‘I was bullied too’: stories of bullying and coping in an online community

Abstract

The American Academy of Pediatrics has identified bullying as a serious health risk for adolescents. In today's age of social media and smartphones, this health risk has taken on new forms and extended its reach. Strategies to reduce the prevalence of and negative consequences associated with both traditional bullying and cyberbullying require knowledge of victims' lived experiences as well as the coping strategies they employ – both effectively and ineffectively – to respond to their tormentors. This article presents findings from an in-depth content analysis of the entire set of 1094 comments from a viral blog post about cyberbullying in which people shared their personal stories of bullying and coping. These stories included a mix of both traditional and online forms of victimization, as well as more general reflections about the distinct qualities of networked publics that serve to magnify, spread, and exacerbate the effects of bullying. The findings suggest that victims of both traditional bullying and cyberbullying are often targeted because they do not conform in one way or another to mainstream norms and values. Victims employed similar coping strategies to respond to their online and offline tormentors. Common behavioral strategies included seeking social support, ignoring/blocking, and finding a creative or expressive outlet. The two most commonly cited cognitive strategies were self-talk and taking the bully's perspective. Not all strategies were judged to be effective. The findings have relevance to researchers seeking to understand bullying from the perspective of victims and to practitioners seeking to develop effective interventions to support bullying victims.

Keywords:

• cyberbullying
• bullying
• victimization
• coping strategies
• internet

Acknowledgements

The authors would like to thank the peer reviewers and journal editor for their feedback on earlier versions of this paper.

Notes on contributors

Katie Davis is an Assistant Professor in the Information School at the University of Washington, where she studies the role of digital media technologies in adolescents' academic, social, and moral lives. Davis is the co-author with Howard Gardner of The App Generation: How Today's Youth Navigate Identity, Intimacy, and Imagination in a Digital World (2013, Yale University Press). [email: [email protected]]

David Randall is a Ph.D. student in the Information School at the University of Washington. His research interests are on the impact of offline meetups on groups that have formed complete or predominately online, with particular focus on productivity and interpersonal relationships. [email: [email protected]]

Anthony Ambrose is a Master's student in the Information School at the University of Washington. His focus of interest centers on the comparative examination of norms and behaviors in online environments when compared to offline social interactions, specifically addressing how factors of cultural inheritance and physical/geographical boundaries affect behaviors and expectations. [email: [email protected]]

Mania Orand is a Ph.D. student in the field of Human Computer Interaction at the University of Washington's Engineering School. Her research interests are on designing web and mobile technologies, user experience, and digital media. [email: [email protected]]