Planet Gadgets Gadget Blog

Teens Being Bullied Online

by Darren

If you're new here, you may want to subscribe to our RSS feed. Thanks for visiting Planet Gadgets!

The fine art of bullying has been brought online. In fact, electronic communications tools such as email and text messaging, are giving bullies even more power to harass and terrify their victims. The trend has disturbing overtones, according to many.

Internet bullying has emerged as a new and growing form of social cruelty,” Kirk Williams and Nancy Guerra of the University of California at Riverside wrote in one of a series of reports published in the Journal of Adolescent Health.

The reports, from researchers organized by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, show a 50 percent increase in the number of kids aged 10 to 17 who said they were harassed online — from 6 percent in 2000 to 9 percent in 2005.

“Youth harassed online were significantly more likely to also report two or more detentions or suspensions, and skipping school in the previous year,” Michele Ybarra and colleagues at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore reported in another study in the journal.

The internet can be a scary place for teens and adults alike. This issue will receive much more attention in the next few years as awareness of the problem expands.

If you enjoyed this post, subscribe to the Planet Gadgets RSS feed!. You should also visit the Gadgets Forum. We update everyday about the latest gadgets and the newest technology.