Technological advancement and Cyberbullying

Almost every aspect of human behavior has changed as a result of technology. Now, communication can happen more quickly and simultaneously with a large number of individuals. With advancements in technology, the concept of personal privacy has been expanded to encompass online postings. Even in a time when everything is computerized, social ills and offenses that were once committed by hand still exist. This has sparked the growth of new electronic sins, such as cybercrime. Because this new behavior is closely related to the advancement of computer technology, it has a much wider audience than traditional crime. Every computer user in the cyberspace is capable of committing a cybercrime or being a recipient of criminal activity (Berson, Berson & Ferron, 2008). Cyber theft, Phishing, and Cyberterrorism have been the most focused cybercrime faults in the political and civil arena. The advent of internet technology has brought a new type of bullying that is spreading fast among adolescents (Gale Student Resource in Context, 2016). In this paper, the focus has been shifted to a more sophisticated cyber crime known as cyberbullying that is on the rise in the social arena. This paper outlines how bullying has evolved to a more dangerous crime that is even more damaging and malicious. The difference between cyberbullying and offline bullying is analyzed in this critique. This will help understand how globalization through technology and social media has fueled the development and spread of cyberbullying. With reference from “cyberbully” movie (2015), this paper defines and portrays different forms of cyberbullying by giving case scenarios in the video.

Definition of concepts

Cyberbullying takes place in various electronic gadgets, and it occurs in different forms. In all its form and cases, cyberbullying always mimics the offline bullying as seen in cyberbully movie (2015). Cyberbullying is harassment or bullying that takes place over electronic media such as cell phone, tablets, and computers. It can occur in different forms depending on the media of communication used. The most common avenues of cyberbullying are social media conversation and messaging, text messaging, online chatting apps such as WhatsApp and Skype, telephone calls and website (U.S. Department of Health & Human Services, 2017). Cyberbullying is meant to be threatening to the recipient, intimidating or even blackmailing the recipient to abide by the bully’s wishes. This vice can assume different forms, and it can be factual or false. According to U.S. Department of Health & Human Services (2017), information in the form of messages from the bullies, their videos, photos can be published over the internet so as to shame and intimidate. In cyberbullying the bully mostly uses their victims’ personal information to intimidate their targets in the cyberspace. The bully’s goal, in this instance, is that the target will receive a negative reaction from other users such as youths that will make them feel threatened or blackmailed. In the cyberbully movie (2015), the first instance of cyberbullying occurs when Casey Jacobs finds out her ex-boyfriend Nathan Legg has posted information regarding her depression condition. Casey’s condition has been private information only known to her and her friend Meghan Turner. Her reaction to the tweet portrays her intimidation and anger from her ex-boyfriend who she already despises. According to the University of British Columbia (2012), cyberbullying is on the rise among the American children and youths. Researches done by these university finds out that 25-30% of American youth have taken part in or experience cyberbullying at one point of their life. This compares with only 12% of American youth who have admitted to having taken part or experience offline bullying.

Difference between Cyberbullying and Offline Bullying

Cyberbullying and offline bullying have some significant differences even if one is an evolution of the other. First, they face the gap between modernity and tradition which is defined by technological advancement (Lohmann, 2012). According to Lohmann, Offline bullying is characterized by the physical presence of a victim, a bully and a bystander in one location together, and at the same time. In most instances, offline bullying is premeditated and involves the use of force to hurt the victim. This traditional bullying is proactive and aggressive that takes the form of a harsh jokes on the victims, criticism, and malicious actions to intimidate the victim or even fights (Lohmann, 2012). The bully mostly targets their victims when there is an audience whom they prompt to laugh at the weakness of their victims. According to Lohmann, Bullies are mostly bigger and physically strong than their victims; they mostly use this trait for their self-protection and to intimidation. Offline bullying can be verbal through hate remarks, abuse or jeering, it can be physical, and it can also be social (Gale Student Resource in Context, 2016).

Cyberbullying, on the other hand, is more virtual, and there is no direct physical contact between the bully and their victim. This type of bullying is on the rise due to increased internet connectivity and the ease of doing it (Lohmann, 2012). Physical size is not an issue in this case, therefore, smaller or week bullies can easily target a bigger victim as long as they have something on them. According to Lohmann, the majority of cyberbullying cases reported occurring in the social media with the leading ones being Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube. Other cybercrimes such as phishing and cyber theft have propelled these types of bullying due to the ease of phishers infiltrating in to the victim’s privacy. Offline bullying is hard to prevent, and mostly the solution occurs when the bully is stopped or incarcerated. Cyberbullying can, however, be stopped or avoided easily by taking a measure such as increasing cyber security, reporting offensive messages to the website providers, vigilance while posting private material online and saving all bullying evidence for litigation (Lohmann, 2012). The anonymity of cyberbullies may make this modern vice complicated as observed on the Cyberbully movie. Therefore, it all depends on the probable victim being vigilant and staying safe (Gale Student Resource in Context, 2016). In spite of their differences both cyberbullying and offline bullying share the same characteristics of intent and harm for their intentions (Chadwick, 2014)

Technology and Social media

In Cyberbully movie, the complexity of technology is portrayed as the bullying events unfold on Casey. The bully, who is also a hacker with high computer knowledge, uses his process to intimidate, blackmail and even to harass Casey by creating fear. Technology advancement and the advent of the internet is a key contributor to cyberbullying. According to Taube (2011), cyberbullying is taking technology where bullies can’t. Technology has given bullies a bigger audience to post intimidating information of their victim. Technology proliferation and accesses of information all the time has been the catalyst for adolescent’s aggression in the cyber (Chadwick, 2014). In the movie, Casey Jacobs expresses her disagreement with the hacker about the magnitude of the bullying she has been doing yet she thinks that is a norm among her fellow age mates. Casey thinks that trolling and making a destructive comment on people’s online content is normal and it’s certainly not evil because everyone does it. Formalizing bullying, trolling, and hate comments have been the primary reason cyberbullying is not being reported to authorities (Taube, 2011). Cybercrime victims suffer secretly, and a majority of them suffer from depression that is associated with the bullies’ action on them (Gale Student Resource in Context, 2016). According to Langhorst (2012), 160,000 children miss school every day due to intimidation, low morale, and depression. Casey Jacobs finds her self-implicated in a cyberbullying case involving Jenifer Li, a student in her school (Cyberbully, 2015). Jennifer Li enjoyed singing, which she considered as spiritually connecting her with her dead mother. Casey started negative reviewing the video without considering what motivated Jenifer to sing the way she did. The negative troll Casey left on the videos comment section sparked a conversation that consisted of hate remark and bullying. This intimidation impacted negatively on Jenifer’s confidence to the point that she transferred to a different school to seek relief from bullying. Due to the vastness of technology and high social interconnectivity created by it, Jenifer Li could not hide from bullying. Constant trolling and bullying followed her in the subsequent school which caused her to develop anxiety and depression. She expressed her condition on the internet by posting photos of herself injuring herself in a manner that suggested she was depressed and needed sympathy from the cyberspace bullies. Social media sites such as Facebook and Twitter are capable of reaching the most audience at any time. When these avenues are used by bullies, their key goal of generating a negative reaction from the public to the victim is quickly realized (Chadwick, 2014). In the movie, Casey’s actions as the initial bully influenced other like-minded bullies to troll Jenifer.

The vastness of cyberspace and its accessibility makes cyberbullying to be a spontaneous behavior, unlike offline bullying. The bullies, in most instances, do not consider the position of their victims before they attack them. As observed in the movie, Casey’s actions against Jenifer, the hackers’ action against Casey and the cyberspace audience action towards Jenifer lacked intent. According to Taube (2011), the complexity of cyberbullying is expected to grow and spread as internet connectivity grows. This has influenced social media companies such as Facebook to counter the vice on its site. The anti-bullying tool on Facebook website has given bullying victims a platform to notify authorities of any cases of bullying through the site (2011). YouTube has policies and regulations that define the content that should be reported in case a user is harassed or bullied on the website (YouTube, 2017). For YouTube, abusive videos, revealing personal information, recording someone without consent, posting content to humiliate someone and posting negative videos and observations is considered bullying. When these actions are reported to YouTube, the video is taken down to stop the spread of bullying (YouTube, 2017).

Social media is the main avenue of social interaction among the young people today (O’Keefe & Clarke-person, 2011). The websites create a virtual world to teenagers, and their life is ultimately bound to them. According to O’Keeffe and Clarke-person (2011), social media sycophancy makes the young people value their image on social image more than their real life. This is evident in the movie where Casey Jacob is willing to do everything the hacker tells her to do, failure to which he promises to “end her life” by posting a nude picture on Instagram. Casey abides to the hackers instruction because she believes that the nude photos will taint her image on social media and there is no point of living if that happens. O’Keeffe and Clarke-person (2011) advises that there is a need for guardians to regulate Internet usage for children and youth to avoid obsession. The internet obsession can be a notice in Casey’s family when her dad hopelessly tries to get her to join him for food, but she is still glued to the monitor. Their real-time connectivity with her friend Meghan Trainer and Alex is also a good indication of how children in her age are ’living on the internet.’ The biggest risk facing young people on the social media is a lack of privacy knowledge which can expose them to malicious phishers (O’Keeffe & Clarke-Pearson, 2011).

Cyberbullying and Psychology

Cyberbullying can cause immense psychological damage to victims that turn fatal in some cases. O’Keeffe and Clarke-Pearson 2011 states that children and young adults are at risk of being affected by depression, anxiety, alienation and suicide due to emotional immaturity. In the cyberbully movie (2015), Casey Jacobs is first portrayed as a depressed character when information about her depression is allegedly leaked by her ex-boyfriend. Jennifer Li first suffers from anxiety and depression when she first posts showing her suicidal attempts on her arm; she later commits suicide as a result of cyberbullying. Huduja & Patchin (2010) advice that adolescent aggression, anxiety, and depression should be taken seriously to prevent suicidal decisions. Suicidal Ideation is common among depressed children, but it is mostly assumed by their peers. This scenario is observed on Jenifer Li in the movie. If Casey identified the level of hate Jenifer was getting from her classmates and fellow internet users she would have noted the level of harm her actions created to her. Jenifer wanted sympathy from her bullies once she saw that a change of school would not stop the online harassment. Hudaja and patchin (2010) indicates that sensitization of school going adolescents with real cases of cyberbullying can help them understand its dangers

Conclusion

Cyberbullying is a complex behavior that can take different forms. Internet technology and social media are the primary reason for existence, complexity and the spread of cyberbully among the youth. As discussed in the paper, the evolution of bullying from the traditional and offline bullying to internet bullying has seen the old behavior have more audience and more victims. Cyberbullying on social media and the internet entirely is being fueled by a teenage obsession with social media and ignorance to privacy rules. With examples from the cyberbully, this paper has clearly defined the form and magnitude cyberbullying can take and how technology has played a role in easing the ability to bully people online.

Reference

Chadwick, S. (2014). Impacts of cyberbullying, building social and emotional resilience in schools. Available from http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&scope=site&db=nlebk&db=nlabk&A N=683280 (Accessed on 13 April 2017).

Gale Student Resource in Context (2016). Differences between Cyberbullying and Traditional Bullying. Available from http://ic.galegroup.com/ic/suic/ReferenceDetailsPage/DocumentToolsPortletWindow?dis playGroupName=Reference&u=groves&p=SUIC&action=2&catId=&documentId=GAL E%7CEJ2181500310&zid=6fd20aaf5793389959fde88575ac3810 (Accessed 13 April 2017).

Lohmann, C. (2012). Cyberbullying versus Traditional Bullying. Available from https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/teen-angst/201205/cyberbullying-versus- traditional-bullying (Accessed on 13 April 2017).

Okeffe, G.S. & Clarke-Pearson K. (2011) The Impact of Social Media on Children, Adolescents, and Families.Clinical Report-The Impact of Social Media on. 4(127), 800-803. Available from http://pediatrics.aappublications.org/content/pediatrics/127/4/800.full.pdf (Accessed on 13 April 2017).

Taube, D. (2011). Cyberbullying: Technology goes where bullies can’t. Available from http://poststar.com/news/local/cyberbullying-technology-goes-where-bullies-can- t/article_e8e7c3aa-5d95-11e0-827b-001cc4c03286.html (Accessed on 13 April 2017).

U.S. Department of Health & Human Services, (2017). Cyber bullying. Stopcyberbullying.gov. Available from https://www.stopbullying.gov/cyberbullying/what-is-it/ (Accessed on 13 April 2017).

University of British Columbia (2012). Cyberbullying and bullying are not the same: UBC research. Available from http://news.ubc.ca/2012/04/13/cyberbullying-and-bullying-are- not-the-same-ubc-research/ (Accessed on 13 April 2017).