Cyber-Victimization Experience among Higher Education Students: Effects of Social Support, Loneliness, and Self-Efficacy

Listen to Me! Target Perceptions of Digital Hate: A Scoping Review of Recent Research

Digital hate is typically targeted toward individuals or groups based on distinct attributes. Despite numerous studies on targets of digital hate, there is a lack of a systematic meta-perspective on targets' perceptions of digital hate. Therefore, this scoping review aims to assess available definitions and characteristics of targets, consequences of digital hate together with targets' reactions and coping strategies, dominant methodologies, and identified future outlooks of digital hate victimization research. To achieve this goal, we systematically searched two established databases (i.e., Web of Science and Scopus) for research published from 2020 onwards using a comprehensive search string of digital hate terms. Out of the 12,978 publications screened for eligibility, 230 studies met the inclusion criteria for this review. All selected studies were in English and featured targets of digital hate as the sample. The findings indicate a lack of conceptual clarity, a strong dominance of Global North perspectives, a scarcity of research on children, older adults, men, and people from minority groups, and a need for experimental and longitudinal quantitative research methods, as well as qualitative and mixed-method research. Most importantly, we found that victimization consequences and coping strategies adopted by targets have been researched without sufficiently accounting for inconsistently privileged and intersectional identities and without examining contextual effectiveness. This review, therefore, emphasizes the necessity of taking an intersectional approach to gain a thorough understanding of targets' digital hate victimization experiences and both short- and long-term coping effectiveness.

Social support and mental health outcomes in palestinian children victims of bullying and cyberbullying during the covid-19 pandemic: an exploratory investigation

BACKGROUND

Studies have shown that COVID-19 negatively impacted mental health by increasing depression and anxiety. Additionally, bullying might deteriorate children's psychological functioning. Nevertheless, social support has been studied as a positive buffer for mental well-being.

OBJECTIVES

Thus, our study aimed to examine the consequences of the COVID-19 outbreak on children's mental health when they are a victim of bullying and cyberbullying. Moreover, we tested the effect of social support as a mediating variable. A sample of 141 children (63 boys and 78 girls) 9 to 13 years old (M = 10.31, SD = 2.26) who reported having experienced bullying participated in the research. All were Palestinians living in Israel, attending primary schools.

METHODS

Data was collected using the following measures, the Multidimensional Bullying Victimization Scale (MBVS), the Adolescents Cyber-Victimization Scale (CYBVICS), the Strengths and Difficulties Questionnaire (SDQ), a questionnaire measuring the effect of COVID-19 on mental health outcomes, the Revised Child Anxiety and Depression Scale (RCADS), and the Multidimensional Scale of Perceived Social Support (MSPSS). Structural equation modelling was applied to test the association between variables and mediating effects.

FINDINGS

A positive correlation between Fear of COVID-19 and traditional bullying, cyberbullying, depression, and anxiety were found. Moreover, social support was negatively correlated with traditional forms of bullying and cyberbullying. Also, statistically significant differences between traditional bullying, cyberbullying, depression, and parents' difficulties emerged from parental marital status.

CONCLUSIONS

findings might help victims of bullying by training teachers and guiding parents to construct intervention plans to empower the social networks of children victims.

Mediating effect of self-efficacy between social support and compassion fatigue among Geriatric Services and Management interns: A cross-sectional study

OBJECTIVES

To explore the impact of social support on CF and further clarify the mediating role of self-efficacy among Geriatric Services and Management interns.

METHODS

A cross-sectional survey study examined social support, self-efficacy and CF in 592 interns in Geriatric Services and Management from 46 institutions in China.

RESULT

The level of CF among Geriatric Services and Management interns is low but about one-third of the respondents is at high risk of CF. Social support was positively correlated with self-efficacy (β = 0.114, P < 0.01). Social support significantly reduced CF (β = -0.322, P < 0.01). Similarly, self-efficacy had significant direct effects on CF (β = -0.497, P < 0.01). Additionally, self-efficacy played a partial mediating role in the relationship between social support and CF.

CONCLUSION

Social support can directly affect the CF of Geriatric Services and Management interns and indirectly through self-efficacy. Accordingly, It is necessary to strengthen social support and self-efficacy to relieve CF among Geriatric Services and Management interns.

Understanding Children's Online Victimization through the Psychosocial Lens: The Roles of Loneliness, Online Social Currency, and Digital Citizenship

This study employed a risk and resilience framework to investigate the influence of multidimensional factors, considering psychosocial and behavioral aspects, on online victimization among fifth-grade children (ages 10-11). Loneliness, online social currency disturbance, and digital citizenship were examined as predictors of online victimization. Data were collected from 196 students through a self-reported online survey conducted on electronic devices provided by the schools. The findings indicated that 78.6% of fifth-graders owned a smartphone, 70.9% had a gaming console, and the most common online activities were playing online gaming (73%), talking with friends (62.8%), and seeking entertainment (62.2%). Online victimization was prevalent, with 30.8% of children reporting they had been called bad names, 24.7% receiving rude comments, 15.9% expressing feelings of worry or threat due to online harassment, and 3.1% experiencing cyberbullying lasting for days. Furthermore, the results revealed a negative association between digital citizenship and online victimization, while loneliness and online social currency disturbance were positively associated with online victimization after accounting for children's gender and time spent online. In conclusion, this study suggests that efforts to prevent and address online victimization should prioritize promoting digital citizenship and increasing awareness of the roles of loneliness and social currency disturbances in online social dynamics.

The role of self-efficacy and parental communication in the association between cyber victimization and depression among adolescents and young adults: a structural equation model

BACKGROUND

With the rapid advancement and revolutionization of information and communication technologies, adolescents and young adults use smartphones, the internet, and social networking services more frequently, as a result, the problem of cyber-bullying sharply increases, and eventually it causes psychological issues and negative thoughts in the victims. This study aimed to examine the role of self-efficacy and parental communication in the relationship between cyber victimization and depression among adolescents and young adults in India.

METHODS

Secondary data analysis was performed on a cross-sectional dataset obtained from the Understanding the Lives of Adolescents and Young Adults (UDAYA) wave 2 survey. The sample included 16,292 adolescent and young adult boys and girls aged 12-23 years. Karl Pearson Correlation coefficient analysis was done to examine the correlation between outcome variable (depressive symptoms), mediator variables (self-efficacy and parental communication) and key explanatory variable (cyber victimization). Further, structural equation modeling technique was applied to examine the hypothesized pathways.

RESULTS

Adolescents and young adults being victims of cyber-bullying [β = 0.1357, p < 0.001] and those witnessed inter-parental violence were positively [β = 0.0026, p < 0.001] correlated with depressive symptoms. Self-efficacy and parental communication were negatively related to depressive symptoms among adolescents and young adults. There was a significant positive relationship between cyber victimization [β = 0.258, p < 0.001] and depressive symptoms. Cyber victimization was positively related to self-efficacy [β = 0.043, p < 0.001] among adolescents and young adults. Self-efficacy [β= -0.150, p < 0.001] and parental communication [β=-0.261, p < 0.001] reduced depressive symptoms among the participants.

CONCLUSIONS

The findings suggest that adolescents and young adults who are victims of cyber-bully may have depressive symptoms and their mental health can be improved through the enhancement of self-efficacy and increased parental communication. Improved peer attitudes and familial support for empowering cyber victims should be taken into account while framing programs and interventions.

Trajectories of college students' general self-efficacy, the related predictors, and depression: A piecewise growth mixture modeling approach

General self-efficacy plays a critical role in the development of college students, and mastering the development of students' general self-efficacy is helpful to explain students' behavior and psychological performance. Based on the data from the same cohort of college students for four consecutive years, this study used the piecewise growth mixture model to identify the developmental trajectories of general self-efficacy, built a multinomial logistic regression model to analyze the related predictors on different trajectories, and further compared the differences in depression symptoms in general self-efficacy trajectories. Three trajectories of college students' general self-efficacy were identified: stable-rising (8.7%), stable-decreasing (2.4%), and moderate and stable (88.9%). With the moderate and stable class as the reference, gender and extraversion are the predictors of students in the stable-increasing class; gender, extraversion, mother's education level, and university tier significantly predict students who fall into the stable-decreasing class. With the stable-increasing class as the reference, gender also has a significant predictive effect on students who belong to the stable-decreasing class. However, age, ethnicity, siblings, hometown location, father's education level, BMI, sleep, and major were not related predictors. Furthermore, mean differences in depression between latent classes of general self-efficacy trajectories were significant, and the depression scores of the stable-decreasing class were beyond the normal range in the third and fourth years. To promote college students' mental health, we suggest that colleges provide more specific psychological interventions to students based on the classification.