Social media plays a major role in the lives of young generations, but beyond ‘likes’ and smiling emojis, there’s a serious downside to digital communications: cyberbullying.
Reportlinker conducted a survey on the issue, targeting Millennials and Gen Z aged 13 to 24, to answer several questions:
- Are young generations aware of the danger of cyberbullying?
- Have they been victims of cyberbullying (threats, racist, sexist attacks, revenge porn etc)?
- How do they react?
- Do young women feel more at risk?
Key results show that:
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Instagram and Snapchat are the most popular social sites, garnering 71% and 66% of mentions respectively. Despite being the largest social network, Facebook was mentioned just 54% of the time and Twitter 42%.
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When listing the platforms where the cyberbullying occurs, the top 5 include text messages (24%), closely followed by Facebook (23%), Instagram (21%), Twitter (21%) and Snapchat (10%)
Threats:
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71% of young generations say they are concerned about cyberbullying.
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There is a clear gender split when it comes to feeling threatened with 45% of young women being very concerned compared to 38% of young men saying they are not concerned at all
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Young people are more aware of the dangers of posting too much personal information as 68% said they share less information about themselves on social media than before.
How many victims?
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38% of people have already been victims of cyberbullying
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Young women are more likely to be targeted with embarrassing unwanted contact and threatening messages mentioned 61% of the time.
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Racist (35%) and sexist (34%) attacks were also mentioned followed by non-consensual image sharing or revenge porn (23%).
Asking for help:
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Although 15% of respondents would keep the issue a secret, 38% would tell their parents and 27% would tell their friends.
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By contrast, respondents are less likely to go to the police or inform a teacher about the issue.
To see all the survey results click here.
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