As social media platforms such as Instagram, Snapchat, and TikTok continue to grow in popularity,adolescents spend much of their time online navigating complex virtual worlds.
New research suggests that increased time spent online may be linked to cyberbullying behavior. A study from the University of Georgia found that high social media addiction scores, spending more time online, and being male significantly predicted cyberbullying among adolescents.
“Some people engage in cyberbullying online because of the anonymity and the fact that there is no retaliation,” said Amanda Giordano, the study’s principal investigator and an associate professor in the UGA Mary Francis College of Early Education. he said. “There are young people who are still in the middle of their cognitive development, and we provide them with technology that has a global audience and expect them to make good choices.”
Cyberbullying takes many forms, including personal attacks, harassing or discriminatory behavior, spreading defamatory information, online misrepresentations, spreading personal information, social exclusion, and cyberstalking.
The study surveyed adolescents between the ages of 13 and 19. Of the 428 participants surveyed, 214 (50%) were female, 210 (49.1%) were male, and 4 (0.9%) were other.
Exploring Social Media Addiction
When adolescents are online, they adapt to different social norms than when interacting in person with peers. People often become more aggressive or critical on social media because of the anonymity online and the ability to avoid retaliation. Additionally, cyberbullies may feel less remorse and empathy when committing these acts because they are unable to understand the direct impact of their actions.
“Perpetrators are not given the opportunity to see how harmful their bullying is, nor are they given the opportunity to learn from their mistakes and do something different,” Giordano said. “This is a frightening situation because the natural consequences of offline bullying do not extend to them.”
Teens addicted to social media are more likely to become involved in cyberbullying, as are young people who spend more time online. A participant in this study reported that he spends an average of 7 hours per day online, and the average maximum time he spent online per day was over 12 hours.
“Social media addiction is when you crave social media even when you’re not using it, and you continue to use social media despite the negative effects,” Giordano said. “The negative effects include being tired during the day because you’re scrolling all night, having conflicts with your parents, doing poorly in school, and doing things online that you don’t care about later.” .Unfortunately, they are still using social media.”
Social networking sites are designed to give people a hit of dopamine, and some people compulsively seek that hit, she added. “It’s feeding into that addictive behavior and they may be using cyberbullying as a way to get likes, shares, comments and retweets,” she said. “This is a common feature found in behavioral addictions. People begin to rely on rewarding behaviors as a way to feel better when they are experiencing negative emotions. Hence the article Social Media Addiction I think this is really interesting because it shows that there are other factors at play besides just time spent online.”
The study also found that male adolescents were more likely to engage in cyberbullying than females, consistent with previous research showing that aggressive behavior is more likely to be male-driven. . Further research into men’s socialization processes could help identify what drives them to engage in further cyberbullying behavior.
Next steps for counselors and clinicians
Giordano believes that if a youth is participating in cyberbullying, counselors should begin assessing them for social media addiction and provide a treatment plan to help them redefine their relationship with technology. . These interventions may include helping adolescents consider how they define their self-worth or limiting the time they spend on social media platforms.
“There are a significant number of strong and reliable assessments of social media addiction in adolescents with good psychometric properties,” Giordano said. “When clinicians see cyberbullying happening, I think they need to look at not just the cyberbullying, but the relationship between the individual and social media, and address social media addiction.”
School counselors are often unaware of cyberbullying until an incident occurs. To address this issue, Giordano recommends that schools start educating students about cyberbullying and social media addiction early as a preventative measure, rather than waiting to repair the damage. Through awareness campaigns and support groups, schools can give students the opportunity to talk about cyberbullying, understand the consequences of their actions, and prepare for potential risks.
“Schools and school counselors need to implement this prevention activity early and educate students about the risks of addiction from challenging behaviors such as gaming and social media,” Giordano said. “We teach them the warning signs of behavioral addiction and what to do if they start to feel like they are losing control of their behavior, and learn other ways to manage their emotions rather than relying on those behaviors. We need to help them find ways to do that. There are already a lot of programs moving in this direction, which I think is great, and I think we need to do more of.”
Counselors can reduce the risk of these addictive behaviors from an early age by teaching and equipping children with emotional regulation skills and other ways to cope with emotions.
“If you think about it, young people are not only figuring out who they are offline, but they’re also trying to figure out who they want to be online,” Giordano said. “We are giving our youth so much more to do during this formative period, including deciding how they want to express themselves online. I think it’s a complicated world.”