Types of cyberaggression: adolescents and youth experience

Abstract

Background. Cyberaggression is widespread phenomenon in the online environment, that doesn’t cause direct physical harm but has a lasting negative impact on the psychological state of participants. Objective. The study analyzes the relationship between offline and online aggression, the prevalence of various types of cyberaggression among adolescents and youth and their emotional experience, as well as parents’ awareness of it. Design. The study comprises of 3395 participants: 1554 adolescents aged 12-17, 736 young people aged 18-30, and 1105 parents of adolescents aged 12-17 from 8 federal districts of Russia. Respondents answered questions about the relationship between online and offline aggression, the collision with cyberaggression and emotional response to it. Results. The school is ahead of the Internet as a space of encounter with hostile situations. Most respondents believe that people are more likely to experience hostile situations in real life than online. Most adolescents face different types of cyberaggression. Adolescents are more likely to encounter flaming, trolling and cyberhate, and less likely to encounter cyberbullying and cyberstalking. Youth is more likely to encounter flaming. The least emotionally significant situations are flaming and cyberhate. Trolling causes strong feelings in every third adolescent, cyberstalking in every fifth, cyberbullying in every second. At the same time, parents are not aware of their children’s experience with cyberaggression and the intensity of their experience. Conclusion. The spread of various types of cyberaggression and the emotional response to them require the development of differentiated approaches to the prevention of various situations of cyberaggression and the development of specific coping strategies in the collision with them.

Keywords

• cyberaggression
• adolescents
• youth
• flaming
• cyberhate
• trolling
• cyberstalking
• cyberbullying