Cybervictimization among preadolescents in a community-based sample in Canada: Prevalence and predictors

To examine the prevalence and predictors associated with cybervictimization among preadolescents in a community-based sample from Canada.

Data were drawn from a cohort of 5783 students of grades 5-8, aged 9-14 from 109 elementary schools at the Saskatoon Health Region, Saskatchewan of Canada based on the Student Health Survey in the year of 2010-2011. Multivariate logistic regression with the generalized estimating equation was used to determine the individual and contextual factors associated with self-reported cybervictimization.

Of the 5783 school children, 5611 (97.0%) responded to the question regarding cybervictimization. Among those respondents, 572 (10.2%) reported being cyberbullied at least once in the past four weeks. The students most likely to be victimized by cyberbullying were girls, students in grades 7 and 8 compared with grade 5, Aboriginal students compared to non-Aboriginal students, those who had lived part of their life outside of Canada compared with those who lived all of their life in Canada, those who reported drinking alcohol in the past, those who reported very elevated depressive symptoms, those who were traditionally bullied, those who had low self-esteem, and those who had a poor relationship with their parents. School-level variation in cyberbullying victimization is negligible. School neighbour-level deprivation is not significant after adjusting for individual-level characteristics and parent-child relationship.

Our findings identified important characteristics of preadolescents with higher susceptibility to cybervictimization in a Canadian setting, which can be used to develop intervention strategies for mitigating cybervictimization among the study population.