The phenomenon of bullying and, more recently, cyberbullying, continue to be of interest to scholars, practitioners and policy makers. To date, the vast majority of research into bullying and cyberbullying has been contained to compulsory education contexts, leaving a dearth of literature in post-compulsory education. This thesis explores cyberbullying in the context of post-16 education in England, considering, in particular, four research questions relating to prevalence, involvement of particular groups, reasons for cyberbullying, and consequences on feelings, learning, and social integration. Previous research on cyberbullying is considered, including a discussion of the definition and criteria of both bullying and cyberbullying. The main contributions to knowledge are the age group and context of this research, the use of phenomenology as a philosophical framework in the research design, data collection, and analysis, and how attribution theory is related to the reasons given for cyberbullying others and being cyberbullied. A mixed methods survey methodology was used to collect data; an online questionnaire was used to collect data from 5,690 students from 41 colleges, and semi-structured interviews were used to collect in-depth data from six victims of cyberbullying. In terms of prevalence, 7.9% of those aged 16–19 years old who study in colleges in England reported being victims of cyberbullying and 1.9% admitted to cyberbullying others. The findings also show certain demographic groups statistically more likely to be disproportionately involved as cyberbullies, such as boys and those who were offline victims at school, and as cybervictims, such as girls and those who had a physical disability. A range of reasons were reported for cyberbullying others, in particular the victim’s intelligence/ability and because of feelings of anger, and for being cyberbullied, in particular because of their physical appearance and friendship groups. Various consequences for being a cybervictim were revealed, in particular on they way they felt and on their mental health/wellbeing.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:bl.uk/oai:ethos.bl.uk:682969 |
| Date | January 2015 |
| Creators | West, Dean |
| Publisher | University of Warwick |
| Source Sets | Ethos UK |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Electronic Thesis or Dissertation |
| Source | http://wrap.warwick.ac.uk/77918/ |
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