Online Abuse on a Popular Social Media App : What it Looks Like and How to Stop it

Abstract

A popular social media app partnered with the Cyberbullying Research Center to better understand online abuse and personal experiences of children on the app. This study’s purpose is to focus on the extent to which youth from the United States were being cyberbullied on a popular social media app. Surveys were sent for users to report the occurrence. Twenty percent of US Youth experienced online bullying on the app. Sixty percent of those youth said the experience negatively impacted their life and were less likely to use the app because of it. The most common reason for bullying was because of appearance. Forty-four percent of users said they were aware of tools to report bullying. The hope is to educate users and reduce the number of online bullying experiences to zero.