A Qualitative Exploration of College Students’ Perceptions of Cyberbullying

This study facilitates understanding of college students’ current and previous experiences with cyberbullying and negative social media experiences using an exploratory, qualitative design. Participants were 16 undergraduate freshman or sophomores (9 women, 7 men) at a medium-sized, United States university. A 13 question, semi-structured interview probed participants’ past and present experiences with cyberbullying. Iterative, thematic analysis was used to analyze data. Codes were clustered together based on similarity, then grouped into hierarchical themes. First, participants considered cyberbullying to be a grey area, and their definitions of cyberbullying varied considerably. Almost all participants indicated that they experienced and witnessed the most cyberbullying during adolescence. Third, participants mentioned screens and fake personas as mechanisms through which aggressors could distance themselves from victims, empowering individuals to disengage from the harm they were causing. Last, participants described a lack of education and knowledge about cyberbullying resources. Results have policy implications including the need to educate young people about cyberbullying, and, importantly, how to report cyberbully attacks.