Research Article

Who Are the Victims of Cyberbullying? Preliminary Data Towards Validation of "Cyberbullying Victim Questionnaire”

Mirian Agus 1 , Maria Lidia Mascia 1 * , Maria Assunta Zanetti 2 , Simona Perrone 3 , Dolores Rollo 4 , Maria Pietronilla Penna 1
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1 Department of Pedagogy, Psychology, Philosophy, Faculty of Humanistic Studies, University of Cagliari, Italy2 Department of Brain and Behavioural Sciences, University of Pavia, Italy3 Istituto Comprensivo “Renato Moro”, Taranto, Italy4 Department of Medicine and Surgery, University of Parma, Italy* Corresponding Author
Contemporary Educational Technology, 13(3), July 2021, ep310, https://doi.org/10.30935/cedtech/10888
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ABSTRACT

In the literature there are more and more works dealing with cyberbullying and adolescents’ perception of this phenomenon. In particular, we are interested in cyberbullying and the effects of cyberbullying on adolescent life. What is more, in 2020 the impact of COVID-19 has increased the digital presence of cyberbullying behaviours. This phenomenon is extremely complex, since it is multicomponential and multifactorial, and many components act on it. Starting with an analysis of the literature, this work offers preliminary data towards the validation of a self-reporting questionnaire; it was administered to 650 adolescents, to evaluate their perceptions of the victims of cyberbullying. The questionnaire consisted of 33 items; Principal Component Analysis was applied, which identified the dimensions resuming the items’ variability. The findings confirmed the multidimensional nature of the issue covered by the questionnaire and highlighted three psychological dimensions: Internalisation, Counterbalance and Marginalisation. The results support the structure of the questionnaire, useful to quickly collect information about adolescents’ perception of cybervictimisation. The assessment of this information might help teachers, educators, and tutors to formulate targeted interventions to combat the spread of cyberbullying aimed for example at improving emotional intelligence, starting from the construction of emotional contagion.
Keywords: cyberbullying, adolescent representations, cybervictims, assessment

CITATION (APA)

Agus, M., Mascia, M. L., Zanetti, M. A., Perrone, S., Rollo, D., & Penna, M. P. (2021). Who Are the Victims of Cyberbullying? Preliminary Data Towards Validation of "Cyberbullying Victim Questionnaire”. Contemporary Educational Technology, 13(3), ep310. https://doi.org/10.30935/cedtech/10888

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