646095

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JIVXXX10.1177/0886260516646095Journal of Interpersonal ViolenceElçi and Seçkin

Article
Journal of Interpersonal Violence
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Cyberbullying © The Author(s) 2016
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DOI: 10.1177/0886260516646095
Consequences in Higher jiv.sagepub.com

Education

Alev Elçi1 and Zeliha Seçkin1

Abstract
Technology has many positive effects on education, but negative effects also
exist. One of the negative effects is cyberbullying spreading out of school
boundaries to the social networks. The increasing popularity of social
media among youngsters engenders cyberbullies who exploit the virtual
environment besides the usual emails. This distresses the students and
adversely affects their families, teachers, and others around them. Although
research studies mainly concentrate on prior education, there seems to be
a need to investigate the situation in higher education. This study focuses on
students studying technology and related disciplines, who are hence likely
to be well connected with cyberspace, and explores their awareness about
cyberbullying. The findings reveal that female students have significantly less
awareness than males. This study will help address some gender issues in
cyberbullying.

Keywords
cyberbullying, higher education, bullying, management information systems,
awareness

1Aksaray University, Turkey

Corresponding Author:
Alev Elçi, Faculty of Economics and Administrative Sciences, Department of Management
Information Systems, Aksaray University, Aksaray 68100, Turkey.
Email: [email protected]

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2 Journal of Interpersonal Violence 

Introduction
The use of technology has increased in every aspect of social life: changing
daily schedules, relationships, communication, work processes, and creating
new forms of networks and extending existing ones. Arıcak, Tanrıkulu,
Siyahhan, and Kınay (2013) denoted the situation as, “Despite these positive
changes, the advances in information and communication technologies also
introduced problems that are unique to information age” (p. 318). Among
other problems, extensive use of technology has engendered a new form of
bullying that disseminates the incidences. Consequently, bullying is now
referred as two different concepts: traditional bullying and cyberbullying
(Pieschl, Porsch, Kahl, & Klockenbusch, 2013). The diversity of cyberbully-
ing and traditional bullying is stated as exhibiting a difference in the intensity
and frequency of attacks, creating difficulty to identify suspects, challenging
to stop, and increasing number of victims from anywhere and anyplace
(Sabella, Patchin, & Hinduja, 2013). As a result of these, cyberbullying has
become “a significant concern of parents, educators and policy makers”
(Talwar, Gomez-Garibello, & Shariff, 2014, p. 122).
This study concentrates on cyberbullying awareness of students in a
developing university of a developing country and its relationship with gen-
der, age, and Internet usage. The adolescent group included in this study has
been seldom considered in the literature so this study will contribute to new
insights to the field.

Cyberbullying
Bullying has existed since time immemorial and manifested itself in physical,
verbal, and indirect actions as an aggressive behavior that causes harm, repeats
over time, and develops imbalanced power (Kowalski & Limber, 2007; Nansel
et al., 2001). The latest developments in technology have changed the prac-
tice, boundary, context, and time frame of bullying. This transformation not
only changed the nature of bullying but also renamed the term as electronic
bullying or cyberbullying. Smith et al. (2008) defined cyberbullying as “An
aggressive, intentional act carried out by a group or individual, using elec-
tronic forms of contact, repeatedly and over time against a victim who cannot
easily defend him or herself” (p. 376). Another definition by National Crime
Prevention Council (2016) is “Online bullying, called cyberbullying, happens
when teens use the Internet, cell phones, or other devices to send or post text
or images intended to hurt or embarrass another person” (para. 2) . According
to Ybarra, Boyd, Korchmaros, and Oppenheim (2012), cyberbullying is bully-
ing communicated through online environment. Marcum, Higgins, Freiburger,

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Elçi and Seçkin 3

and Ricketts (2014) professed cyberbullying as fairly new and “one of the
most recently recognized forms of cybercrime” (p. 539). Cyberbullying is
claimed to be at “widespread rates among youth and adults” around 75% in
school age (Kowalski, Giumetti, Schroeder, & Lattanner, 2014). Hinduja and
Patchin (2011) identified that youth and young adults are mainly targeted on
their sexual orientation or gender identity/expression. Wang, Iannotti, and Luk
(2012) tested the patterns of physical, verbal, exclusion, rumor, and cyberbul-
lying behavior in adolescents.
Ybarra and Mitchell (2007) investigated the effects of bullying and cyber-
bullying on the health of adolescents. It is determined that two main conse-
quences of this problem can be psychological and emotional (Hinduja &
Patchin, 2009). “Cyberbullying is a global public health challenge with the
potential to disrupt or destroy the lives of children, adolescents, and their
families” (D’Auria, 2014).

Technology and Cyberbullying

Technology even changed the parties involved in bullying. According to
Willard (2007),

A cyberbully may be a person whom the target knows or an online stranger. Or

the cyberbully may be anonymous, so it is not possible to tell. A cyberbully
may solicit involvement of other people who do not know the target—
cyberbullying by proxy. (p. 268)

Besides, cyberbullying can occur to anyone without differentiation in any

age, gender, ethnicity, academic performance, and socio-economic level
(Arıcak et al., 2008). As Dredge, Gleeson, and de la Piedad Garcia (2014)
summarized from related literature, cyberbullying victims are people with
low self-confidence, self-esteem, and somatic symptoms who exhibit emo-
tional reactions such as anger, sadness, embarrassment, frustration, annoy-
ance, fear, and terrorization. Marcum et al. (2014) investigated the relationship
between being a victim of and being an offender of cyberbullying and also
compare the experiences of female and male. They discover that there is no
difference in cyberbullying in Facebook between female and male who have
low self-control, and that those who are cyberbullied are most likely to
cyberbully.
Sabella et al. (2013) advocated that cyberbullying, augmented by the tech-
nology, can happen at “speed of thought” and can be crueler than traditional
bullying because it targets a larger audience by using a rich selection of
media. There can be more problematic aspects of cyberbullying compared

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4 Journal of Interpersonal Violence 

with traditional bullying. These dissimilarities are stated as cyberbullying can

occur at any time, and the content can be spread very quickly and to a mass
quantity of people so that the students can be more affected by “virtual real-
ity” (Kowalski & Limber, 2007).
The technology used in cyberbullying was first emails (the electronic
replacement of traditional mailing); now the use of Internet and Web 2.0 set-
tings is also involved. Some of these venues can be named as instant messag-
ing, chat rooms, websites, online games, social networking sites, and text
messaging (Kowalski & Limber, 2013). In addition, even some activities
such as online shopping, online research, and video sharing have the potential
of experiencing cyberbullying (Navarro & Jasinski, 2013). Technology used
in cyberbullying can make big differences by wide and instant dissemination
effect. A great number of supporters can gather in the bullying process in a
short time frame, besides that if the victim is not experienced in using, and
has limited access to, technology, then he or she is easy target and has diffi-
culty to escape (O’Brien & Moules, 2010). The students’ experience in com-
puter and Internet usage is a great concern where the results of Ybarra and
Mitchell’s (2004) study discovered that cyberbullies rate themselves as
Internet experts compared with those who do not cyberbully others.
Social Networks providing an innovative way of communication and col-
laboration are the latest networking opportunities for students to communi-
cate, share, and interact with each other. However, besides such constructive
capabilities, social networks can be used as a tool for harassment and abuse
of others (Lenhart et al., 2011). There can be different forms of cyberbullying
such as sending repeated messages, spreading unfavorable personal informa-
tion, and participating in insulting others (Marcum et al., 2014). In the past,
students were often bullied at school life. However, now, cyberbullying
affects their life as a whole, spreading from school boundaries to the social
networks, which became a continuation of real life. And this range does not
only cover friends and peers, it is spread all over the network, to friends of
friends.

Cyberbullying in Higher Education

Minor, Smith and Brashen (2013) emphasized that there are a large number
of research studies related to cyberbullying prior to higher education. Twenty-
first century use of virtual space increased the global efforts to “understand”
and “prevent” cyberbullying in higher education. By means of Williams and
Guerra (2007), Nansel quoted, “Such interest coincides with a growing
awareness of the detrimental consequences of being bullied on children’s

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Elçi and Seçkin 5

well-being as well as the recognition that bullying is a significant problem in

schools” (p. 14).
A study by Smith and Yoon (2013) conveyed that the university students
claimed a little percentage of cyberbullying in campus: Two percent said that
students bully other students, and 3% said that instructors bully students. On
the other side, Minor et al. (2013) investigated the existence of cyberbullying
to find out whether students bully their faculty members. The results revealed
that 33.8% of online instructors from various programs in School of
Management claimed to be cyberbullied by students and 4.4% were
hesitant.
Not only students but also other people around them in school are con-
cerned and affected by the consequences of cyberbullying. Their awareness
will benefit them to illuminate, define, analyze, and solve the problem. Minor
et al. (2013) recommended several approaches that could help mitigate the
problem of cyberbullying including training of students, faculty members,
and supervisors.

Gender Issues in Cyberbullying

A few gender-related studies claim that female students perceive cyberbully-
ing as a problem (Agatston, Kowalski, & Limber, 2007). Those who are the
targets of cyberbullying and those who witnessed also claim that one of the
top target topics is gender (Smith & Yoon, 2013). Navarro and Jasinski’s
(2013) study investigates the risk of cyberbullying between genders. Li
(2006) commented on the importance of determining the role gender plays in
cyberbullying. Also, the overall findings of Faucher, Jackson, and Cassidy
(2014) from Canadian universities determine gender similarities and differ-
ences that exist between male and female student respondents’ backgrounds.

Problem Statement
The students, who are studying the information systems–related disciplines
such as Management and Information Systems (MIS), are expected to be
more acquainted with the Internet and technology than others. One of the
authors determined that the incidence of cyberbullying has increased during
the use of social media for support of teaching and learning. Before the pos-
sibility of university students being engaged in cyberbullying as a bully or
victim, it is needed to identify the extend they are aware of cyberbullying.
This awareness may enable them to take their guards against this 21st-cen-
tury crime.

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6 Journal of Interpersonal Violence 

The consequences of cyberbullying in higher education can be considered

more significant and diverse than foregoing cyberbullying activities within
school boundaries. With the development of technology and social media
tools, cyberbullying is expanding independent of time and space. This expan-
sion also prohibits the control and prevention mechanisms of cyberbullying
by teachers, administrators, peers, and family. Especially in higher education,
this control is extremely challenging because the students are young adults
with limited supervision and protection of school and family. As a result, the
cyberbully victims are at more risk and some may be driven to severe conse-
quences such as suicide (Hinduja & Patchin, 2011).
The purpose of this research is to investigate the cyberbullying awareness
of university students with respect to gender, age, and Internet usage in higher
education.
The following research questions will be searched for:

Research Question 1: To what extend are the students aware of

cyberbullying?
Research Question 2: Is there a difference in cyberbullying awareness
based on gender, age, and Internet usage frequency?

Method
The primary aim of this research is to determine the cyberbullying awareness
of MIS students and its relations with the independent variables gender, age,
and Internet usage. Survey research method was used to collect data. An
instrument prepared by Yenilmez and Seferoğlu (2013) for measuring teach-
er’s awareness is adopted to explore students’ awareness. The data collected
were later analyzed by using SPSS 20.0 Statistical Package.

Participants
The target population was the students from department of MIS in a govern-
ment university in Turkey. Student samples are from this department for the
convenience of the authors. Also, the discipline they study is expected to
have more Internet and technological savvy students and may have intensive
possibility of facing cyberbullying type of crimes. The sampling consists of
174 participants from a target population of 189.
The number of participating female students (50.6%, n = 88) and male
students (49.4%, n = 86) was very close. According to the ages, 76.4% of the
participants were between 17 and 20 (n = 133), 23% were between 21 and 24
(n = 40), and only one student older than 25. The Internet usage frequency

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Elçi and Seçkin 7

was high in most of the students; 77% (n = 134) of the students used Internet
more than few hours a day. Only 19.5% (n = 34) used the Internet less than
few hours a day, and 2.9% (n = 5) used it less than few hours a week. Here,
“few hours” is considered as 2 to 3 hours. There was just one exceptional
student who declared that he or she uses the Internet only few hours a month.

Measures
The introduction of the instrument used in this research explained the aim of
the research and informed the students that they have the choice of not
responding all or part of it, if it is against their will, and that their responses
will not be used for other than research purposes. In the first section of the
survey instrument, there was the demographic information of the students
such as gender, age, and Internet usage frequency. Second part was a 12-item
cyberbullying awareness questionnaire. To identify the level of awareness, a
Likert-type 5-point scale was used with agree/disagree scale where 1 is indic-
ative of strongly disagree, 2 is disagree, 3 is neither agree nor disagree, 4 is
agree, and 5 is strongly agree.

Procedure
A pilot study was administered to randomly selected 20 students, to find out
the clarity and comprehension of the items, in case there were problems. The
feedback from these responses was used in finalizing the survey. At the
beginning of the survey, a paragraph was included to explain the aim and
significance of the study to the students. Also, the ethical issues and their
choice of not to participate were stated. Later, the students who were willing
to participate in the survey gathered in the classrooms to fill up the question-
naire. Collected data were entered into SPSS 20.0 and analyzed to find
answers to the research questions of the study.

Statistical Analysis
The analysis was done in two stages: First, the reliability of the instrument
was tested and then descriptive data analysis was done. An approximation of
the internal consistency reliability of the instrument was tested to determine
Cronbach’s alpha. For the whole instrument, Cronbach’s α = .773 (scale item:
12), which showed that the instrument was quite reliable. In the data analysis
procedures, mean was calculated as descriptive statistics. T test was used to
find differences of level of cyberbullying awareness with respect to gender,
age, and Internet usage frequency.

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8 Journal of Interpersonal Violence 

Results
Although technology facilitated fast communication, bulk data sharing,
and ease of accessing information, it created a vulnerable environment.
This is despite technological developments taking into account “problems
associated with use.” In this context, diffusiveness of this situation
increased the number of related studies. Our study, exploring the intersec-
tion of higher education and the awareness and engagement in cyberbully-
ing, is one of them taking into consideration MIS students with the
following findings.
The results showed that the item lowest mean value was for Item 02 (M =
2.16). This showed that students disagree with the fact that “Cyberbullying
is done by only adults” declaring there was no age limit for cyberbullying.
The reason for this may be the students think that social media and Internet,
which are used by all the segments of the society without age limit, can be
the environment for cyberbullying. The highest mean value was for Item 09
(M = 4.19), confirming their agreement with the statement “Cyberbullies
share private information, images and photos of people that they want to
harm.” Students have selected this important fact, meaning they have the
awareness that people can harm each other and abuse privacy using technol-
ogy. Total mean value was (M = 3.64), and all other mean items are dis-
played in Table 1.
T test was done to find the difference in Items 01 through 12 based on
demographics. The results show that there was no statistically significant dif-
ference between awareness for 12 items and independent variables based on
age and Internet frequency. There was statistically significant difference
between Items 01, 03, and 05 only based on gender. Table 2 shows the details
of all items. This result confirms the importance of gender differences, which
is also emphasized in related research mentioned above (Arıcak et al., 2008).
As seen in Table 2, significance of Item 01 was .002 < .05. This item was
the definition of cyberbullying stating that “Students are deliberately exposed
to repeated and intentional malicious behavior that cause harm to others, by
the use of information and communication technologies in the virtual envi-
ronments.” Male students are more aware of this description of cyberbullying
than females. This result may be confirming the remark, “males appeared to
be more at risk of cyber perpetration” by MacDonald and Roberts-Pittman
(2010). Agatston et al.’s (2007) study shows that the majority of female stu-
dents indicated that cyberbullying was a problem.
Next, in Item 03, there was statistically significant difference between
male and female students (.001 < .05). Here, male students were more aware
than females that “Cyberbullies are more likely to be men than women.”

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Elçi and Seçkin 9

Table 1. Descriptive Statistics for Cyberbullying Awareness (N = 174).

Item Description M
01 Students are deliberately exposed to repeated and 3.55
intentional malicious behavior that cause harm to others,
by the use of information and communication technologies
in the virtual environments.
02 Cyberbullying is done by only adults. 2.16*
03 Cyberbullies are more likely to be men than women. 3.49
04 Children have low possibility to be exposed to cyberbullying 2.30
behavior.
05 Cyberbullies seize personal computers, email address, or 4.01
private information.
06 Cyberbully deliberately sends infected email messages to 3.89
others.
07 Cyberbully uses threatening behavior via communication 4.01
media over the Internet (chat rooms, instant messaging,
email, etc.) or telephone.
08 Cyberbully would damage the reputation of others by 3.93
distributing gossip and rumors.
09 Cyberbullies share the private information, images, and 4.19**
photos of the people that they want to hurt.
10 Cyberbullies use the private information, images, and 4.13
photos of the people that they want to harm for
blackmailing.
11 Cyberbullies seize the password of a person’s account and 4.17
damage the account owner’s relations with others.
12 Cyberbullies gather with other users in virtual environment 3.82
to force a person to be excluded from the group or leave
the environment.
Total 3.64

*The lowest mean value.

**The highest mean value.

The last item that is significantly different between male and female students
was Item 05 (.005 < .05) which is, “Cyberbullies seize personal computers, email
address, or private information.” Similar to the previous two items, male students
were more aware than the female students about the information security seizing
activities by cyberbullies. The differences of male and female students’ aware-
ness of cyberbullying activities are not very surprising since that is in line with
what Turan, Polat, Karapırlı, Uysal, and Turan’s (2011) claims of the number of
male cyberbully and more often females being cyberbullying victims.

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10 Journal of Interpersonal Violence 

Table 2. Relationship Between Cyberbullying Awareness and Gender.

Significance
n M t Value (Two-Tailed)
Item 01
Female 88 3.28
Male 86 3.83
3.199 .002
Item 03
Female 88 3.07
Male 86 3.93
4.562 .001
Item 05
Female 88
Male 86
2.830 .005

Discussion
The main purpose of this study was to provide insight to cyberbullying while
determining to what level the technology-savvy higher education students are
aware of it. Differences between demographics such as age, gender, and
Internet usage were investigated. Results clarified that students are aware of
cyberbullying. Li’s (2006) results showed that little more than half of the
students were aware of cyberbullying issues, and males were more likely to
be cyberbullies than their female peers. Molluzzo and Lawler’s (2011) study
supported these findings. They found out, however, college students were
totally aware of cyberbullying and incidents, yet insignificant number of stu-
dents claimed it as a serious issue. And most of the cyberbullying is of harass-
ing messages posted on a social networking site. Precisely in some issues of
our research results, male students were identified to be more aware than
female students. These were the settings of cyberbullying, interference of
security, and gender issues.
Cyberbullying can create unhappiness, anxiety, distress, and difficulty to
focus on academic work referred to as “psychosocial and academic effects of
cyberbullying” by Mishna, Saini, and Solomon (2009). According to these
findings, students, administrators, teachers and supervisors, and families
should play an important role to improve students’ cyberbullying awareness
and determine the strategy to react in such cases. Cyberbullying attacks not
only cause fear and anger but also humiliate students. These kinds of actions
are attacks to a person’s individual health, self-perception, and education

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Elçi and Seçkin 11

rights. It may even prohibit creating an inclusive educational environment

that values and respects diversity and equity.
To avoid such negative traits, cyberbullying can be mitigated by taking the
following steps. The university has to be sensitive in these issues and prepare
policy for handling cyberbullying. Minor et al. (2013) suggested that the fac-
ulty members and supervisors need to be trained about cyberbullying behav-
ior and how to control it. The students also need to be trained about
cyberbullying behavior and how to mitigate it. As a result, developing cyber-
bullying awareness will be a means to moderate consequences in higher
education.
The following studies in this area confirm that men are more involved in
cyberbullying activities. Dilmaç (2009) stated that males reported more
cyberbullying behavior than females. A similar result was reached by
Kowalski and Limber (2007). Also, Navarro and Jasinski’s (2013) study
showed that females are at greater risk as target of cyberbullying compared
with males. In opposition, study of Ybarra and Mitchell (2004) mentioned
that males and females equally reported individual cyberbullying. From this
point on, studies show that both female and male students are showing simi-
lar cyberbullying behavior. Although in the last few years, studies show that
more females reported as victims than males (Zalaquett & Chatters, 2014).
Patchin and Hinduja (2011) argued that within adolescents, 24% reported
being victim and 16% being cyberbully. Those who have been victims most
likely become offenders (Marcum et al., 2014). This also may show that stu-
dents are aware of both roles of cyberbullying.
The findings of this study also support the situation of females of a devel-
oping country. It is important to emphasize the consciousness raising particu-
larly in female students not to be victims. Favela (2010) discussed that
“female violence is a real and tangible concern that must be addressed” by
suggesting the prevention strategies. Furthermore, the study will contribute
to the literature for higher education students’ awareness of cyberbullying to
protect not only the students but even the teachers and administrators from
this 21st-century crime.
The university from where participant students were drawn is located in a
conservative community small town in central Anatolia. As a consequence,
lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgendered, questioning, and allied (LGBTQA)
nuances are not pronounced nor admitted by individuals let alone be visible.
So it may not be usually subject of cyberbullying. As a limitation, this study
refers to sex identity as female and male in terms of gender. The number of
students surveyed in this research may be considered a limitation; however,
they suitably represent students attending MIS departments in government
universities. The study may be eventually applied to a larger group of students

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12 Journal of Interpersonal Violence 

from different universities, but this is not likely to produce drastically different
results for all universities in Turkey that receive students through a centrally
managed competitive entrance exam. Instead, future study may concentrate on
variety and instances of cyberbullying in higher education aiming to evolve an
inventory for the benefit of future researchers.

Declaration of Conflicting Interests

The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research,
authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Funding
The author(s) received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publi-
cation of this article.

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Author Biographies
Alev Elçi, PhD, works as an assistant professor in Aksaray University, Management
and Information Systems department. She was a visiting researcher in Roger Williams
University with a 6 months grant of Scientific and Technological Research Council of

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Elçi and Seçkin 15

Turkey (TÜBİTAK). Her main research areas are faculty development, technology-
enhanced learning, educational technology, social networks, learning communities,
animation- and game-based learning, internationalization, and narrative approaches.
She has co-authored a book titled, Faculty Beliefs and Needs: Opening the Gate to
ICT-Based Professional Development in Teaching and Learning. She is currently
teaching database management, project management, knowledge economy and
society.
Zeliha Seçkin, PhD, was an undergraduate at the public administration department of
Selçuk University in 1998 and graduated from Niğde University Institute of Social
Sciences in 2002. She got her doctoral degree in 2009 from Niğde University Institute
of Social Sciences. She is currently a faculty member and an associate professor in
Management Information Systems department. Her work areas are mobbing, organi-
zational behavior, organizational citizenship, and organizational commitment, tech-
nology and innovation.

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