Longitudinal Relations Between Social Media Use and Cyberbullying Victimization Across Adolescence: Within-Person Effects in a Birth Cohort.

Abstract

Cyberbullying involves aggressive behaviors or threats through digital platforms. Youth who are victims of cyberbullying are at risk for a wide range of emotional and behavioral problems. Given the growing role of social media in adolescent life, understanding its relation to cyberbullying is crucial for prevention and policy. Although numerous studies suggest that social media use predicts cyberbullying victimization, methodological shortcomings limit their ability to infer the etiological role of social media use in cyberbullying victimization at the individual level-an issue this study addresses. A sample from two birth cohorts of children (n = 781, 53.4% girls) in Trondheim, Norway, was assessed biennially through interviews and questionnaires from age 12 to 18. Social media use and cyberbullying were related at the between-person level (i.e., those who use social media more than others were more likely to experience cyberbullying than others). However, within-person increases in self- or other-oriented social media use did not predict future within-person changes in cyberbullying victimization. The vast majority of former studies, which have not explored within-person changes, may have overestimated and overinterpreted the role of social media use in cyberbullying victimization. Efforts to reduce cyberbullying victimization by decreasing individual social media use may have limited effectiveness.