{"id":362406,"date":"2021-11-08T12:43:05","date_gmt":"2021-11-08T17:43:05","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/staging.fox.temple.edu\/?p=362406"},"modified":"2025-11-20T15:47:22","modified_gmt":"2025-11-20T20:47:22","slug":"to-report-or-not-report-that-is-the-cyberbullying-question","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www3.fox.temple.edu\/discover\/2021\/11\/08\/to-report-or-not-report-that-is-the-cyberbullying-question\/","title":{"rendered":"To report or not report? That is the cyberbullying question"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

We all lived through moments where we have had to intervene. Perhaps it was in response to a child being bullied on the playground. Or maybe it was after we saw a peer being treated unfairly in the workplace. But as the saying goes, \u201cIf you see something, say something.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n

However, what happens when bullying is happening over the internet and social media? <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Considerable research has been conducted on what motivates whistleblowers to speak up when they see something inappropriate at work, but little research examines how bystanders respond to inappropriate online comments. Context is everything, however, and a playground or office setting is much different than Twitter or Facebook.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Jason Thatcher, the Milton F. Stauffer Professor of Management Information Systems at the Fox School, is interested in the question of what motivates bystanders to report social media harassment to platforms. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWhat we know from whistleblowing is it takes communities to help solve problems. Unfortunately, social media platforms do not seem to do a good job of encouraging users to report instances of abuse,\u201d Thatcher says. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

According to Thatcher, online bullying is viewed very differently than in-person bullying. Online users are often dissuaded from reporting instances of cyberbullying because they don\u2019t know what happens after a report is filed. They also do not know if reporting is confidential online as it is in other instances, such as anonymous reporting hotlines.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This topic is explored in-depth in Thatcher\u2019s new journal article Standing up or standing by: Understanding bystanders\u2019 proactive reporting responses to social media harassment<\/em>,<\/a> which was recently accepted for publication in Information Systems Research. The article was co-authored by Randy Wong and Christy M.K. Cheung of Hong Kong Baptist University, as well as Bo Sophia Xiao of the University of Hawaii.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Thatcher says that one of the best tactics for combating cyberbullying is encouraging others to intervene. However, what Thatcher and his peers found is that that\u2019s a task that is easier said than done. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

When reviewing bullying literature, they found that bullying online is viewed very differently than bullying in person<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Using a contextualized intervention framework, their study looks at data gathered from 291 active Facebook users. The goal was to better understand why individuals choose either to report or not report instances of cyberbullying. They found that four factors play a role.<\/p>\n\n\n\n