Study finds 57 per cent of young Quebecers have been cyber-stalked

More than half (57 per cent) of Quebecers between the ages of 10 and 18 have experienced cyberbullying, according to a study commissioned by online protection company McAfee.

Yet only 22 per cent of young Quebecers have sought help. Another 22 per cent said they hid the situation from their parents.

"That's why it's important - and this is what we recommend to parents - to try to maintain an open environment so that the child can really report these types of events and allow parents to react to these types of actions," said McAfee spokesperson Lam Son Nguyen. And this, "from 10 years old", or the age at which they receive their first connected devices.

Seventy-eight percent of Quebec parents said they are taking concrete steps to protect their children, compared to 85 percent worldwide. These measures include discussion (66 per cent), monitoring electronic devices (53 per cent), talking to the school principal (28 per cent), therapy (11 per cent) and changing schools (8 per cent).

SOCIAL MEDIA WILD WEST

The Quebec numbers may seem large, but the rate of children being bullied online is lower than the Canadian (60 per cent) and global (63 per cent) averages.

In Canada, children mostly report incidents where they have been insulted (46 per cent), experienced some form of exclusion on social media (34 per cent) or been the subject of false rumours (20 per cent). Another 25% have experienced racially motivated bullying. However, these instances may have been experienced only once.

In terms of more serious forms of bullying, 11 per cent of Canadian youth say they have experienced harassment or physical threats. An even greater proportion report having experienced sexual harassment (14 per cent).

Other forms of bullying identified by the study include "trolling" (purposely instigating conflict for one's own amusement), "doxing" (publicly revealing information about someone, such as their name, address or school) and revealing one's sexual orientation or gender identity.

In total, 24 per cent of Canadian youth say they have deleted a social media account in order to escape cyberbullying.

In Canada, Facebook is the platform where the most kids are either bullied (59 per cent) or witness (48 per cent) cyberbullying. It is closely followed by Instagram, which is also owned by the Meta company, and then YouTube, TikTok and Twitter.

LACK OF AWARENESS

"The majority of the time, the cyberbully comes from within the child's environment," said Nguyen. "It starts in the schoolyard and spreads online."

Indeed, 52 per cent of Canadian youth say they know their tormentor personally. But that percentage could actually be even higher, as some hide behind fake accounts to attack people they know.

While only 14 per cent of Canadian youth admit to having ever bullied online, a majority (53 per cent) admit to having done certain things - such as name calling or exclusion - when the word "bullying" is not used in the question.

"It's true that a derogatory remark is quickly made, especially when dealing with teenagers," Nguyen reminded. "The problem is that when it's spread on social networks, it has a snowball effect. One person will make this comment, which will be picked up by another, which will be picked up by another person, and right away it's a spiral."

The study was conducted by MSI-ACI in July 2022 with 11,687 respondents living in 10 countries - Canada, the United States, France, the United Kingdom, Germany, Mexico, Brazil, Australia, Japan and India. The online questionnaire was first completed by parents alone, and then their children were asked to complete the second part.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published in French on Sept. 3, 2022.