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Researching Teaching and Learning.

By Doreen Rifaie.

Bullying is a multidimensional issue that negatively affects both the victim

and the perpetrators. There are many forms of bullying; the most common is physical,
which is referred to as traditional bullying. There is a great deal of research conducted
on traditional bullying and its implications for teaching practices. However, there are
other forms of bullying that have not been studied to such extent. One such form of
bullying that is overlooked is Cyber-Bullying. Cyber-Bullying is a rising issue for
educators but there is little research on this issue. Sakellariou, Carroll and Houghton
article Rates of Cyber Victimization and Bullying Among Male Australian Primary
and High School Students (2012) aims to bring awareness to educators. They argue
that due to advancements in technology Cyber-bullying will increase. In comparison,
Hemphill, Tollit, Kotevski and Heerdes article Predictors of Traditional and Cyberbullying Victimization: A Longitudinal Study of Australians Secondary School
Students" (2014) compares traditional bullying to Cyber-bullying. This article looks at
negative impact of bullying: psychological, emotional and social health of victims. In
addition, both articles underlining objective is to provide more research on Cyberbullying for educators so that there can be reformation of existing practices and
policies on preventing Cyber-bullying.

The article Rates of Cyber Victimization and Bullying Among Male

Australian Primary and High School Students by Sakellariou, Carroll and Houghton
(2012) researched different forms of Cyber-bullying. The Article looks at the rates of
each media, they also attempted to see which male age group is most effected by

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Cyber-bullying and why. The research is Australian based and the authors focused on
Brisbane and Sydney schools in the article. The schools were picked from city areas
with larger populations for a fair representation of the different socio-economic
backgrounds. The reasoning being choosing Brisbane and Sydney schools was to
obtain research that included diversity. The authors literature research included
international Cyber-bullying research articles, they had also deconstructed the
definition of Cyber-bullying in order to present a cohesive classification to the
participants. Furthermore, the author is aware that this research has limitations,
especially in the selection of test subjects. And they concluded that this research offers
clear evidence of Cyber-bullying in school aged male students.
The comparison article Predictors of Traditional and Cyber-bullying
Victimization: A Longitudinal Study of Australians Secondary School Students" by
Hemphill, Tollit, Kotevski and Heerde (2014) aims to research the predictors of
Cyber-bullying through a longitudinal study. The article looks at both traditional
bullying and cyber-bullying. The author aims to identify predictors of Cyber
perpetrators, this is so that prevention policies can be created. This article is also
Australian based and is focused on schools in Victoria. The authors had collected data
from the International Youth Development Study (IYDS); this organisation collects
data from Victorian, Australia and Washington, U.S. The data collected from IYDS
starts in grade 5, they had obtained more data from the same group of students when
they were in grade 7 (2004) and grade 9 (2006). The author used the student data that
was taken from schools in Victoria, Australia for grades 5, 7 and 9. The participants
were of both genders. The authors literature review includes both international and
Australian based research; they had included research on traditional bullying. The
article offered their audience an overview of the predictors of a traditional perpetrator

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and the negative effects that this bulling has on both the victim and perpetrator. In
addition, the researcher had linked common traits of Cyber-bullying and traditional
bullying perpetrators and had also highlighted key differences between they forms of
bullying. The author highlights the implication for teaching practice and policy.
Moreover, the author is aware that the research has several limitations, one limitation
mentioned is the collection of data, specifically in the collection of cybervictimization data, it was noted that they had data for 2006, as this was when it was
first measured. The article concluded that the use of evidence based prevention
policies and practices in schools teach students to control their emotions to reduce
traditional and cyber-bullying experiences.

Sakellariou, Carroll and Houghtons article Rates of Cyber Victimization and

Bullying Among Male Australian Primary and High School Students (2012) had
used various literatures from both international and national research. In the literature
review the authors had stated that this is and international issue. They back this
statement up by presenting cyber-bullying research from 14 different studies,
including: UK, USA, Australian and Canada. In addition to this, there had been large
gap in Sakellariou, Carroll and Houghtons research (2012), their research was
inconsistent they had research that provided them with different rates. Some research
showed that cyber-bullying for both genders was fewer than 15% while other studies
stated that it was as high as 42% (Sakellariou, Carroll and Houghton, 2012). Another
limitation to Sakellariou, Carroll and Houghtons literature research was that they did
not focused on male statistics exclusively, they had incorporated both gender research,
this has effected the article over all as it had shoed they did not focus specifically on
their chosen gender, it becomes apparent latter in the article when the authors has

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stated that by selecting a single gender had been a limitation (Sakellariou, Carroll and
Houghton, 2012) However, the authors support their research idea with Popoviitis research. This author is cited constantly within Sakellariou, Carrol and
Houghtons (2012) article to reinforce their research. They state that due to increasing
access to technology there will be and increase in cyber-bullying. Popovi-itis
research had argued that due to the rise in technology there is an increased
opportunity for traditional bullying to transfer into cyber-space (2011). Also, Popoviitis (2011) had compared traditional bullying to cyber-bullying, similarly to
Hemphill, Tollit, Kotevski and Heerde article Predictors of Traditional and Cyberbullying Victimization: A Longitudinal Study of Australians Secondary School
Students" (2014). In comparison, Hemphill, Tollit, Kotevski and Heerde (2014)
include international research in their studies but they focus on two Australian studies.
The authors include the work Australian National Study (ANS) to understand the rate
of cyber bullying in both male and female students between ages 8-14 years old
(Hemphill, Tollit, Kotevski and Heerde, 2014; Chadwick, 2014). This research was
supportive of the authors own research as it had provided important statistical
evidence that related to their own research participants.

There are key similarities in methodology between Sakellariou, Carroll and

Houghton article and Hemphill, Tollit, Kotevski and Heerde article (2014; 2012). The
first similarity between these articles is the their method of obtaining research data,
both research articles are based on surveys, and they had also contacted schools and
research organiastions to acquire permission for their research (Sakellariou, Carroll
and Houghton, 2014; Hemphill, Tollit, Kotevski and Heerde, 2012). Another
similarities in both articles methodology is age range of students that are surveyed,

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Sakellariou, Carroll and Houghton (2014) had surveyed aged 13, grade 7, students
during one of the three surveys. In Sakellariou, Carroll and Houghton (2012) research
they had a mean age of 13.8 for their participants. However, their participants were
different and the method of selection had also differed. They had selected their male
participants based on the stratified random sampling (Sakellariou, Carroll and
Houghton, 2012; Ullman, 2015). The participants were selected from two states;
students were selected from middle class in city locations from both secondary and
primary schools, also they all were male (Sakellariou, Carroll and Houghton, 2012).
In comparison, Hemphill, Tollit, Kotevski and Heerde had implemented the method of
longitudinal sampling, cohort study; they had followed the same group of students,
from grade 5 to 9 (2014, Ullman, 2015; Hale, 2013). Both had used a point scale
system and measured the result by using the Cronbachs Alpha (Ullman, 2015).
However, Hemphill, Tollit, Kotevski and Heerde (2014) had implemented additional
measures of their data, they implemented a dichotomous measure to measure cyberbullying and traditional bullying separately (Hagger-Johnson, 2014).

The results obtained by Sakellariou, Carroll and Houghton in their research

articleRates of Cyber Victimization and Bullying Among Male Australian Primary
and High School Students, (2012) had shown that the age group most susceptible to
cyber-bullying was, 9.2% of junior secondary participants, 3.1% of Primary students
and 6.9% of high School students (Sakellariou, Carroll and Houghton, 2012). The
results also had presented the rates of which technological media was most frequently
used to victimize students (Sakellariou, Carroll and Houghton, 2012). The most used
form of technology media used for Cyber-bullying was SMS text messages, Table 1
details the results obtained from the article (Sakellariou, Carroll and Houghton, 2012).

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The results that Hemphill, Tollit, Kotevski and Heerde had obtained in their
article Predictors of Traditional and Cyber-bullying Victimization: A Longitudinal
Study of Australians Secondary School Students (2014) presented detailed the
differences between cyber-bullying and traditional bullying. The study showed that
only 33% of students had never been cyber-bullied, and of the 33% it had been found
that 12% had also experience traditional bullying (Hemphill, Tollit, Kotevski and
Heerde, 2014). The results also showed that female participants had experienced
more cyber-bullying than the male participants of the study, in addition, the result had
displayed gender no difference between traditional bullying (Hemphill, Tollit,
Kotevski and Heerde, 2014).

Both research had limitations; Sakellariou, Carroll and Houghton work had an
excellent method of data collection, and the aim of measuring each technological
media was also very well thought out (2012). However, there had been a number of
drawbacks to this research article, firstly the articles aim of providing evidence that
this is an increasing issue was not present, the research was only performed once, it

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would have make more of an impact if it had bee conducted as a longitudinal
research. This would have clearly denied the authors earlier argument that cyberbullying was increasing with the advancements of technology (Sakellariou, Carroll
and Houghton, 2012; Popovi-iti, et al., 2011). Another limitation was that the
article only focused on males, this contradicted the literature research that had
included both genders, the authors have also acknowledged this limitation,
(Sakellariou, Carroll and Houghton, 2012). In comparison, Hemphill, Tollit, Kotevski
and Heerdes article was more focused during the literature research; it had offered
clear and concise definitions and comparisons of traditional bullying (2014).
However, the results were lacking, there had been a comparison of traditional and
cyber-bullying but this comparison did not occur until grade 9 (Hemphill, Tollit,
Kotevski and Heerde, 2014). In addition, the IYDS had experienced a lack of funding
this had caused a gap within the results, there was not enough funding to obtain
results from grade 8 in 2005, the authors has recognised this limitation (Hemphill,
Tollit, Kotevski and Heerde, 2014).

Sakellariou, Carroll and Houghton article (2012) and

Hemphill, Tollit, Kotevski and Heerdes article (2014) outline various teaching
implications. Both articles had highlighted that educators and school psychologists
need to have a comprehensive understanding of what cyber-bullying is and how to
identify perpetrators (Sakellariou, Carroll and Houghton, 2012; Hemphill, Tollit,
Kotevski and Heerde, 2014). This knowledge must be obtained in order to implement
practices and policies to protect students from subsuming to cyber-bullying. One
example is the reformation of a school policy, the usage of mobile phones during
classrooms. In order to prevent cyber-bullying implementation of stricter rules on

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mobile phone usage need to be enforced, Sakellariou, Carroll and Houghton reported
that almost 33% of students did not adhere to this rule (2012).

In conclusion, the research provided by Sakellariou, Carroll and Houghton

article Rates of Cyber Victimization and Bullying Among Male Australian Primary
and High School Students (2012) and Hemphill, Tollit, Kotevski and Heerdes article
Predictors of Traditional and Cyber-bullying Victimization: A Longitudinal Study of
Australians Secondary School Students (2014) provided very important insight to an
international issue. Cyber-bullying is an issue that continues to rise as the
advancement in technology is made. Academic and psychological practitioners must
be aware of Cyber-Bullying and it is hard to detect. Therefore, reforms and policies
must be implemented to prevent Cyber-bulling from occurring in schools. There had
been limitations and gap in both research, however, they provide a valuable insight to
this worldwide issue. Furthermore, more research is needed.

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Reference:
Chadwick, S. (2014). Impacts of Cyber-bullying, Buildinf Social and Emotional
Resilience in Schools. Australia: Springer.

Hagger-Johnson, G. (2014). Introduction to Research Methods and Data Analysis in

the Health Science. London: Routledge.

Hale, S. (2013). Research Methods in Interpreting: A Practical Resource. London:

Bloomsbury Academic.

Hemphill, S. A., Tollit, M., Kotevski A., & Heerde, J. A. (2014). Predictors of
Traditional and Cyber-bullying Victimization: A Longitudinal Study of
Australians Secondary School Students. Journal of Interpersonal Violence,
30(25), 2567-2590. DOI: 10.1177/0886260514553636.

Popovi-itis, B., Djuri, S., & Cvetkvi, V. (2011). The prevelance of CyberBullying Among Adolecents: A Case Studey of Middle Schools in Serbia.
School Psychology International, 32 (4), 412-424. DOI:
10.1177/01430311401700.

Sakellariou, T., Carroll, A., & Houghton, S. (2012). Rates of Cyber Victimization and
Bullying Among Male Australian Primary and High School Students. School
Psychology International, 33(5), 533-549. DOI: 10.1177/01430323140374.

Ullman, J. (2015). Applying Education Research 2nd edition. Sydney: Pearson.

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