Cyberbullying: A Bigger Social Problem than Traditional Forms of Bullying

Running head: BUSINESS ACADEMIC SUCCESS
BUSINESS ACADEMIC SUCCESS
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BUSINESS ACADEMIC SUCCESS
Bullying is the aggressive behaviour that one individual shows towards another
individual. Bullying is quite existent in current times, especially in schools and colleges,
where students who perceive themselves as being in power bully those students who are not
popular or not within their liking. Bullying is a repetitive act which happens over time when
there is an imbalance in power between the individuals. Bullying are of three types which are
verbal bullying, social bullying and physical bullying. These are the traditional forms of
bullying which has been in existent for a long time. However, with the emergence of
technology, there appears a new type of bullying which is cyber bullying. This essay will
critically analyse whether cyber bullying has become a much bigger social problem than that
of traditional forms of bullying. The study will provide evidence of the extent that
cyberbullying cause a problems among the individuals in recent times.
According to Kowalski et al. (2014) cyberbullying is a kind of aggressive behaviour
which is carried out in a repetitive manner to intentionally hurt another individual through the
use of an electronic medium such as text messages, e-mails, instant messages or social media
platforms. This kind of bullying is done against people who so not have the power or the
strength to defend themselves. Cyberbullying is a kind of verbal bullying where the
individual in power writes statements that hurts the sentiment or the reputation of another
person. Around 25% of school going children have faced cyberbullying at one point in their
life (Kowalski et al. 2014). There are different forms of cyberbullying which come into view
in recent times which make it difficult to prevent since the bullies find new ways to hurt their
victims. In this world of technological advancements, bullies emerge with new forms of
cyberbullying which are non-exhaustive in nature. Slonje, Smith and FriséN (2013) explains
that the most common type of cyberbullying comes in the forms of harassment or threats,
making fun or jokes about the victim or spreading rumours through different mediums. In the
article, there were certain media forms which have been reported by the victims as been used