Cyber Bullying: A Growing Concern in the Virtual World

This paper discusses the growing concern of cyber bullying in the virtual world. It covers the causes, modes and effects of cyber bullying and suggests that strict cyber security rules should be implemented to prevent this evil practice.

Running head: SOCIAL PSYCHOLOGY
Social Psychology
Name of the Student
Name of the University
Author Note

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Abstract
The aim of the following paper is to discuss upon the several issues in evil practice of cyber
bullying in the society. The instances of such incidents have been increasing to a new level in the
cyber practices. Most of the victims are the young people and they have very often lost their
reputations within the society for indulging in these practices. The context of cyber bullying has
been discussed in the paper along with the probable reasons for this kind of bullying. The cyber
security rules should be made more strict to avoid this kind of evil practice within the society.

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Table of Contents
Introduction......................................................................................................................................3
Idea of cyber bullying......................................................................................................................3
Several modes of the cyber bullying...............................................................................................4
Reasons for cyber bullying..............................................................................................................5
Conclusion.......................................................................................................................................6
References........................................................................................................................................7

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Introduction
The purpose of this paper is to demonstrate about the aspect of cyber bullying in the
contemporary virtual world. The cyber bulling has been considered as one of the virtual media
ethics in the contemporary organizations. Several scholars have discussed about the reasons and
effects of the cyber bullying since many criminal offences have been committed through the use
of this evil. The cyber bullying has been spread all over the world due to the excessive use of the
social media tools via cell phones, laptops and other electronic devices like tablets. In this paper
the critical analysis of the cyber bullying will be done. The reasons for the cyber bullying would
be discussed along with its ill effects on the society. The young people in the society are
generally the victims of the ill effects of the cyber bullying (Modecki et al., 2014). This practice
should be stopped to protect the virtual environment.
Idea of cyber bullying
The cyber bullying has been regarded as a growing problem in this digital world. The
context of bullying has been found everywhere. However, the contemporary digital technology
has made it easier to implement the ideas of the digital bullying all the more. According to Smith
(2012), it is much easier to bully the people on the cyberspace than bullying them face to face.
The people who are engaged in this evil of cyber bullying can do it very easily since there are
lesser risks that they shall not be caught (Litwiller & Brausch, 2013). Some students who do not
have the courage to engage in the face to face bullying have the edge to bully their enemies in
the cyberspace. It is much harmful than the real world face to face bullying since they can hack
the systems of their targets and gather the personal information about them. The cyber bullying
takes place over the internet and it is a very strong medium for harassing the people.
In the words of Low & Espelage (2013), the cyber bullying can appear through the text
messages, SMS, emails and the online social media forums and online games. People are able to
share the several information and content through these mediums. On the other hand () has
opined that the cyber bullying has been on the increase in the recent times on a large level
indeed. Some of the common online social media forums where the cyber bullying can take place
are Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and Snapchat (Dadvar et al., 2012). The young people in the
society have become addicted to the use of these social media forums. Apart from that the use of

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the online games has also brought about this social media evil into existence. Some of the major
things that can bring about this evil are sending, posting or sharing the harmful contents through
text messages, pictures or videos. The contents can be mean, derogatory or negative also. Thus
this practice has become one of the common trends in the cyber bullying in the contemporary
times (Low & Espelage, 2013).
As per Dadvar et al. (2013), the aspects of cyber bullying can be caused through the
sharing of the private or personal information about other people and making their lives hell
through the embarrassments. The humiliation is also caused among the people through the
bullying in cyber mediums. However, it has also been seen in some of the bullying instances that
it has crossed the line of the criminal approaches and illegal activities. There are some serious
ways of committing the cyber bullying and it has some serious effects on the minds of the
victims (Slonje, Smith & Frisén, 2013). If a man discovers that some false news or fake video
has been posted on the internet forums about him, it would surely drive him mad to a huge
manner. Thus the cyber bullying has been regarded as a more dangerous mode than the
conventional bullying. Some derogatory discussion posts are screened on the online social
media forums without the proper idea or knowledge of the incident (Bannink et al., 2014).
Several modes of the cyber bullying
The cyber bullying has become a very serious concern within the constraints of the
virtual society (Schneider et al., 2012). The ability by which the people can make some vicious
posts on the internet and make the derogatory remarks is considered to be harmful for the
security of the common people. There are generally three ways in which the people can be much
effective in engaging with the cyber bullying. The web mediums and the social media platforms
have taken the cyber bullying to a completely different level altogether (Stauffer et al, 2012).
The people engaged in this evil can do it very easily since they can access several websites very
easily, popularity of the websites and the encouragement for the less responsibility for the
boundaries that are imaginary. There are some major concerns that can be seen in the context of
cyber bullying among the victims (Low & Espelage, 2013).
The various modes through which the cyber bullying can take place are the comments,
photos by the process of super imposing, posts and contents that can impact negatively on the

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psychology of the people. According to Stauffer et al. (2012), the main concern is the fact that
these contents can be viewed by the strangers in the social media community as well as the
strangers. When an individual shares content over the social media, many comments come
flowing in since the content can be hurtful or derogatory for a community. On the other hand,
Kowalski et al. (2012) has defined the fact that these comments or posts can hurt the emotions of
the people in several ways. The online reputation of the people can be declined despite the fact
they might not have posted it altogether. Thus cyber bullying might be harmful for all the
persons who are being bullied and the ones who are engaged in it. The harmful concerns of this
scenario are:-
 Most of the information that are communicated are become permanent in the public
forums and might destroy the online reputations of the public.
 The cyber bullying can also impact negatively on the college admissions of the young
people, employment or several areas of life.
 The parents and employers might not be able to identify when the cyber bullying takes
place since it is very difficult to be recognized.
Reasons for cyber bullying
There are some specific reasons as to why this cyber bullying takes place all over the
world. The reasons are as follows:-
 The revenge mentality is one of the most important reasons for the cyber bullying among
the children.
 People commit to the act of cyber bullying because he or she might have been bullied by
the present victims at a time. They have been unable to find a better or healthier way to
cope up with the challenges. This is the easiest and most convenient step for them to
pursue (Stauffer et al, 2012).
 The cyber bullies often are of the opinion that the victims deserve this treatment because
of their own faults.
 The kids often go on to bully the people whom they recognize to be weaker or vulnerable
than them.

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 They give justifications to their actions of cyber bullying because they feel they also had
been bullied at some point of time previously.
 When the cyber bullying activists find out they have not been given the proper amount of
importance in their circle they start making derogatory comments or trap their targets
through posting unethical comments or posts through their online profiles. This can be
done by hacking their profiles. Authors like Huang, Singh & Atrey (2014) have opined
that it is very much unethical or unlawful to do these kinds of comments or posts on the
social media profiles of others.
 It has been also seen that this act of cyber bullying is done by the groups of young people
only to insult their competitor groups or gangs. This practice can also be harmful for the
overall of reputation of the individual people.
These practices have already done a lot of harm to the people in the society. Therefore, it is
high need of the hour to control this cyber bullying across all the countries and communities.
Only then the basic rights and privacy can be secured to live happily without the fear of losing
the reputation in the virtual world.
Conclusion
In the concluding section, it can be said that the cyber bullying has led to several
problems in the lives of the common people in the communities. The derogatory posts and
comments made through the online social media have led to the loss of reputation for the young
kids and the employees in different organizations. The influential people in the society have not
been left out of the victimization as well. The legal frameworks should be developed to cope up
with thus evil practice and saving the lives of the young people. Strict prohibitions should be
implied on using the profiles of others through the cyber security.

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References
Bannink, R., Broeren, S., van de Looij–Jansen, P. M., de Waart, F. G., & Raat, H. (2014). Cyber
and traditional bullying victimization as a risk factor for mental health problems and
suicidal ideation in adolescents. PloS one, 9(4), e94026.
Dadvar, M., Jong, D. F., Ordelman, R., & Trieschnigg, D. (2012). Improved cyberbullying
detection using gender information. In Proceedings of the Twelfth Dutch-Belgian
Information Retrieval Workshop (DIR 2012). University of Ghent.
Dadvar, M., Trieschnigg, D., Ordelman, R., & de Jong, F. (2013, March). Improving
cyberbullying detection with user context. In European Conference on Information
Retrieval (pp. 693-696). Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg.
Huang, Q., Singh, V. K., & Atrey, P. K. (2014, November). Cyber bullying detection using
social and textual analysis. In Proceedings of the 3rd International Workshop on
Socially-Aware Multimedia (pp. 3-6). ACM.
Kowalski, R. M., Limber, S. P., Limber, S., & Agatston, P. W. (2012). Cyberbullying: Bullying
in the digital age. John Wiley & Sons.
Litwiller, B. J., & Brausch, A. M. (2013). Cyber bullying and physical bullying in adolescent
suicide: the role of violent behavior and substance use. Journal of youth and
adolescence, 42(5), 675-684.
Low, S., & Espelage, D. (2013). Differentiating cyber bullying perpetration from non-physical
bullying: Commonalities across race, individual, and family predictors. Psychology of
Violence, 3(1), 39.
Modecki, K. L., Minchin, J., Harbaugh, A. G., Guerra, N. G., & Runions, K. C. (2014). Bullying
prevalence across contexts: A meta-analysis measuring cyber and traditional
bullying. Journal of Adolescent Health, 55(5), 602-611.
Schneider, S. K., O'donnell, L., Stueve, A., & Coulter, R. W. (2012). Cyberbullying, school
bullying, and psychological distress: A regional census of high school students. American
journal of public health, 102(1), 171-177.

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Slonje, R., Smith, P. K., & FriséN, A. (2013). The nature of cyberbullying, and strategies for
prevention. Computers in human behavior, 29(1), 26-32.
Smith, P. K. (2012). Cyberbullying and cyber aggression. In Handbook of school violence and
school safety (pp. 111-121). Routledge.
Stauffer, S., Heath, M. A., Coyne, S. M., & Ferrin, S. (2012). High school teachers' perceptions
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352-367.