Cyberbullying: either perpetrating or being the victim of online aggression is more common in the younger population than even before. As children spend more time online, they become exposed to greater numbers of communications outside our scope of knowledge. As online behavior becomes more prevalent in their lives, it is important that we teach our children discernment.
Being a kid can be rough. If your child is the easy going, well-mannered individual they may have an easier time of it. But, for the neglected, socially awkward, self-conscious, passive, or easily influenced child, they may have an even rougher time of it. As parents, we can off-set these experiences in our children’s lives by teaching social-emotional skills, manners, appropriate social contact, self-esteem, and how to have a conversation and make friends with new acquaintances. Unfortunately, not all children are lucky to have mindful adults showing them the ropes. As a parent, I would like to believe that it’s the corporations and media platform’s jobs to insulate our children from aggression online, but unfortunately, it’s not. It’s OUR job. This is an important job. It’s become such an important project to protect kids from online dangers that our current First Lady has made it part of her public relations platform. The bottom line is, all our children deserve a safe and positive online experience.
Cyberbullying is like its counterpart, Bullying, in that one person, or group of people attempt put a person or group of people down. In Cyberbullying, the perpetrator uses technology instead of face-to-face contact. According to an article written for the Pediatric Journal of Medicine, up to 25% of children have been affected by cyberbullying. Our children spend more and more time online, gaming, chatting with friends/family, using social media, using search apps and the infinite knowledge of the internet for academic learning, self-regulation, entertainment, and listening to music that it nearly impossible to track everything and everyone they are exposed to. It is important to have frequent conversations with our children about content they are exposed to, interactions they are having with peers and people they’ve met online and talk through these communications with them. It’s upsetting to learn that there are criminal cases in which minors are being held accountable for content on their phones – inappropriate pictures or text messages, for example – that they had no idea they could get in trouble for. Even though some of our children will resist our “nosiness” it is still a protective parenting behavior to be curious about and insistent upon transparency about outside influences on our children. Talk with your children about appropriate content to send/receive (i.e. no personal information, photos, nudity, threats.)
Cyberbullying has frequently been the cause of childhood suicide. Girls get bullied more often than boys, and LGBTQ populations are bullied more frequently than those children who identify and behave as their birth gender. Kids get bullied for things they’ve said, social faux paus, gender orientation, gossip, and rumor. It can be difficult to address bullying, especially when it is difficult for us to know when, where, and how it is happening.
When cyberbullying happens: when kids are online. How cyberbullying happens: through harassment (unwelcome and inappropriate verbal or physical conduct, or coercive behavior, where the behavior is known or reasonably ought to be known to be unwanted or welcome;) and, menacing (suggesting the presence of danger; threatening), as well as name calling, and critique and judgment of physical attributes are some of the “hows” of cyberbullying. Where cyberbullying happens: in online social media platforms, email, texting, wherever kids are online.
What we can do about it: pay attention to your children’s engagement with social media. Children are still growing, and they require guidance. Even though some children will say they don’t need your guidance, they still need your guidance. Be a good role model. Our kids watch how we engage with the world. If we are aggressive with people online or over the phone, such as when we are frustrated that a snow day doesn’t get called, or customer service is less than helpful, they are watching how we respond or react in those situations. If our children have more leadership qualities, they may toy with aggression to make others feel bad, or to express their frustration and annoyance. If our child is a follower, they may be taken advantage of by someone who has more personal power than they do calling the shots and telling them what to do. Let’s help each other learn to be accepting and understanding of others’ personal and cultural differences and ways of being. Then, people are much more apt and open to being accepting and understanding of our own cultural and personal differences.
Self-regulation may help with the effects of bullying, whichever side of it you may find yourself on. If you or someone you know are on the receiving end of inappropriate communication, remember to breathe. Breathing low in your belly has a physiological response in the body, switching your nervous system from “fight, flight or freeze” to the relaxation response as discovered by Herbert Benson in his groundbreaking research on stress and physical health. “The relaxation response is a physical state of deep rest that changes the physical and emotional responses to stress and is the opposite of the fight or flight reaction.” Talk with your children about self-regulation, help them learn strategies to manage their mood and behavior, practice some of these strategies with them. This is one of the best ways to counteract the effects of bullying. Increasing self-esteem is another way to counter the effects of bullying behavior. It has been known for some time that bullies bully because the do not have the elements of inner mastery that will help them manage their own mood and behavior. Increasing self-esteem helps people on both sides of the equation.
For more information on how to stop bullying, how to teach and learn self-regulation and develop empathy (what it feels like to understand someone else’s emotional state), and how to be an upstander (getting involved in supporting someone who is being victimized), versus a bystander (being paralyzed by watching someone be victimized), please utilize the resources below.
Resources
https://useboomerang.com/ taking the battle out of screen time
Safe Schools https://www.safeschools.com/blog/cyberbullying-what-educators-need-to-know/
Cyberbullying: Hiding Behind the Screen article by Erin Peebles, MD, FRCPC published in Pediatric Child Health 2014 Dec; 19(10):527-528 National Library of Medicine
The Relaxation Response by Herbert Benson, Harvard Medical School 1976
Do Something https://www.dosomething.org/us/facts/11-facts-about-cyber-bullying
Great Schools https://www.greatschools.org/gk/articles/faq-about-cyberbullying/
Eureka Alert https://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2016-08/asa-ycm081616.php online article about this paper:
The paper, “Toxic Ties: Networks of Friendship, Dating, and Cyber Victimization,” was be presented on Saturday, Aug. 20, at 2:30 p.m. PDT in Seattle at the American Sociological Association’s 111th Annual Meeting.
NPR article about Sesame Workshop/Sesame Street’s efforts to help children learn empathy https://www.npr.org/sections/ed/2016/10/17/497827991/a-sesame-study-in-kindness
NPR article about sharing online photos of your kids https://www.npr.org/2019/08/12/750577697/what-parents-may-not-realize-when-they-post-about-their-kids-online
NPR article on how to manage screen time https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2016/10/21/498706789/no-snapchat-in-the-bedroom-an-online-tool-to-manage-kids-media-use