Digital Disaster

Jessica Crook

7 January 2015

Statement of Topic
I will be researching cyber bullying, the effects it has on teenagers mental health,
and the laws and programs dealing with it, and if they should be changed.
Purpose
Cyberbullying is more and more common among teenagers and young adults.
There are not as many laws and programs on it as there should be. Many kids are being
cyberbullied. This is a question of policy because I will address current policies and laws
regarding cyberbullying and why they should be changed.
Scope
I will explain what cyberbullying is, how it happens, and how it differs from
physical bullying. I will compare the effects of cyberbullying with physical bullying. I will
present multiple studies that have been done in other countries assessing the mental
effects of cyberbullying. I will focus a lot on the effects being bullied can have on a
teenager. I will not talk about how mental illnesses develop or how they are treated. I
will talk about current laws and policies regarding cyberbullying in the United States and
Canada. I will not talk about policies from other countries. I will evaluate a program and
its effectiveness and determine if overall, as a country, there should be change in
cyberbullying policies.
Research
In the last fifteen years technology has changed quite drastically. Cell phones
have the ability to access any part of the internet and allow people to send a message
to someone on the other side of the planet in seconds. With the rise of instant
4

messaging came a rise to social media websites. To name a few, Myspace and LinkedIn
came about in 2003, Facebook followed a year later. Twitter was founded in 2006,
Chatroulette in 2009, Instagram and Pinterest in 2010, and Snapchat in 2011. (5 Simple
Facts).
Teenagers and young adults under the age of 30 use these social media sites
more than any other age group. 75% of teenagers own their own cell phone, giving
them easy access to the internet and social media. 63% of teenagers use the internet
daily. 73% of teenagers aged between fourteen and seventeen use a social networking
site. You can see from the graph below the age distribution of teens that use social
media websites (Lenhart). The reason more 14-17 year olds use social networking sites
is because there are usually age restrictions that require someone to be thirteen to join.
Since still 55% of 12-13 year olds are on social networking sites, it shows that its easy
to create a false account where at least the age is not accurate. There are a lot of social
media accounts made from false personal information. The most common ways social
media is used by teenagers is to send group and private messages, and post comments
on blogs, pictures, and pages.(Lenhart)

A main appeal of some social media sites is the anonymity behind false names.
To make a profile on a social media account a real name or picture isnt always
required. There are countless accounts based on fake names. This does help keep
children and other people who could be targeted by predators safe. However, anonymity
can also lead to cyberbullying. Grohol, in an article addressing anonymity on the web,
states anonymity allows people to hide behind their computers while saying whatever
they want with little ramification. and Mark Zuckerberg says I think anonymity on the
Internet has to go away. People behave a lot better when they have their real names
down I think people hide behind anonymity and they feel like they can say whatever
they want behind closed doors (Now You See Me). People do things they otherwise
wouldnt normally do when the punishments go away. If nobody knows its them who is
saying mean things, then they cant get in trouble for it, and are then more likely to do it
again.
Cyberbullying is defined by Websters dictionary as the electronic posting of
mean-spirited messages about a person (as a student) often done anonymously. This
is different than physical bullying because it uses words instead of fists to hurt
somebody. Examples of physical bullying would be being punched or kicked, having
lunch money stolen, and being tripped in the hallways. It can, but does not always,
include verbal abuse like name calling and threats. Cyberbullying takes place online and
not in person. Examples of cyberbullying could be a hateful message posted publicly or
privately on a social media website, threats posted online, the posting of embarrassing

stories or pictures.

This picture shows a

hateful text received on a cell phone (Cyber Bullying). This is an example of

cyberbullying.
Cyberbullying itself wasnt possible until fairly recently, but each year there is
more of it. There is still more physical bullying than there is cyberbullying but the
distance between the two is not very large. Cyberbullying is accepted, and might be
expected, of kids in high school (Goebert). There is also a lot of mixed bullying where a
kid is bullied in person at school and then is also bullied online when they go home.
These kids who experience both types of bullying have a higher suicide risk (Chang).
A researcher named Fong-Ching Chang from Thailand conducted a study on
bullying to test whether or not there was a correlation between bully victims and
depression and suicide. He conducted his study on 12-14 year old boys from a school in
Thailand. He gave each of them a survey explaining what kind of bullying they deal with,
how often it happens, if they ever bully, and how often, and how severe the bullying is.
Change also took a mental assessment to see if they are at a high risk of depression or
suicide.

He found that kids who were bullied both at school and at home online had the
greatest risk for depression. Kids who were just bullies and not the victims also had a
higher rate of depression than kids who were neither a bully nor a victim. He found a
positive correlation between kids who were involved in bullying and depression rates.
This study also found that the effects of cyberbullying alone did not put the kids at a
significantly higher risk of suicide and depression than other kids.
However, it is impossible to know the cause of the correlation. Does bullying
increase the risks of depression, or do higher depression rates affect the social behavior
of an individual making them a higher target of bullying? This study was also done in
Thailand, a collectivist culture that values self-control and inner harmony which could
have led to false reports on the surveys and would not necessarily be able to be
generalized for America (Chang).
Depression and similar mentalities often partner with drug and substance abuse.
A man in Hawaii wanted to see if there was a correlation between cyberbullying and
substance abuse. A survey was given to students at a high school in Hawaii. The
participants came from varied cultures and economic statuses, giving more
generalizability to the study. The surveys asked if the students had been cyberbullied
and what their drug habits were. In hopes of keeping the results as honest as they
could, the students were promised anonymity in their answers. What he found was that
students experiencing cyberbullying tripled the likelihood of binge drinking, and more
than doubled the likelihood of using marijuana and attempting suicide than kids who
were not being bullied (Goebert).

These correlations between drug abuse and depression with cyberbullying is

troubling. According to BullyingStatistics the third leading cause of death in young adults
and teenagers is suicide. This results in around 4,400 deaths annually. Nearly 7% of
high school students have attempted suicide. Yale University (as cited in BullyStatistics
2015) has done studies that showed those who were the victims of bullying were 2-9
times more likely to think about suicide. ABC News (as cited by BullyingStatistics)
reported that about 160,000 kids stay home from school every day because they are
afraid of their bullies at school. According to i-Safe (as cited in BullyStatistics) more than
a fourth of teens have been a victim of cyberbullying. Less than half of these victims tell
anybody about it.
There are tons of teenagers who are being bullied online. Research mentioned
above suggests that being the victim of cyberbullying can lead to higher risks of suicide,
depression, and drug abuse. However, less than half of cyberbully victims are willing to
come out and get help. Those that do tell their parents or a teacher cant always get
help. Cyberbullying is not necessarily against the law. This means that they cant
necessarily get their bully in trouble and the bullying will most likely continue. Passing
laws that would incriminate someone for cyberbullying could infringe on peoples First
Amendment right to free speech. Instead, laws are passed that make schools create
their own policy on cyberbullying and have them punish violators with their own
punishments carried out by school officials rather than police officers. This helps limit
cyberbullying done with electronic devices owned by the school, but not from privately
owned devices. Very few states address cyberbullying that takes place outside of school
(Musser).

46 states have laws on cyberbullying and a lot of them address issues such as
intimate images are distributed or posted on an Internet site when the person depicted
had an agreement, or a reasonable expectation, that the images would be private. In
Colorado and Utah the laws only apply if the victim can show that it caused emotional
distress (Musser).
In Canada there is a bill that criminalizes harassing or annoying behaviour
conducted via electronic communication. It also states that everyone who sends a
message with the intent to alarm or annoy a person or who makes an indecent
communication commits an offence (Coburn). The U.S. does not have a federal law like
this that criminalizes cyberbullies.
There are hundreds of different programs and policies in schools trying to deal
with bullying. A lot of schools have their own system in place for students to report
bullies or regular assemblies that warn against the harm in bullying. Some programs are
more effective than others. Meg Domino conducted a study to test a certain program
implemented for a year in a middle school. The program was called Take the Lead and
its goal was to lessen bullying in a sample of seventh grade students by focusing on
positive youth development by strengthening social and emotional skills. The TTL
program was implemented for two semesters; one in the fall and one in the spring. One
group was part of the fall program and the other was part of the spring program. The
students were given surveys before it started, when the fall program ended, and when
the spring program ended. The survey determined how often and severe bullying was in
the school. The two groups results were compared to each other (Domino).

10

Dominos results found that the program was very influential on bullying. There
was a significant decrease in self-reported bullying and victimization thanks to the
program. It supported the idea that strength-based programming is beneficial to
growing kids and teens because it focuses on being positive about themselves and
being positive towards others as well. This program is different from many other
programs because it seeks to change the thinking process of kids, and create a positive
atmosphere in the school rather than give a set of rules and punishments for bullies.
The findings from this study suggest that implementing youth development programs,
like the one tested, could significantly lower the frequency and severity of bullying
(Domino).
This study focused more on how physical bullying changed, not very much on
cyberbullying. Today physical bullying is still more prevalent than cyberbullying, but both
can have very serious and very bad effects to young teenagers mental health. Since
the program focused on positivity and changing the mentality of students, its safe to
assume that the rates of cyberbullying would have also decreased along with the rates
of physical bullying.
Studies have shown that implementing certain programs can help decrease the
amount of bullying. There are not a lot of schools implementing these programs. Right
now bullying in all forms is happening at a very high rate and there are a lot of suicides
each year that could be prevented. A program that prevents students from becoming
bullies in the first place would help decrease bullying. If rates of bullying, both physical
and online, can be decreased, then so would the rates of depression, drug abuse, and
suicide in young people. Current programs and policies in most school are not lessening

11

rates of bullying by a lot. A lot of policies deal with consequences the bullies would face.
This indirectly promotes a culture that bullies because it implies that its expected. There
are not a lot of consequences regarding cyberbullying, so kids feel they can get away
with it. Bulling is still an issue because it has been linked to a decrease in mental health
in young people. Many kids commit suicide because they are being bullying. To stop
this, policies and programs will need to change.

Ethics Summary
Suicide leads to 4,400 deaths in teenagers and young adults annually. More than
half of suicides are bully related. There are no real federal laws criminalizing bullies. Is it
ethical to let thousands of teenagers commit suicide or stay home from school because
they are too scared to face their bullies? It is not. By not creating policies to try and
lessen bullying, the government is letting teenagers die. Most of these suicides could
have been prevented if there were less bullies. Most schools, for example my middle
school, had a very weak bullying policy. If we saw a bully we were supposed to write
their name and stick it in a box and see if something happened. The amount of bullying
never changed. My school didnt even mention that cyberbullying was bad and that kids
shouldnt do it. In fact, the internet safety assembly told us not to send naked pictures
because someone could send them around. It basically told us that the danger of the
internet is other bullies. The assembly never told kids not to send the naked pictures
around or not to cyberbully. Is it ethical to form a culture that expects bullies, rather than
form a culture that doesnt accept bullying?
12

People should be teaching kids not to bully instead of teaching kids what to do
when they see bullying. By doing this they are indirectly supporting bullying and that is
unethical. If it was culturally unacceptable to bully people, there would probably be less
bullies. Its been shown that being bullied both online and in person drastically increases
someones risk at depression and suicide. This should be seen as something similar to
attempted murder. Its not ethical to let something like that go unpunished. The main
reason that it is, is because it would be infringing on the freedom of speech. I think its
more ethical to punish cyberbullying and lessen a Constitutional right rather than the
other way around.

Proposal of Action
This essay showed that bullying, both physical and online, correlate to teenagers
decrease in mental health. Suicide is the third leading cause of death in young people in
the U.S. and that can be fixed. There is currently no federal law in place that would
punish anyone who cyberbullies unless they outright threaten the victim. This lack of
consequence leads to more and more people turning into bullies. How can the U.S.
lessen bullying as a whole? I propose that a law be put in place that requires a program
like the Take the Lead program Domino studied. The program should focus on students
self-confidence, self-appreciation, appreciation of others success, good manners, and
being a good leader. The program should be implemented in all grades until high
school.
Since the program would be required by federal law, tax money would pay for it.
This money would be used to fund a campaign to get teachers and students excited
about it. It would also pay people to train teachers and faculty on how to implement the
13

program. It would cost around $80 billion dollars to fund the new program. Money would
be spent on trainers, advertisements, and curriculum handbooks. This would increase
the percent of the national budget used on educational spending, so another area would
have to decrease to limit national debt. The Congressional Budget Office would have to
decide where to pull funding from. They could lessen the amount being spent on fighting
in other countries and the military, as most of the national budget goes to that. Or they
could redistribute what is already allotted to education and have most of it go towards
this new program instead of building new schools and supplying schools with electronic
devices for every student and teacher.
The campaign to get people to support the program would be geared toward
students mostly. It would be a few spokespersons who travel to nearly every public
elementary and middle school in the nation. The speakers would introduce the new
program as a fun way to make friends and prepare for adulthood. Its important to make
the students excited for the program and want to do it, otherwise they wouldnt
participate and it wouldnt have as good of results. The program itself should include a
lot of team-bonding games and activities where everyone feels like they are in a safe
environment. There would also be lessons on building the students self-confidence.
The programs goal is to build character in the children starting from a younger
age. After about ten years bullying should not be such a big issue because by that point
the environment in schools would have changed to not promote bullying. The program
could also have other effects like decreasing depression and suicide, not just because
kids arent being bullied as much, but because they are taught to be strong and
courageous in themselves.

14

Conclusion
Should there be a change in the current policies surrounding cyberbullying? Yes.
Being bullied online increases the mental effect of being bullied in person and many
kids are bullied both at school and online. Its been shown that being bullied can lead to
higher rates of depression, suicide, and substance abuse. There are not really any laws
regarding cyberbullying specifically. Legally, schools need to have some sort of policy
that says bullying will not be tolerated, but there is not a lot that can be done when
cyberbullying happens on personal electronic devices instead of school owned ones.
There have been programs to try and stop bullying, and a successful one
focused on characteristics that would make students feel more confident in all aspects
of their lives. The program ended up significantly lowering the frequency and intensity of
bullying in seventh graders. This program could be implemented nationwide and
hopefully create a generation that doesnt want to bully.

15

Works Cited
"5 Simple Facts That You Can't Say No to Social Media for Your Business." Macro the
Micro. 25 Apr. 2015. Web. 05 Jan. 2016.
"Anonymity in Cyberbullying." Anonymity in Cyberbullying. Web. 06 Jan. 2016.
Chang, Fong-Ching, et al. "Relationships Among Cyberbullying, School Bullying,

And

Mental Health In Taiwanese Adolescents." Journal Of School Health 83.6 (2013):

454-462. Academic Search Premier. Web. 29 Dec. 2015.
Coburn, Patricia I., Deborah A. Connolly, and Ronald Roesch. "Cyberbullying: Is
Federal Criminal Legislation The Solution?." Canadian Journal Of
Criminology &
Premier. Web. 5 Jan.

Criminal Justice 57.4 (2015): 566-579. Academic Search

2016.

"Cyber Bullying." Cyber Bullying. Web. 06 Jan. 2016

DOMINO, MEG. "Measuring The Impact Of An Alternative Approach To School
Bullying." Journal Of School Health 83.6 (2013): 430-437. Biomedical Reference
Collection: Basic. Web. 6 Jan. 2016.
Goebert, Deborah, et al. "The Impact Of Cyberbullying On Substance Use And Mental
Health In A Multiethnic Sample." Maternal & Child Health Journal 15.8 (2011):
1282-1286. Academic Search Premier. Web. 5 Jan. 2016.
Lenhart, Amanda. Social Media & Mobile Internet Use among Teens and Young Adults.
Millennials, Pew Internet & American Life Project. Pew Internet & American Life
Project, 2010-Feb-3 ERIC. Web. 4 Jan. 2016.
Merriam-Webster. Merriam-Webster. Web. 29 Dec. 2016.

16

Musser, Ashley N. "States Address School Cyberbullying. (Cover Story)." First Reading
(Legislative Research Unit) 27.4 (2014): 1. MasterFILE Complete. Web. 5
Jan. 2016.
Now you see me Wait, youll never do! Anonymity in Cyberbullying. Web. 05 Jan.
2016
Sexual Abuse Is Only a Click Away. - News. Web. 13 Nov. 2015.

17