Individual Stress, Contextual Stress, and Network Attributes on Cyberbullying Perpetration Among Young Adults During the COVID-19 Lockdown

ABSTRACT

General Strain Theory (GST) was applied to understand the emergence of cyberbullying during the COVID-19 lockdown. However, how contextual stress and network attributes contributed to cyberbullying perpetration has yet to be explored. Thus, to fill this gap in the literature, this study surveyed 494 young adults from one college of a university in China during the COVID-19 lockdown. The contextual stress was measured by the average stress reported by each individual’s self-nominated peer. Logit regression with interactive terms was conducted to investigate whether network attributes moderate the stress-cyberbullying nexus. The results revealed that cyberbullying perpetration was directly triggered by individual stress rather than contextual stress. Further, young adults with increased individual stress had a higher probability of cyberbullying perpetration, if their betweenness was high. Notably, for those with elevated betweenness, the association between contextual stress and cyberbullying perpetration was attenuated. Our findings provide novel insights into understanding cyberbullying phenomenon during the pandemic. Roles of individual stress and contextual stress on trigging cyberbully perpetration varied with one’s network position. Both the network analysis and the GST theory had significant potential to be applied in further cyberbullying studies.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Supplementary data

Supplemental data for this article can be accessed online at https://doi.org/10.1080/01639625.2023.2271117

Additional information

Funding

This study was supported by the Project of Social Science Foundation of Jiangsu Province (Grant No. 21XWC010) and Jiangsu University Philosophy and Social Science Foundation Project (Grant No. 2020SJA0008)

Notes on contributors

Zhihao Ma

Zhihao Ma is an Assistant Professor at Computational Communication Collaboratory, School of Journalism and Communication, Nanjing University. His research interests include new media and health communication, psychological network methodology, and psychometrics.

Tzu-Hsuan Liu

Tzu-Hsuan Liu is an Associate Professor at the School of Political Science and Public Administration, Huaqiao University. Her research interests include Criminology, criminal justice, and mental health.

Yiwei Xia

Yiwei Xia is an Associate Professor at the School of Law, Southwestern University of Finance and Economics. His research interests include quantitative methods, criminology, criminal justice, and social demography.