Regular articles
Media reporting of cyberbullying
A framing analysis of The Star
Cyberbullying refers to aggression that is intentionally and repeatedly carried out in an electronic context
(e.g., e-mail, blogs, social networking sites, instant messages, text messages, etc.) against a person who cannot easily defend
him- or herself. Cyberbullying is an important phenomenon to research for many reasons. First, although varying prevalence rates
have been reported, cyberbullying victimization has been found to occur at frequencies that are cause for concern. Second, many
victims of cyberbullying have been found to experience a range of negative outcomes as a consequence. Third, previous studies
found that increased Internet usage has led to increased involvement as perpetrators, victims or witness in cyberbullying. It is
alarming that a survey conducted by Anis, Rahim and Lim (2012) in Malaysia revealed
that 60% of the cases took place in social networking sites such as Facebook and MySpace. This study aims to examine the coverage
of cyberbullying by The Star, which is the English-language daily newspaper with the largest circulation in
Malaysia. Framing theory was employed as the theoretical framework, while content analysis was used as the research methods. This
study revealed that coverage on cyberbullying in The Star was dominated by the “prevention and intervention
strategies” frame. The social problem was also presented as an individual-level problem (episodic framing) as well as
societal-level issue (thematic framing). Implications of the findings to the understanding of cyberbullying and framing research
were discussed.
Article outline
- Introduction
- Literature review
- Theoretical framework
- Method
- Findings
- Prevention and intervention strategies
- Prevalence of cyberbullying
- Harmful impact of cyberbullying
- Risks of the internet
- Regulations, laws or court cases related to cyberbullying
- Discussion
- Conclusion and suggestion for future studies
-
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Cited by (1)
Cited by 1 other publications
Chun, JongSerl, Jinyung Kim & Serim Lee
2023.
A content analysis of South Korean newspaper coverage of adolescent cyberbullying.
Children & Society 37:6
► pp. 2011 ff.
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