Cyberbullying: Why Children do not tell?

Abstract

Cyberbullying dialogue within the academia, policy makers and socially concern citizens have been ongoing for decades. Researches and discussions have been done to understand the cyberbullying phenomena itself – the definition, types and prevalence; the effects of cyberbullying – socially, psychologically and at times physically when the cyberbullying is brought to the real physical world; its contributing factors to cyberbullying – the hours spent on social media, role of schools, socioeconomic status, personality, bully-victim role, coping styles, among others. Though there are some that studied family as a contributing or mediating variable, there are still gaps in regards to the role of family in cyberbullying. Previous researchers have argued that children who are victims of cyberbullying often do not share such experiences with adults namely their teachers, counsellors and parents. Hence this paper aims to provide the frame to answer the question of why children generally do not speak up on their experiences even with their family members. The discussion is based on PusPA Model that looks at the push and pull factors of speaking up at micro and meso level analysis. Findings of this research are divided into two parts; agency and social institution. As for the agency level, the push factors include the feeling they deserve to be bullied and the act is harmless. As for the pull factor, the children choose to tell people when they think the act would affect them negatively and for some, it is part of their personality to open up. For the social institution, the push factors are fear of cyberbully consequences, afraid of being blamed by family members and do not want to reveal their secrets. As for pull factors, the children choose to tell as the family members are non- judgmental and supportive.