Blocking Sexual Predators & Cyberbullies on Mysp

8/13/2019 Blocking Sexual Predators & Cyberbullies on Mysp

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BLOCKING SEXUAL PREDATORS AND CYBERBULLIES ON MYSPACE

THE KIDS ARE ALRIGHT

Short Report 2006-03

Larry D. Rosen, Ph.D.

California State University, Dominguez Hills

August 2006

This short report examines the prevalence and impact of cyberbullies on MySpace in light of

the recent research study entitled Online Victimization of Youth: Five Years Later by

Crimes Against Children Research Center at the University of New Hampshire. This study,

funded by the U.S. Department of Justice through a grant to the National Center for Missing

and Exploited Children, compared the results from two Youth Internet Safety Surveys

(YISS), the first performed in 2000 and the second in 2005. Results of this comprehensive

study, which can be found at http://www.unh.edu/ccrc/pdf/CV138.pdf, examined three major

areas of victimization unwanted sexual materials, solicitation for sexual activity, and

harassment. I will provide a more detailed analysis of this seminal study in the next several

weeks. This brief report examines the actions of the children in the YISS study when faced

with these three areas of victimization.

The table below details how the 1,500 10- to 17-year-old subjects in the 2005 YISS study

reacted when faced with unwanted sexual materials, solicitation or harassment. It is

obvious from the table that these children and teens are quite adept at handling the three

types of victimization, particularly those of a sexual nature. It is also clear that the

majority were not upset by the event. Interestingly, it appears that the children and teens

are getting better at dealing with the victimization. Comparable data were available

from both the 2000 and 2005 surveys for how solicitations and harassment were handled.

In 2000, 79% of the pre-teens and teens dealt with the solicitation appropriately; in 2005

this increased to 93%. The same result was apparent for their appropriate response to

harassment, which increased from 60% in 2000 to 74% in 2005. Clearly, children and

adolescents are getting better at handling these potentially harmful occurrences. [NOTE:
http://www.unh.edu/ccrc/pdf/CV138.pdfhttp://www.unh.edu/ccrc/pdf/CV138.pdf


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comparable data for dealing with unwanted sexual materials were not available from the

2000 YISS study.]

VICTIMIZATIONTYPE

BLOCKED PERSON,REMOVED SELF,

TOLD PERSON TOSTOP, OR IGNORED

PERSON OR

MATERIAL

NOT UPSET OR ONLY ALITTLE UPSET BY THE EVENT

Viewing UnwantedSexual Materials

92% 74%

Solicitation for Sex 93% 72%

Harassment 74% 62%

I recently completed a large study of 1,257 MySpace users. A full report of the results

can be found at www.csudh.edu/psych/lrosen.htm. One question on this extensive survey

queried whether the MySpacer had ever had to block someone from their MySpace

page. In my study, 329 MySpacers (26%) indicated that they had blocked someone

from their MySpace page. Those who blocked someone were compared to those who

had not on all demographics, MySpace usage, MySpace friends, and psychological

variables (e.g., depression, self-esteem, Internet addiction, shyness, honesty, etc.). The

following details the people most likely to block someone:

Those who had been on MySpace more than one year.

Those with more friends.

Those who were on MySpace more hours per week.

Those who were less shy.

Those who were had less friend support.

There were no differences for any other variables. This indicates that the act of blocking

someone is more common among more advanced MySpace users who have accumulated

a large friends list and spend many hours per week on MySpace. From a personality

point of view, the blockers were not shy although they felt that they lacked support from

friends in general.
http://www.csudh.edu/psych/lrosen.htmhttp://www.csudh.edu/psych/lrosen.htm


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When queried further about the reasons why they blocked this person, the following

results were found:

REASONS FOR BLOCKINGNUMBER WHO

BLOCKED

SOMEONE

PERCENTAGE OF

BLOCKED PEOPLE

Annoying, rude, ignorant, inappropriate,bugged me, was crazy, too much drama

102 31%

Talked about sex, asked for sex, pervert,

nasty, vulgar43 13%

Harassed, hate mail, threats, aggression,wouldnt stop

38 12%

Ex-girlfriend or boyfriend causing trouble 29 9%

Stalker 24 7%Did not like 22 2%

Did not know person, did not want to add

as a friend17 8%

Creepy, pig, bitch, jerk 12 4%

Spam, advertisements, computer-generated

requests11 3%

Gay (e.g., some gay dude e-mailed me. 4 1%

Other, undetermined 27 8%

When reasons for blocking were compared with all demographics, MySpace usage,

MySpace friends, and psychological variables (e.g., depression, self-esteem, Internet

addiction, shyness, honesty, etc.), there were no significant differences. In other words,

there were no determiners of who blocked someone for, say, stalking, versus someone

who was blocked for harassment.

Another question on the survey asked about whether the MySpacer had ever had a bad

experience on MySpace. Overall, 361 MySpacers (29%) reported having a bad

experience, a similar number to those who had to block someone (n=329). Interestingly,

however, when the two questions were compared, only 56% of those who had to block

someone reported it as a bad experience. This result is comparable to the YISS data in


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the table above showing that the majority of adolescents in that study were not upset by

the victimization.

What Does This Mean for Parents?

Both the YISS study and my MySpace study point out that adolescents in cyberspace

have learned to deal effectively and easily with potentially uncomfortable situations and

have, in fact, increased their use of appropriate tools over the past 5 years. If the

victimization is due to another person, it is handled through strategies including blocking

that person, ignoring him, or telling the person to stop. If the victimization is through

unwanted sexual materials, the teens have no trouble simply ignoring the material and

moving on. In addition, for nearly three-fourths of these children and teens, the event

was really a non-event as it did not appear to cause any emotional upset.

Taken together, these results are quite encouraging. Clearly young people are not passive

victims of sexual solicitations, pornography and bullies in cyberspace. In reality, most

are hardly fazed. Most assuredly they are not victims. We should be concerned about

those few who report that they were upset by the experience. This is something that

parents should be discussing with their children using what I term Proactive and

Reactive Parenting. Proactively, parents should use these three categories of potential

victimization as a springboard in talking to their children. In an honest, non-punitive

discussion, parents can bring up these examples and use them to prepare their adolescent

children to be aware of the possibilities. Reactively, parents need to caution their

children that if anything uncomfortable occurs they should immediately talk to their

parents, who can then help them deal with any upset. The following websites are

invaluable resources for keeping your teens safe on the Internet, in general, and MySpace

in particular:

SafeKids.com

Center for Safe and Responsible Internet Use at csriu.org

cyberbully.org


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NetFamilyNews.org

StaySafe.org

For the most part, the kids really are alright. You can help ensure that they are safe by

practicing proactive and retroactive parenting to keep them safe.

Blocking Sexual Predators & Cyberbullies on Mysp

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