Social Media and its influence

While starting a new school year can be exciting and fun, it can also be tough for children of any age — dealing with new teachers and new students, and continuing the friendships (and rivalries) that they formed during the previous year. But these days it’s even more difficult for students as school dynamics and drama have a significant presence online, essentially coming home with the child through digital devices and social media.

Cyberbullying is probably the most threatening issue that children face when they’re online, and social networks play a significant role in the severity of this issue. For the same advantageous reasons that make social media a great tool to help victims of cyberbullying, it can also be used to perpetrate cyberbullying, especially among teens. According to the Teen Internet Behavior study that was conducted by McAfee, “Almost one in four teens claimed to be a target of cyberbullying and two-thirds of all teens have witnessed cruel behavior online”.