<p>Cyberbullying: Harassment in the Space of Modern Technologies</p>

Abstract

This paper is a continuation of the article “Bullying as an object of research and cultural phenomenon” (Psychology. Journal of the Higher School of Economics, 2013, vol. 10, №3, p. 149-159) and focuses on bullying on the Internet. Widespread use of the Internet and teenagers’ addiction to social networks in conjunction with the deficit of user competence and lack of understanding of the need to maintain a certain ethics of Internet communication make cyberbullying one of the greatest social risks in adolescents. We consider the psychological aspects of cyberbullying that are associated with the specificity of the virtual environment and that make it different from traditional bullying – such as the anonymity of the bully and their continued access to the possibility of prosecution, fear of deprivation of access to the computer of the victim as a motive of concealing information about cyberbullying from their parents, countless and anonymous witnesses, lack of feedback in bully-victim communication and the phenomenon of disinhibition. We consider the basic forms of cyberbullying (flaming, griefing, trolling, defamation, impersonation, the disclosure of secrets and fraud, exclusion / ostracism, cyberstalking and sexting) in order to show the specificity of online bullying behavior. Means to stop and prevent cyberbullying include technical aspects (account lockout, privacy settings, etc.) but otherwise are similar to dealing with bullying outside of the Internet: these are increase of the user awareness in terms of acceptable behaviors, understanding of the need to maintain respectful relations between users (including unmoderated Internet sites and websites that don’t have official rules of conduct), as well as exclusion and possible termination of unsafe, degrading statements and images.