This episode of DNews is brought to you by Norton.
As the old saying goes, "On the the Internet, no one know you're an *beep*," and science
is showing, cyberbullying has some long-lasting effects.
Our parents had bullies, they stole their lunch money on the walk to school and beat
them up out of sight of the teachers, but cyberbullies don't have to go far to get out
of sight or find a victim.
A study in School Psychology Quarterly found when it comes to bullying: girls were more
likely to be victims of verbal or relational assaults, while boys were more likely to be
physically bullied, and as kids age the physical bullying peters out, but cyberbullying increases.
According to research in Psicothema, one in four teens were cyber-bullied in the year
prior to the study.
And unlike old school bullying, the internet is in your pocket all the time thanks to smartphones.
63 percent of the teens said they never shut off their phones, so they can be bullied anywhere,
and as more people carry devices like phones and laptops the numbers will grow.
The long-term effects of this round-the-clock bullying are just beginning to be studied.
According to the same Psicothema study, with most, the cyberbullying lasted less than a
month; but four percent of teens said they'd been regularly cyber-bullied for three to
six months and three percent for more than a year!
That's a LOT of bullying!
And it doesn't stop there, the Boston Children's Hospital released a study earlier this year,
that says even though the bullying stops, the harm sticks around forever.
People who experienced harrassment at any age experienced worse mental and physical
health later in life, plus increased depressive symptoms and lower self-worth.
Another study in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences found victims of bullying
had increases in anxiety disorders, panic disorder, and depression, additionally, people
who were bullied had higher levels of C-reactive protein, a biomarker which has been linked
to higher cardiovascular risks.
Bullies, they had lower levels of that protein.
Jerks.
Anyway, the reasons aren't clear, but a study by the Family Institute at Northwestern University
said teenagers have more difficulty processing and dealing with cyber bullying, than classic
bullying simply because online is more solitary.
No one comes to the victim's defence, and it's difficult for a victim to work out differences
with the bully.
This isn't just a kids issue either, climate scientists are cyberbullied constantly.
Gavin Schmidt, a climate scientist for NASA, told Scientific American he gets a lot of
hate mail and intimidating letters.
Journalists, myself included, also experience bullying on a regular basis.
It's not easy to put your face on YouTube, knowing that everything you say or do will
be commented on; usually negatively.
Again, females have it worse than males, as exposed by the current #GamerGate bullcrap.
But that's neither here nor there.
Cyberbullying is truly horrible to the people it affects, and it's becoming such a growing
problem a 13-year-old from Chicago entered a project in the Google Science Fair that
cut bullying comments by 93.43 percent -- her invention?
A piece of software that identifies a mean comment and simply asks if they're sure they
want to post it.
Almost everyone tested reconsidered.
Luckily there’s already software out there to protect you from cyberbullying and other
online dangers out there -
so a big thank you to Norton for protecting the vulnerable AND for sponsoring the show.
Have you ever been a victim of cyberbullying?
Bullies in general?
We're here for you, we're a community.