An
analysis of the attitude towards cyberbullying and cyber victimization among
the university students of Sri Lanka
Abstract
Cyberbullying is a form of bullying
that occurs through technological means, such as social networking, instant
messaging and through mails. It can be constant, and at other times may occur
in isolated incidents, but despite the timeline of progression, some scholars
argue that the effects are almost always catastrophic (Kowalski, Limber, &
Agatston, 2012).With the emergence of internet and sophisticated cyber
technologies, real words bullies have been applied to cyberspaces by those who
tend to be aggressive without being aware of the potential harm they cause to
another person. This has become an intriguing area for academics and
practitioners. The present study aims at explaining the attitude towards
cyberbullying and cyber victimization among the university students in Sri Lank
in terms of their personality factors. A short form of Eysenck personality
Questionnaire, Rank scale for cyberbullying indexes were given for 113
university students. The frequency statistics and person correlation of
coefficients were carried out in analyzing data. The most important findings of
the study is that, the attitude towards cyberbullying and cyber victimization
was related to psychoticism and extraversion dimensions of personality.
Regarding the cyber victimization levels, it was found that most of the
participants were subjected to cyber victimization at least in one occasion in
their life. Results indicate that Female participants were more likely to be
subjected to cyber victimization than the males. Further, it was found that
anonymous calls, creating fake profiles or web pages are the most popular
methods used by university students for cyberbullying.
Keywords:
Cyberbullying, Cyber victimization, personality
1. Introduction
1.1 Background of the
study
With the rapid growth in
technological advancements, the availability and use of internet has been
increased exponentially in recent years and it continues to grow at an
explosive rate. Thus the use of internet has become an integral part of
peoples’ life’s and often people use it to communicate with others through text
messages, sharing videos, photographs and social network sites etc. In parallel
to these developments in the context of technology, various problems have come
in to the existence about the use of internet by various parties such as
students who are at the stage of adolescence period, representing various
universities and colleges.
Research in this field demonstrates
that today we face with cyberbullying behaviors more often which is a new form
of violence emerged with the advancements in technology and internet related
services. The word “bullying” is often defined as being an aggressive,
intentional act or behavior that is carried out by a group or an individual
repeatedly (Whitney & Smith, 1993, Olweus, 1999). Vandebsch and Cleemput,
(2008) describes Cyberbullying behavior, literally, as a kind of violence,
including the usage of internet and mobile phones. Accordingly, Li (2007)
described cyber bullying as a kind of bullying behavior involving inclination
as hacking personnel websites, accounts and damaging one’s reputation and
information presented, through the use of technologies.
Cyberbullying is a form of bullying
which has in recent years become more apparent with the increase in usage of
electronic devices such as computers and mobile phones by young people. Cyber -
Bullying has been increasing in online environment at an explosive rate like no
other. Researches believes the increasing online shared life among youngsters
such as university students has contributed significantly for the dramatic
increase in cyberbullying behaviors. (Campell, 2005; Dehue, Bolman and Vollink
2008). According to a research done by UNICEF, 19.7% university students
reported engaging in cyberbullying at least one time, and 54.4% of them
reported as Victims of cyberbullying at least once in their life time.
Accordingly it can be said that a new kind aggression called as Cyber -
bullying has emerged with the rapid growth in technology in cyberspace which
may also bring out cyber victimization.
Cyberbullying can take many forms.
The main types of cyberbullying behaviors are anonymous calling, sending spam
mails or viruses, creating fake profile or web pages, posting photographs or
videos of someone without his consent, hacking someone’s profile, sending mean,
vulgar or threatening messages and spreading lies and rumors through internet
about someone else. Cyberbullying is also different from traditional bullying
because it is anonymous and it can have a rapid effect through comments or
sharing videos or photographs etc. are sent around the world in minutes and it
can occur at anywhere – anytime. Cyberbullying is a particularly invasive form
of bullying and one from which it can be difficult to escape (Lodge,
Frydenberg, 2012)
Researchers has found through studies
that, all over the world people use internet in many different ways depending
on their own personal factors and preferences especially, based on the three
dimensions of personality defined as neuroticism, psychoticism, extraversion
which are identified under the Eysenck’s personality theory. Neuroticism is a
dimension of personality defined by instability and high anxiety at one end and
stability and low anxiety at the other end. Extraversion dimension of
personality is characterized by being outgoing, talkative, high on positive
affect and in need for external stimulation. Psychoticism personality is
characterized by such as recklessness, anger, inconsideration and hostility. In
addition to that psychoticism personality may associate with psychotic
disorders or have a greater risk of developing such diseases. Findings indicate
that the greater use of internet is related to decreased communication with
family members, social isolation and an increase in depression and loneliness
which associated with the above mentioned personalities of Extraversion, Neuroticism
and Psychoticism. Hence this study aims at seeking a relationship between attitudes
towards cyberbullying, cyber victimization and personality factors of
university students.
1.2 Objectives of the study
The aim of the study is
to achieve the following research objectives,
1. To
find out the existing level of cyberbullying and cyber victimization among
university students of Sri Lanka,
2. To
find out a relationship between attitudes of cyberbullying, cyber victimization
and personality of university students.
1.3 Scope of the study
Undergraduates of various
departments of management and commerce faculty of university of Sri
Jayewardenepura were selected for the study irrespective of their year of
study.
2.
Literature review
2.1 Summary
of the base research
Cyberbullying
is a fairly recent concept, and the research exploring it is still in its
initial phase. Nevertheless most of the researches has been able to conduct
successful studies in the context of cyberbullying by exploring relationships
between cyberbullying behaviors and the intensity of those cyberbullying
behaviors with demographic variables such as age and gender.
One
of the research carried out by Ozden, M.S & Serra, 2013 discuss the
perception of cyberbullying and cyber victimization by university students in
terms of their personality factors. The objective of the researcher was to find
an association between university student’s perceptions of cyberbullying, cyber
victimization and their personality factors. The researcher defines
cyberbullying as electronic bullying and online social cruelty that occurs
through e-mail, instant messaging, chat rooms, web pages, video gaming and
digital messages sent via cellular phones. On the other hand the concept of
cyber victimization is explain in a simple manner as being victims of
cyberbullying activities.
For
the study the researcher identifies ten types of cyberbullying behaviors listed
below;
·
Anonymous calls
·
sending spam mails or viruses
·
sending mean, vulgar and threatening
messages
·
spreading lies and rumors about someone
else
·
creating fake profile or web page
·
posting photographs or videos of someone
without his consent
·
sending request for sexual intercourse
·
hacking someone’s profile
·
fake statue or place statements
·
Harassing or threatening statements
devoted to a partner in a romantic relationship.
The
personality factors of the students (independent variable of the research) were
determined by the researcher in his study through Eysenck personality
Questionnaire (EPI) which is a widely accepted method for assessing personality
of humans. The questionnaire assess the personality of a person in three
dimensions including 101 sample self – reported items designed to top each of
the factors with “Yes” or “No” answers and give score for psychoticism,
neuroticism and extraversion (Cervone and Pervin, 2008).In addition to that the
researcher had used four point Likert scale type of questions to assess the
degree of harmfulness of ten cyberbullying behaviors identified for the
research. A cyber-bully/Victim scale was used to assess the perception of
students in cyberbullying and cyber victimization. The scale consist of 19
items under 3 factors.1.Factor is about online sexual harassment, 2. Factor is
about intentionally excluding someone from an online group and disturbing him,
3. Factor is about spreading mean or embarrassing rumors.
The
researcher picked a sample of 136 students in age range of 18 - 39 for the
study from Istanbul Kultur University. Among his total sample, 39% represented
males’ students and 61% represented females. Using the data collected the
researcher has examined gender influences on student’s beliefs regarding
cyberbullying and found a significant difference between males and female
university students only in cyberbullying behavior of “spreading means or
embarrassing rumors. The researchers states that male university students were
more concerned as cyberbullying offenders as spreading mean or embarrassing
rumors, than females.
In
addition to the above, the findings of the researcher shows that male
university students perceived “Posting photographs or videos of someone without
his consent”, “sending online request for sexual intercourse”, “hacking
someone’s profile” as significantly harmless cyberbullying behaviors than the
females. Further the researcher has found a relationship between cyberbullying
behaviors and personality factors. A strong co- relation has been found between
sending online requests for sexual intercourse and psychoticism personality
dimension where as a medium significant co – relation founds between “creating
fake profile or web page” and being psychoticism and “hackings someone’s
profile” and being psychoticism. As per the research findings the other
personality dimensions such as extraversion and cyberbullying behaviors such as
creating fake profile or web page seems to shows a weak but significant
negative co- relation. The researcher states that the personality dimension of
extraversion increases the student’s perception of creating fake profiles or
web pages as more harmful. Further the researcher was able to found a
relationship between cyber victimization and personality factors. According to
the research findings a weak significant co- relation exists between cyber
victimization and psychoticism personality factors.
In
conclusion the researcher address the primary question of the research that is
whether the tendency to be a cyberbullying offender or victim is associated
with personality factors or not. Based on findings of the study the researcher
emphasizes that being either a cyberbullying offender or to be a victim was
related to be psychoticism.
2.2 Review of existing
other literature
Most
of the researchers has made efforts to examine the factors behind cyberbullying
.Among those studies of cyberbullying, Sourander (2010) discussed the wide
range of psychiatric and psychosomatic problems associated with the
cyberbullying. The researcher states that most of the cyberbullying offenders
and victims experience more frequent psychosomatic problems, headaches, sleep
disorders, a higher number of emotional and peer – related problems and
neglected by others.
Perren,
Dooley, Shaw & Cross (2010) found that the cyberbullying behaviors are
highly correlated with psychological and physical problems. Through the
examination of large number of respondents they found that both cyber –victims
and cyber – bullies experienced higher level of stress than their peers,
including higher depressive symptoms, which eventually led them to engage in destructive behaviors
such as tendency to smoke and increased alcohol consumption.
Bauman
(2010) in this study found that majority of those who engage in cyberbullying
activities had experiences in cyberbullying activities before as offenders and
victims. Further, it was emphasized that most of the persons victimized through
cyberbullying activities were tend to blame themselves for their own behavior
and found to tolerate such abuses resulted through cyberbullying activities
than taking necessary actions to avoid such victimization in future such as
being disconnected from technology.
A
study conducted by Wolak, Mitchell & Finkelhor (2007) examines adolescent
perceptions of online harassment which is one of the cyberbullying behaviors.
Researchers found that “those harassed by known peers were about five times
more likely to have used the internet to harass someone they were mad at than
youth not harassed”. In addition to that the study shows an impressive result
in which females were found to be much more likely to engage in cyberbullying
activities than their males counterparts.
Koing,
Gollwitzr, & Steffgen (2010) in their study found that revenge/retaliation
as a motivational factor contributes significantly to the increase in
cyberbullying activities in cyber space.
There
are some other studies conducted by the researchers with regard to intensity of
cyberbullying behaviors. A study conducted on 177 secondary school students in
Canada shows that 23% of the respondents have been exposed to bullying via e-
mail and 41% of them via telephone )messages. Further 35% of them have bullying
via chat rooms.32% of them have been exposed by friends they know in school.11%
of students have been exposed to cyberbullying by students they do not know. (Shariff.2005)
National
children’s home (NCH) have produced a survey on cyberbullying. The survey
conducted on 770 young people aged 11-19.The results of the survey shows that
20% of the young people had been bullied or threatened by some sort of digital
bullying such as posting videos and pictures, and 14% through text messages.
Further 5% of respondents found to be bullied through chat rooms and 4% by e
mail.
2.3 Secondary data
Numerous
sites and publicly available information sources reports researches and vital
information with respect to cyberbullying and cyber victimization. An American
website I – safe reports research in cyberbullying, from a survey of 1,500
students aged between 9-13 years old. The main findings (cited from www.mmu.k12.vt.us) were that 42% of
children claimed to have been bullied online. 35% had been threatened online,
and among them 21% had received threatening e- mails or other messages.
An
Australian news website www.theinquirer.net
provide brief statistics on cyberbullying. The statistics has been produced
based on a study conducted on Queensland University of technology. According to
the published information it is revealed that 13% of the respondents of the
study seems to have already experienced cyberbullying at the year of 8, and 25%
of them knew somebody who had experienced in cyberbullying.
The
national society for the prevention of cruelty to child (NSPCC) provide
statistics with regard to cyberbullying on their official web – site (www.nspcc.org.uk) .According to one of
the self – completion survey conducted on online, it was found that 28% of children aged 11-16 with a
profile on a social networking has
experienced upsetting cyberbullying activities in United Kingdom. Among them
37% were exposed to trolling (Unkind, sarcastic or negative comments or rumors
circulated through online) where as 22% of them were excluded from social
groups through cyberbullying activities.12% reported being harassed by sending
sexual messages online.
The
UNICEF organization’s official website provide some key findings with respect
to cyberbullying and cyber victimization. According one of the studies carried
out by UNICEF, 19.7% of university students found to be engage in cyberbullying
at least one time and 54.4% of them reported being victims of cyberbullying at
least one of their life time
The
nobullying.com which is an online forum aimed at educating, advising,
counselling and all importantly helping to stop bullying. According to the
public statistics published on the web – site, 25% of teenagers have
experienced cyberbullying via cell phone or internet. Further 11% percent of
the respondents have report cyberbullying activities such as taking photos and
ideas and posting them online .Further it was found that Over 55% of the
respondents has witnesses cyberbullying on social media.
3. Research method
3.1 Data collection method
A
questionnaire was devised for the purpose of data collection. The questionnaire
consists with four parts as Part A, Part B, Part C and Part D. The Part A of
the questionnaire records demographic information of the respondents such as gender,
age, department to which they belong and year of study. Part B of the
questionnaire consists with Single choice questions developed in order to
identify existing levels of cyberbullying and cyber victimization. Part C of
the questionnaire presents likert scale questions for assessing the attitudes of
cyberbullying/cyber victimization of university students in terms of
endangerment degrees of harmful behaviors defined as cyberbullying. The
cyberbullying behaviors used for Part C was derived from the definitions of
“Cyberbullying” in literature. The cyberbullying behaviors are listed as below;
·
Anonymous calls
·
Sending spam mails or viruses
·
Sending mean, vulgar and threatening
messages
·
Spreading lies and rumors about someone
else
·
Creating fake profile or web page
·
Posting photographs or videos of someone
without his consent
·
Sending request for sexual intercourse
·
Hacking someone’s profile
·
Harassing or threatening statements
devoted to a partner in a romantic relationship
·
Fake statue or place statements
The undergraduates were asked to tank cyberbullying
behaviors on a five point likert type of scale; 1= More harmful, 2 = Harmful, 3= Neutral, 4= Harmless, 5= More harmless
The
part D of the questionnaire consists with thirty (30) likert scale type of questions
where ten (10) questions each has been developed to assess personality
dimensions of respondents identified as Psychoticism, Extraversion and
Neuroticism. The questions developed under part D follows the structure of
Eysenck personality questionnaire, which is a popular set of questionnaires
used to assess the personality in three dimensions as mentioned above.
3.2 Types of variables
According
to the research objectives of the study the following independent and dependent
variables has been identified and the questionnaire has been developed in
manner to measure such variables through Likert scale questions as explain in
3.1 above.
1. Independent
variables – Three dimensions of Personality defined as,
i.
Psychoticism,
ii.
Extraversion
and,
iii.
Neuroticism
2. Dependent
variables – i. Attitudes
towards cyberbullying
ii. Attitude
towards cyber victimization
|
Psychoticism
|
|
Extraversion
|
|
Neuroticism
|
|
Attitudes
towards cyberbullying, cyber victimization
|
3.2.1
Independent variables
The
three dimensions of personality neuroticism, psychoticism and extraversion as
defined by Eysenck’s personality theory have been identified as the independent
variables of the study. These personality dimensions of the individuals have
measured through likert scale type of questions which have been formulated to
address each type of personality dimension. Under the data analysis hypothesis
testing has been done under the said dimensions and assessed whether any
relationship exists between the attitude of cyberbullying, cyber victimization and
personality dimensions.
3.2.2 Dependent variables
The
attitude towards cyberbullying and cyber victimization have been identified as
dependent variables of the study. More ever, the attitude of cyberbullying and
cyber victimization are two sides of the same coin. In other words harassing
other people through activities such as creating fake profiles, sending spams
and mails, posting photographs or videos in internet without someone’s consent
are considers as cyberbullying and being
expose to them known as cyber victimization. As aforementioned, since cyber
victimization and cyberbullying are two sides of the same coin, it was decided
to assess the attitude on those two variables using the same set of Likert
scale questions which provides scale 1 to 5 as 1 = more Harmful, 2= Harmful, 3
=Neutral, 4= Harmless, 5 = More harmless. For an instance if a particular
person select scale 5 for a particular cyberbullying activity it implies that
such person seems it as more harmless when engage in such cyberbullying
activity and on the hand, he seems it as more harmless when he/she is cyber
victimized through the same activity by another person.
3.3 Sample
A
convenience sample of 113 students enrolled in different departments of
management and commerce faculty of university of Sri Jayewardenepura
participated in the study. Out of the total participants 69% was males and 31%
was females.
3.4 List of hypotheses
This
study aims to explain university students’ perception of cyberbullying and
cyber-victimization in terms of its relationship with their personality
factors.
Within
the above framework the hypotheses of the study were formulated as follows.
Hypothesis 1:
Null
hypothesis (H0): There
is a relationship between the attitude of cyberbullying, cyber victimization
and psychoticism personality dimension.
Alternative
hypothesis (H1): There
is no relationship between the attitude of cyberbullying, cyber victimization
and psychoticism personality dimension.
Hypothesis 2:
Null
hypothesis (H0): There is a relationship
between the attitude of cyberbullying, cyber victimization and extraversion
personality dimension.
Alternative
hypothesis (H1): There is no relationship
between the attitude of cyberbullying, cyber victimization and extraversion
personality dimension.
Hypothesis 3:
Null
hypothesis (H0): There is a relationship
between the attitude of cyberbullying, cyber victimization and neuroticism
personality dimension.
Alternative
hypothesis (H1): There
is no relationship between the attitude of cyberbullying, cyber victimization
and neuroticism personality dimension.
3.5 Data Analysis method
The
data gathered during the study were analyzed using statistical package for
social sciences (SPSS). Demographic data and single choice questions i.e. Yes
and No questions analyzed using descriptive statistics of frequency technique.
Hypothesis testing performed using person’s correlation to find out the
relationship between the dependent and independent variables.
4. Data analysis
4.1 Descriptive statistics
Demographic information
The
respective information for the research collected from 113 participants who
enrolled in different departments of management and commerce of university of
Sri Jayewardenepura irrespective of their year of study. The below tables
summarizes the demographic information of participants.
Table 1 : Gender analysis of the respondents
Response
|
Frequency
|
Percent
|
Valid Percent
|
Cumulative Percent
|
|
Valid
|
Male
|
77
|
68%
|
68%
|
68%
|
Female
|
36
|
32%
|
32%
|
100%
|
|
Total
|
113
|
100%
|
100%
|
0%
|
|
Table 2 : Age Analysis of the respondents
Description
|
N
|
Minimum
|
Maximum
|
Mean
|
Age
|
113
|
22
|
24
|
23
|
Valid
N (list wise)
|
113
|
|||
As
above table denotes among the total respondents 77% were males and 36%
represents females. The average age of the respondents were 23 years, where
minimum and maximum ages were 22 and 23years respectively.
Existing
level of cyberbullying and cyber victimization
Further,
descriptive analysis over data has been carried out for the purpose of
identifying the existing level of cyberbullying and cyber victimization among
university students in Sri Lanka .As per the findings it was noted that 47% of
the respondents are victims of cyberbullying at least one occasion in their life
time, where 53% were not.
Table 3 : Have
you been ever cyber victimized?
Response
|
Frequency
|
Percent
|
Valid Percent
|
|
Valid
|
No
|
53
|
47%
|
47%
|
Yes
|
60
|
53%
|
53%
|
|
Total
|
113
|
100%
|
100%
|
|
In
combination of the above finding it was noted that females are subjected to
cyber victimization more than the males. The descriptive statistics shown in
the below table provides a higher mean related to cyber victimization for
females than the males.
Table 4 : Group statistics for cyber
victimization on gender wise
Group Statistics
|
|||
Cyber victimization
|
Gender
|
N
|
Mean
|
Male
|
77
|
0.45
|
|
Female
|
36
|
0.69
|
|
Further,
the data was analyzed to find out how often the university students are
subjected to cyber victimization. The results shows that, among the people who
has been cyber victimized, 65% were subjected to cyber victimization on very rare basis, 10 % rarely, 20 % monthly and 5 % weekly. This explains that
most of the students are not exposed to cyberbullying activities too often rather
than on rare occasions.
Table 5 : How
often have you been cyber victimized?
Response
|
Frequency
|
Percent
|
Valid Percent
|
Very
rarely
|
39
|
65%
|
65%
|
Rarely
|
6
|
10%
|
10%
|
Monthly
|
12
|
20%
|
20%
|
Weekly
|
3
|
5%
|
5%
|
Total
|
60
|
100
|
100
|
Based
on the gender analysis it was found that females are subjected to the cyber
victimization too frequently (monthly, weekly) than the males. The below graph
shows that among the respondents females were subjected cyber victimization on
monthly and weekly basis where males were not. This indicates that
cyberbullying activities are direct towards females on frequent basis rather
than males at university level.
|
Frequency
|
Figure 2 : How
often have you been cyber victimized?
In
addition to the above findings, the data was analyzed to detect cyber bullying
behaviors which have had a most impact towards cyber victimization among
undergraduates. According to the results 48% were found to be cyber bullied
through anonymous calling where 17% has been cyberbullied through creating fake
profiles and websites.15% were cyber victims of posting their photographs or
videos by someone else without their consent. Hence it is evident that most
students are exposed to anonymous calling than the other cyberbullying behaviors.
Table 6 :
In which way you have been cyber victimized in most cases?
Response
|
Frequency
|
Percent
|
Valid Percent
|
Anonymous
calling
|
29
|
48%
|
18%
|
Creating
fake profile or web site
|
10
|
17%
|
32%
|
Spreading
lies and rumors about yourself in internet
|
5
|
8%
|
8%
|
Posting
photographs or video of you without consent
|
9
|
15%
|
32%
|
Sending
online request for sexual intercourse
|
5
|
8%
|
5%
|
Hacking
your profile
|
2
|
3%
|
5%
|
Total
|
60
|
100%
|
100
|
With
respect to the involvement in cyberbullying activities by university students,
it was found that among the respondents, 27% engage in cyberbullying activities
where 73% were not. As per the results, it is evident that most undergraduates do
not engage in cyberbullying activities.
In addition to the above, it is important to
understand that the current involvement in cyberbullying activities by
university students are prevailing at a lower level.
Table 7 : Have you ever engage in
cyberbullying activities?
Response
|
Frequency
|
Percent
|
Valid Percent
|
|
Valid
|
No
|
82
|
73%
|
73
|
Yes
|
31
|
27%
|
27
|
|
Total
|
113
|
100
|
100
|
|
Among
the cyberbullying activities used by the undergraduates, Anonymous calls were
found to be the most popular method as shown in the below table. Among the
other methods creating fake profile or website were used as cyberbullying
activities by 35% of the respondents who engage in cyberbullying activities.
Table 8 : Which method do you often use for
cyberbullying?
Frequency
|
Percent
|
Valid Percent
|
|
Anonymous
calls
|
20
|
65%
|
65%
|
Creating
fake profile or website
|
11
|
35%
|
35%
|
Total
|
31
|
100%
|
100%
|
4.2 Hypothesis Testing
The
correlation between the attitudes towards cyberbullying, cyber victimization and
different personality factors were checked using the person correlation analysis.
4.2.1 Attitudes towards Cyberbullying/Cyber
victimization in terms of Psychoticism
It was examined whether there is any relationship exists between
the attitudes towards cyberbullying/ cyber victimization (which is the average
score for the ten indexed given under the cyberbullying activities for
respondents) and personality dimension of psychoticism
Table
9 : Correlation between attitudes
towards cyberbullying/cyber victimization and psychoticism
Psychoticism
|
||
Cyberbullying/Cyber
victimization
|
Pearson
Correlation
|
0.559**
|
Sig.
(2-tailed)
|
0.000
|
|
N
|
113.00
|
|
** Correlation is significant at the 0.01 level (2
- tailed).
* Correlation is
significant at the 0.05 level (2 - tailed).
The findings elicits that there is a moderate positive correlation
(correlation = 0.559, p <0.05) between the attitudes towards cyberbullying/ cyber
victimization and the personality dimension of psychoticism. In other words the
outcomes of the test shows that cyberbullying/cyber victimization is perceived
as more harmless by the persons as the level of psychoticism possessed by them
increases.
In the above analysis, attitudes towards cyberbullying, cyber
victimization has been considered in a more holistic manner rather than
considering the attitudes towards individual cyberbullying activities. Further,
In order to examine relationships between the attitudes towards individual
cyberbullying activities given under the cyberbullying index, a person
correlation analysis was carried out between the attitudes of individual
cyberbullying activities and psychotic personality dimension.
Table 10 : Correlation between attitude
towards individual cyberbullying activities and psychoticism
Cyberbullying activity
|
Psychoticism
|
||
Anonymous
Callings
|
Pearson
Correlation
|
0.690**
|
|
Sig.
(2-tailed)
|
0.000
|
||
N
|
113
|
||
Creating
fake profile or web page
|
Pearson
Correlation
|
0.542**
|
|
Sig.
(2-tailed)
|
0.000
|
||
N
|
113
|
||
Hacking
someone’s profile
|
Pearson
Correlation
|
0.434**
|
|
Sig.
(2-tailed)
|
0.000
|
||
N
|
113
|
||
Sending
online requests to sexual intercourse
|
Pearson
Correlation
|
||
Sig.
(2-tailed)
|
0.000
|
||
N
|
113
|
||
Harassing
or threatening statements devoted to a partner in a romantic relationship
|
Pearson
Correlation
|
0.276**
|
|
Sig.
(2-tailed)
|
0.003
|
||
N
|
113
|
||
** Correlation is significant at the 0.01 level (2
- tailed).
* Correlation is
significant at the 0.05 level (2 - tailed).
Based
on the outcomes of the analysis it was found that a strong positive co –
relation exists between the attitudes towards cyber bullying activity “anonymous
calling” and psychoticism. When the level of psychoticism increases, anonymous
calls given to other people seems harmless (Correlation = 0.69, p<0.05).
Further,
a moderated positive co – relation observed between creating “fake profiles or
web page” and being psychoticism (Correlation = 0.54, p<0.05).and “hacking’s
someone profile” (Correlation = 0.43, p<0.05) and being psychoticism. In
other words creating fake profile or web page and hacking someone’s profile
considered to be harmless by a student when the level of psychoticism possess
by such student tend to increase. In addition to that a weak positive
relationship found between “sending online requests to sexual intercourse” and
being psychoticism (Correlation = 0.35, p<0.05) and “harassing or
threatening statements devoted to a partner in a romantic relationship” (Correlation
= 0.28, p<0.05) and being psychoticism. Undergraduates perceive online
request for sexual intercourse as well as harassing and threatening statements
devoted a partner in a romantic relationship as more harmless with the increase
in psychoticism levels. The dimension of psychoticism personality reflects
traits such as non-conformity, tough – minded, willingness to take risks,
unconcerned about the rights of other people and welfare of others and tendency
towards anti-social behaviors. The most of the traits which are attributed with
psychoticism personality is negative factors which lead to the initiation of negative
activities. As above shown, when the level of psychoticism increases of a
person, he or she perceive certain cyberbullying activities as harmless and
such perception may cause them to engage cyberbullying behaviors.
Expect
for above cyberbullying behaviors, no obvious co – relation can be found
between remaining cyberbullying activities (Sending spam mails and viruses,
sending mean ,Vulgar or threatening messages, spreading lies or rumors about
someone else, Post photographs and videos of someone without his consent, Fake
statute or place statements) and psychoticism.
Table 11 : Correlation between attitude towards individual cyberbullying
activities and psychoticism
Cyberbullying activity
|
Psychoticism
|
||
Sending
spam mails and viruses
|
Pearson
Correlation
|
0.192
|
|
Sig.
(2-tailed)
|
0.061
|
||
N
|
113
|
||
Sending
mean, Vulgar or threatening messages
|
Pearson
Correlation
|
0.066
|
|
Sig.
(2-tailed)
|
0.489
|
||
N
|
113
|
||
Spreading
lies or rumors about some else
|
Pearson
Correlation
|
0.152
|
|
Sig.
(2-tailed)
|
0.108
|
||
N
|
113
|
||
Post
photographs or videos of someone without his consent
|
Pearson
Correlation
|
-0.021
|
|
Sig.
(2-tailed)
|
0.822
|
||
N
|
113
|
||
Fake statue or place statements
|
Pearson
Correlation
|
0.107
|
|
Sig.
(2-tailed)
|
0.261
|
||
N
|
113
|
||
** Correlation is significant at the 0.01 level (2
- tailed).
* Correlation is
significant at the 0.05 level (2 - tailed).
4.2.1 Attitudes towards Cyberbullying,
Cyber victimization in terms of Extraversion
Person
correlation analysis was carried out in order to identify whether any
relationship exists between the extraversion personality dimension and attitudes towards cyberbullying
and cyber victimization.
Table 12 : Correlation between attitudes towards cyberbullying/cyber
victimization and extraversion
Extraversion
|
||
Cyberbullying
|
Pearson
Correlation
|
-
0.221**
|
Sig.
(2-tailed)
|
0.019
|
|
N
|
113
|
|
** Correlation is significant at the 0.01 level (2
- tailed).
* Correlation is
significant at the 0.05 level (2 - tailed).
The results shows that a
weak negative correlation (correlation = - 0.221, p<0.05) exists between the
attitudes towards cyberbullying,
cyber-victimization and extraversion personality. That is when the level of
extraversion increases, the cyberbullying activities are seem as harmful. Hence
an undergraduate who tend to have a high level of extraversion personality
dimensions have a less probability of engaging in cyberbullying activities.
The
attitudes towards each individual cyberbullying activity, categorized
under the cyberbullying index were also evaluated in terms of extraversion to
gather more information regarding the relationship exists between the attitudes
of cyberbullying activities and
personality.
Table 13 : Correlation between attitude
towards individual cyberbullying activities and extraversion
Cyberbullying activity
|
Extraversion
|
|
Creating
fake profile or web page
|
Pearson
Correlation
|
-.404**
|
Sig.
(2-tailed)
|
0
|
|
N
|
113
|
|
Sending
online requests to sexual intercourse
|
Pearson
Correlation
|
-.356**
|
Sig.
(2-tailed)
|
0
|
|
N
|
113
|
|
Anonymous
Callings
|
Pearson
Correlation
|
-.238*
|
Sig.
(2-tailed)
|
0.011
|
|
N
|
113
|
|
** Correlation is significant at the 0.01 level (2
- tailed).
* Correlation is
significant at the 0.05 level (2 - tailed).
The
outcomes of the analysis shows a moderate negative relationship between “creating
fake profile or web page” and extraversion (Correlation = -.404, p <0.05).In
other words this emphasizes the fact that when the level of extraversion increases,
creating fake profile or webpage perceive as harmful. A weak negative
correlation was found between “sending online requests to sexual intercourse”
and being extraversion (Correlation = -.356, p <0.05) and “anonymous
callings” and being extraversion (Correlation = -0.238, p <0.05). For the
same group of people, in this case undergraduates, as the level of extraversion
increases the cyberbullying behaviors, sending online requests to sexual
intercourse and anonymous callings seem harmful. The extraversion personality,
as express associated with traits such as high sociability, impulsive, like for
excitement, talkative, active and expressive. Therefor it is evident that, when
a person possess more extraversion traits rather than other traits associated with
different personality dimensions, a negative attitude towards is directed
towards the anonymous cyberbullying activities such as giving anonymous calls,
creating fake profiles or webpages and sending online request for sexual
intercourse.
There were no significant correlation
found between the other cyberbullying activities used for the research expect
for the above and extraversion personality dimension. As given in the below
table in each and every case the null hypothesis, which is there is a relationship
between the extraversion personality and perception of cyberbullying is
rejected as of significant level (p) is greater than 0.05. However there is a
relationship between user perceptions of cyberbullying activities and
personality for certain cyberbullying activities as above-mentioned.
Table 14 : Correlation between attitude
towards individual cyberbullying activities and extraversion
Cyberbullying activity
|
Extraversion
|
|
Sending
spam mails and viruses
|
Pearson
Correlation
|
-0.036
|
Sig.
(2-tailed)
|
0.708
|
|
N
|
113
|
|
Sending
mean, Vulgar or threatening messages
|
Pearson
Correlation
|
0.038
|
Sig.
(2-tailed)
|
0.688
|
|
N
|
113
|
|
Spreading
lies or rumors about some else
|
Pearson
Correlation
|
0.067
|
Sig.
(2-tailed)
|
0.478
|
|
N
|
113
|
|
Post
photographs or videos of someone without his consent
|
Pearson
Correlation
|
-0.052
|
Sig.
(2-tailed)
|
0.587
|
|
N
|
113
|
|
Hacking
someone’s profile
|
Pearson
Correlation
|
-0.149
|
Sig.
(2-tailed)
|
0.115
|
|
N
|
113
|
|
Harassing
or threatening statements devoted to a partner in a romantic relationship
|
Pearson
Correlation
|
0.117
|
Sig.
(2-tailed)
|
0.218
|
|
N
|
113
|
|
Fake statue or place statements
|
Pearson
Correlation
|
0.081
|
Sig.
(2-tailed)
|
0.393
|
|
N
|
113
|
|
* Correlation is
significant at the 0.05 level (2 - tailed).
4.2.3 Attitudes
towards Cyberbullying/Cyber victimization in terms of Neuroticism
According to person
correlation analysis, no relationship can be examined between attitudes towards cyberbullying
(perception in a holistic view, the aggregate of perception of individual
cyberbullying activities) and neuroticism. As the below table provides, the
significance level is above 0.05 (p> 0.05) with respect to correlation
analysis. This indicate that the obtained relationship is just due to chance
rather than real. Therefor the null hypothesis, that is there is a relationship
between the attitudes towards cyberbullying/cyber victimization and neuroticism personality
dimension cannot be accepted in this case.
Table
15 : Correlation between attitudes
towards cyberbullying/cyber victimization and Neuroticism
Neuroticism
|
||
Cyberbullying
|
Pearson Correlation
|
0.032
|
Sig.
(2-tailed)
|
0.733
|
|
N
|
113
|
|
** Correlation is significant at the 0.01 level (2
- tailed).
* Correlation is
significant at the 0.05 level (2 - tailed).
5. Conclusion
Cyberbullying
seems to be a type of bullying which is becoming increasingly prevalent, as the
use of technology increases by young people such as undergraduates. Previous
studies with respect to cyberbullying has made various findings including an
identification of relationship between the perceptions of cyberbullying, cyber
victimization and personality factors of students.
The
primary questions of interest in this study was whether the attitudes towards
cyberbullying, cyber victimization depend on the personality factors of undergraduates.
The personality of the undergraduates were considered under three dimensions of
personality as explained in Eysenck’s personality theory. The findings of the
research correlated with previous findings, and shows that there is a
relationship between the attitude towards cyberbullying and personality
dimensions of psychoticism and extraversion. As per the findings, when level of
the psychoticism possessed by an individual increases such person tend to see
cyberbullying, cyber victimization as harmless and therefor, may engage in
those activities. On the other hand there is a weak negative correlation found
between the attitudes towards cyberbullying and extraversion which indicates
that people tend to see cyberbullying, cyber victimization as harmful when the
level of extraversion increases.
In
addition to that the existing level of cyberbullying and cyber victimization
levels among university students has been analyzed and found that
undergraduates are engage in cyberbullying and use anonymous calling, creating
fake profile and web pages as cyberbullying behaviors. Further, it was found
that undergraduates are subjected to cyber victimization on rare basis and
cyberbullying activities are more frequently directed towards females rather
than males.
The
main implication arise from the present findings is that the young internet
users are not aware of the level of endangerment of their online behaviors and its
effects on other people’s lives. The nature and increasing extent of
cyberbullying obviously raise issues about how to deal with it. Future research
could highlight these areas and provide a foundation to develop suitable
strategies to change attitude of undergraduates towards cyberbullying and cyber
victimization in order to reduce intensity of such behaviors among the
university students in Sri Lanka as well as in other countries.
