The advance of digital media has created risks that affect the bio-psycho-social well-being of adolescents. Some of these risks are cyberbullying, cyber dating abuse, sexting, online grooming and problematic Internet use. These risks have been studied individually or through associations of some of them but they have not been explored conjointly. The main objective is to determine the comorbidity between the described Internet risks and to identify the profiles of victimized adolescents. An analytical and cross-sectional study with 3212 participants (46.3% males) from 22 Spanish schools was carried out. Mean age was 13.92 ± 1.44 years (range 11–21). Assessment tools with adequate standards of reliability and validity were used. The main results indicate that the most prevalent single risk is cyberbullying victimization (30.27%). The most prevalent two-risk associations are cyberbullying-online grooming (12.61%) and cyberbullying-sexting (5.79%). The three-risk combination of cyberbullying-sexting-grooming (7.12%) is highlighted, while 5.49% of the adolescents present all the risks. In addition, four profiles are distinguished, with the profile Sexualized risk behaviour standing out, with high scores in grooming and sexting and low scores in the rest of the risks. Determining the comorbidity of risks is useful for clinical and educational interventions, as it can provide information about additional risks.
The use of information and communication technologies (ICT) as tools to intimidate, harass, and control the partner has been, so far, little studied in the literature. The aim of this study was to determine the extension and sex differences of victimization of cyber dating abuse, as well as the context in which it occurs, and its relationship with offline psychological and physical aggressions. The sample consisted of 433 college students ages 18 to 30 years. The results showed that over 50% of the participants had been victims of some type of cyber dating abuse in the last six months. The most common behavior was the use of ICT to control the partner. Also, victims of cyber dating abuse were victimized repeatedly, an average of 23 times in the last six months. The data also showed that cyber dating abuse appear usually in a context of jealousy. Finally, the results revealed a significant relationship between cyber dating abuse and offline psychological dating aggressions. Limitations and future lines of research are discussed.
14 March 2015 in Sexuality Research and Social Policy