by REERA YOO
Nearly one in three South Korean students has experienced cyberbullying through online games, text messages, emails and social media, according to a recent state-funded poll.
The survey of 4,000 middle and high school students nationwide showed that 27.7 percent of the respondents admitted to being bullied online over the past three months, reported Yonhap. The most common form of cyberbullying was revealed to be the leaking of private information online at 12.1 percent. Bullying through online games was the second most common case at 10.2 percent, followed by verbal abuse in Kakao Talk chat rooms and on social media at 7.5 percent.
More than half of the respondents confessed to simply watching others get cyberbullied, with less than 3 percent notifying teachers and only 2.2 percent reporting to the police.
When questioned further, more than 36 percent of the respondents said the bullying occurred because the bully “either disliked or hated the victim,” while 20.5 percent said there was “no particular reason” behind the harassment. Others (8.2 percent) revealed that they were being bullied “just for fun.”
Data by National Youth Policy Institute. Graphic courtesy of the Wall Street Journal/Datawrapper.
According to Yonhap, the poll results were revealed at an assembly on cyberbullying, which was held at the National Assembly building and hosted by Rep. Yun Jae-ok of the ruling Saenuri Party.
The assembly covered the latest methods of cyberbullying, such as “cyber imprisonment,” a scenario where bullies pester a victim into accepting a chat room invitation and then verbally harass them.
“We need to come up with practical solutions that will prevent and eradicate cyberbullying, which harms teenagers’ physical and emotional well-being,” said Rep. Yun.
Over the past few months, the South Korean education ministry has been making efforts to prevent cyberbullying, including developing an alert service that notifies parents when their child receives a text message containing foul language. Since South Korea is one of the most wired countries in the world, the ministry commented that cyberbullying has become an unfortunate side effect.
Photo courtesy of Koreaboo
