component of supervision and parental warmth, which have beneficial effects on children's lifestyles ( 43 ). Conversely, in indulgent families, children's behaviors are not heavily restricted and parents guide and encourage their children to adapt to society. The characteristics of this indulgent style, including parental support, positive communication, low imposition, and emotional expressiveness, possibly contribute to more parent-child trust and less misunderstanding ( 75 ). The protective role of warmth/affection and appropriate supervision, which are common features of authoritative or indulgent parenting styles, mitigate youth engagement in cyberbullying. On the contrary, authoritarian and neglectful styles, whether with excessive or insufficient control, are both proven to be risk factors for being a target of cyberbullying ( 33 , 76 ). In terms of geographical location, although several studies found that children residing in urban areas were more likely to be cyberbullying victims than those living in rural or suburban areas, we cannot draw a quick conclusion here, since whether this difference attributes to macro-level differences, such as community safety or socioeconomic status, or micro-level differences, such as teacher intervention in the classroom, courses provided, teacher-student ratio, is unclear across studies ( 61 ). An alternative explanation for this is the higher internet usage rate in urban areas ( 49 ).

Regarding health conditions, especially mental health, some scholars believe that young people with health problems are more likely to be identified as victims than people without health problems. They perceive health condition as a risk factor for cyberbullying ( 61 , 63 ). On the other hand, another group of scholars believe that cyberbullying has an important impact on the mental health of adolescents which can cause psychological distress consequences, such as post-traumatic stress mental disorder, depression, suicidal ideation, and drug abuse ( 70 , 87 ). It is highly possible that mental health could be risk factors, consequences of cyberbullying or both. Mental health cannot be used as standards, requirements, or decisive responses in cyberbullying research ( 13 ).

The Joint Effort Between Youth, Parents, Schools, and Communities to Form a Cyberbullying-Free Environment

This comprehensive review suggests that protecting children and adolescents from cyberbullying requires joint efforts between individuals, parents, schools, and communities, to form a cyberbullying-free environment. For individuals, young people are expected to improve their digital technology capabilities, especially in the use of social media platforms and instant messaging tools ( 55 ). To reduce the number of cyberbullying perpetrators, it is necessary to cultivate emotional self-regulation ability through appropriate emotional management training. Moreover, teachers, counselors, and parents are required to be armed with sufficient knowledge of emotional management and to develop emotional management capabilities and skills. In this way, they can be alert to the aggressive or angry emotions expressed by young people, and help them mediate any negative emotions ( 45 ), and avoid further anti-social behaviors ( 57 ).

For parents, styles of parenting involving a high level of parental involvement, care and support, are desirable in reducing the possibility of children's engagement in cyberbullying ( 74 , 75 ). If difficulties are encountered, open communication can contribute to enhancing the sense of security ( 73 ). In this vein, parents should be aware of the importance of caring, communicating and supervising their children, and participate actively in their children's lives ( 71 ). In order to keep a balance between control and openness ( 47 ), parents can engage in unbiased open communication with their children, and reach an agreement on the usage of computers and smart phones ( 34 , 35 , 55 ). Similarly, it is of vital importance to establish a positive communication channel with children ( 19 ).

For schools, a higher priority is needed to create a safe and positive campus environment, providing students with learning opportunities and ensuring that every student is treated equally. With a youth-friendly environment, students are able to focus more on their academic performance and develop a strong sense of belonging to the school ( 79 ). For countries recognizing collectivist cultural values, such as China and India, emphasizing peer attachment and a sense of collectivism can reduce the risk of cyberbullying perpetration and victimization ( 78 ). Besides, schools can cooperate with mental health agencies and neighboring communities to develop preventive programs, such as extracurricular activities and training ( 44 , 53 , 62 ). Specifically, school-based preventive measures against cyberbullying are expected to be sensitive to the characteristics of young people at different ages, and the intersection of race and school diversity ( 29 , 76 ). It is recommended that school policies that aim to embrace diversity and embody mutual respect among students are created ( 26 ). Considering the high prevalence of cyberbullying and a series of serious consequences, it is suggested that intervention against cyberbullying starts from an early stage, at about 10 years old ( 54 ). Schools can organize seminars to strengthen communication between teachers and students so that they can better understand the needs of students ( 61 ). In addition, schools should encourage cyberbullying victims to seek help and provide students with opportunities to report cyberbullying behaviors, such as creating online anonymous calls.

Conclusions and Limitations

The comprehensive study has reviewed related research on children and adolescents cyberbullying across different countries and regions, providing a positive understanding of the current situation of cyberbullying. The number of studies on cyberbullying has surged in the last 5 years, especially those related to risk factors and protective factors of cyberbullying. However, research on effective prevention is insufficient and evaluation of policy tools for cyberbullying intervention is a nascent research field. Our comprehensive review concludes with possible strategies for cyberbullying prevention, including personal emotion management, digital ability training, policy applicability, and interpersonal skills. We highlight the important role of parental control in cyberbullying prevention. As for the role of parental control, it depends on whether children believe their parents are capable of adequately supporting them, rather than simply interfering in their lives, restricting their online behavior, and controlling or removing their devices ( 50 ). In general, cyberbullying is on the rise, with the effectiveness of interventions to meet this problem still requiring further development and exploration ( 83 ).

Considering the overlaps between cyberbullying and traditional offline bullying, future research can explore the unique risk and protective factors that are distinguishable from traditional bullying ( 86 ). To further reveal the variations, researchers can compare the outcomes of interventions conducted in cyberbullying and traditional bullying preventions simultaneously, and the same interventions only targeting cyberbullying ( 88 ). In addition, cyberbullying also reflects a series of other social issues, such as personal privacy and security, public opinion monitoring, multinational perpetration and group crimes. To address this problem, efforts from multiple disciplines and novel analytical methods in the digital era are required. As the Internet provides enormous opportunities to connect young people from all over the world, cyberbullying perpetrators may come from transnational networks. Hence, cyberbullying of children and adolescents, involving multiple countries, is worth further attention.

Our study has several limitations. First, national representative studies are scarce, while few studies from middle and low income countries were included in our research due to language restrictions. Many of the studies included were conducted in schools, communities, provinces, and cities in high income countries. Meanwhile, our review only focused on victimization and perpetration. Future studies should consider more perspectives, such as bystanders and those with the dual identity of victim/perpetrator, to comprehensively analyze the risk and protective factors of cyberbullying.

Data Availability Statement

The original contributions presented in the study are included in the article/ Supplementary Material , further inquiries can be directed to the corresponding author/s.

Author Contributions

SH, CZ, RE, and WZ conceived the study and developed the design. WZ analyzed the result and supervised the study. CZ and SH wrote the first draft. All authors contributed to the article and approved the submitted version.

Conflict of Interest

The authors declare that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest.

Supplementary Material

The Supplementary Material for this article can be found online at: https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fpubh.2021.634909/full#supplementary-material

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Keywords: cyberbullying, children, adolescents, globalization, risk factors, preventive measures

Citation: Zhu C, Huang S, Evans R and Zhang W (2021) Cyberbullying Among Adolescents and Children: A Comprehensive Review of the Global Situation, Risk Factors, and Preventive Measures. Front. Public Health 9:634909. doi: 10.3389/fpubh.2021.634909

Received: 29 November 2020; Accepted: 10 February 2021; Published: 11 March 2021.

Reviewed by:

Copyright © 2021 Zhu, Huang, Evans and Zhang. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY) . The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) and the copyright owner(s) are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

*Correspondence: Wei Zhang, weizhanghust@hust.edu.cn

† These authors have contributed equally to this work and share first authorship

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