Two out of every five Canadian students have been bullied online in the last four weeks, a new study suggests.
Media Matters and Telus WISE (a national online safety campaign run by Telus) released a study Monday on how young Canadians experienced electronic bullying.
The study coincided with the start of National Bullying Awareness Week. Schools across Alberta took part in many anti-bullying activities as part of it, such as wearing pink shirts for Pink Shirt day or posting positive messages on Post-it notes.
The Post-its might seem silly, said école Secondaire Sainte Marguerite d'Youville student Aly Boilard, but they could help brighten someone's horrible day.
"If we can make one day better, then that's a lot of difference."
The survey of 800 Canadian students found that 42 per cent had been bullied online in the last four weeks, said Shelly Smith, director of the Telus WISE online safety program. About 60 per cent had witnessed cyber-bullying in that same period.
While the survey found that about 71 per cent had intervened at least once to stop online bullying in the last four weeks, it also identified several barriers to intervention. About 67 per cent didn't intervene because they thought it would make them a target, while 43 per cent believed talking to parents or teachers would not solve anything.
"That's a huge wake-up call for us as adults," Smith said.
New face of bullying
ESSMY vice-principal Cindy Pereira said bullying has changed significantly since she started teaching 13 years ago. Although face-to-face harassment still occurs, much of it now happens online through games and social media.
"It's a whole other ball of wax from when we were kids," she said, and it's forcing kids to grow up fast.
ESSMY student Amelie Schoenberger said she'd witnessed plenty of online bullying. The fact that it's not face-to-face means you can't see the impact your actions have on others, which may lessen the guilt you feel from doing it.
"You can lie as much as you want on the Internet."
Online bullying is tougher for schools to manage since it often happens off school grounds, Pereira said. Teachers often don't find out about it until it's escalated considerably.
Most online bullying is between peers through social media, which kids check at all hours to see if they're still popular, Smith said.
"That's huge pressure on kids."
And many parents say they don't understand the technology enough to help their kids, Smith added.
Standing up to bullies
The study found that parents needed to be more active in empowering youth to address bullying and to increase their motivation to intervene.
Parents need to listen to their kids and be advocates for them when it comes to bullying, Smith said.
If the technology gap is a problem, parents should close it by having their kids teach them about things such as Snapchat and Instagram, Smith said. As parents learn about the Internet, they can teach their kids safety tips such as keeping records of chats and emails.
Parents should also set rules on how their kids can use smartphones, Schoenberger said. Her mother had her agree to run all videos and pictures she planned to post to Youtube and Instagram past her before she let her use those services, for example.
"If you're texting someone, your parents should know who you're texting."
The study also found that students were significantly more likely to intervene to stop bullying if they believed it to be morally wrong.
Students have to know that their actions online have real consequences, and that bullying affects not only just the victim, but everyone around the victim, Pereira said.
"We always try to put it back on them: would you want that to happen to you?"
The study can be found at mediasmarts.ca.
