Practice Profile: Cyberbullying Prevention and Intervention Programs

Evidence Rating for Outcomes

Juvenile Problem & At-Risk Behaviors | Bullying

Victimization | Cyberbullying victimization

Date: This profile was posted on February 06, 2020

Practice Goals/Target Population

Cyberbullying intervention and prevention programs are designed to reduce or prevent negative online behaviors among school-aged children ages 9 to 19. Cyberbullying is commonly defined as an aggressive, intentional act carried out by an individual or a group using electronic forms of contact, repeatedly over time, against a target who cannot easily defend him or herself (Slonje, Smith, and Frisen 2013).

Practice Components

Cyberbullying intervention and prevention programs use several different approaches to discourage students from engaging in online bullying and to build the capacity to respond to negative online behaviors. In general, these approaches can be categorized as individual-level, multi-level systemic, and universal or whole school.

Individual-level strategies focus solely on the students in relation to online bullying perpetration and victimization. Programs teach students a variety of strategies to respond to online bullying, including using assertiveness or humor, seeking help from a parent or teacher, or disengaging from the interaction (e.g., by logging off a social media website or “blocking” bullies). Individual-level strategies may include helping students improve their emotional regulation skills and perceived self-efficacy to deal with cyberbullying (Cross et al. 2016).

The universal/whole-school approach involves schoolwide strategies for addressing cyberbullying at the classroom, teacher/staff, family, and student levels (Cantone et al. 2015). Assuming that bullying may be related to the general social climate at school, these programs focus on addressing how school relationships, environments, and policies and practices relate to online bullying behavior (Cantone et al. 2015).

The multi-level systemic approach incorporates some but not all the levels of the whole-school approach. These may include a combination of classroom-level, teacher/staff-level, family-level, or student-level strategies (Cantone et al. 2015). For example, a program may teach students how to respond to online bullying, and additionally assist staff to implement strategies for developing students’ social relationships and peer support. Similarly, a program may be designed to help teachers manage their students’ online behavior, but also disseminate resources about cyberbullying to the students’ parents. Resources for parents are typically designed to help them better understand the technologies used by their children and build their self-efficacy to help their children manage cyber environments (e.g., how to get help, and how to respond to cyberbullying incidents) (Cross et al. 2016).

Meta-Analysis Snapshot
	Literature Coverage Dates	Number of Studies	Number of Study Participants
Meta Analysis 1	2012-2018	24	36534

Meta Analysis 1

Gaffney and colleagues (2019) conducted a meta-analysis to examine the effect of cyberbullying intervention and prevention programs on reducing bullying and victimization among school-aged children and adolescents. For studies to be included in the review, they had to meet the following criteria: 1) defined cyberbullying as an aggressive, intentional act, carried out by a group or individual, using electronic forms of contact repeatedly and over time, and against victims who cannot defend themselves (Slonje, Smith, and Frisen 2013); 2) described the evaluation of an intervention or prevention program implemented with school-aged participants between the ages of 4 and 18; 3) employed experimental and control conditions; 4) measured cyberbullying behaviors using quantitative measurement instruments; and 5) were published from 2000 onward.

The researchers identified relevant published and unpublished studies from 2000 to 2017 through a systematic review of the several electronic databases and from hand searches of relevant journals. Studies were excluded if outcomes related to internet harassment, online harassment, electronic aggression, or traditional school-bullying perpetration and/or victimization. Quasi-experimental studies were excluded if the program did not measure cyberbullying behaviors before and after implementation. Randomized controlled trial designs that included before and after measures were preferred, but these measures were not required. Studies using university students, juvenile who were convicted of a crime, or clinical samples were excluded.

The search resulted in a sample of 24 eligible studies. Two of these presented findings from multiple evaluations, thus resulting in a total of 26 independent evaluations. Several studies used overlapping samples that were then excluded from the meta-analysis. The final sample for the meta-analysis included 18 independent evaluations, 11 of which used randomized controlled trial designs and 7 of which used quasi-experimental designs. This CrimeSolutions review focused on the analysis of randomized controlled trial studies. Therefore, results were based on 10 independent effect sizes for cyberbullying perpetration and 11 independent effect sizes for cyberbullying victimization across the 11 included studies. The 11 studies included a total sample size of 31,995 youths. Two studies were conducted in the United States, two were conducted in Germany, and the others were conducted in Australia, Austria, Belgium, Finland, Greece, the Netherlands, and Spain.

The authors calculated effect sizes for continuous variables using a standardized mean difference formula (Cohen’s d). Effect sizes for dichotomous variables were estimated using odds ratio effect sizes. The authors reported mean effect sizes for impact of cyberbullying programs on bullying perpetration and bullying victimization using three models: fixed effects, random effects, and multiplicative variance adjustment (MVA).