Citation

Doty JL, Gower AL, Sieving RE, Plowman SL, McMorris BJ. Soc. Sci. (Basel) 2018; 7(12).

Copyright

(Copyright © 2018, MDPI: Multidisciplinary Digital Publishing Institute)

DOI

10.3390/socsci7120265

PMID

unavailable

Abstract

Cyberbullying victimization and perpetration are associated with poor mental health outcomes for adolescents, including depressive symptoms, anxiety, and suicide ideation. Although most cyberbullying occurs at home, few interventions have been developed for parents of adolescents. We examined parental connectedness and parental online monitoring in relation to cyberbullying victimization and perpetration, with the goal of understanding how parents buffer young teens from involvement in cyberbullying. We leveraged data from an existing study involving three racially and ethnically diverse middle schools in a metropolitan area in the Midwest of the U.S. (n = 570). In the spring of sixth grade, students reported on cyberbullying involvement, parental connectedness, and parental monitoring. Greater parental connectedness was related to a lower likelihood of cyberbullying victimization and perpetration in logistic regression models. Parental monitoring of online activities was not related to cyberbullying victimization but was marginally related to a lower likelihood of cyberbullying perpetration.

RESULTS suggest that cyberbullying prevention programs should consider ways to foster parent/youth connectedness. © 2018 by the authors.

Language: en

Keywords

Parenting; Adolescence; Cyberbullying; Parental monitoring