Social-emotional approaches to reduce cyberbullying in upper secondary education students

Abstract

Information and Communications Technologies (ICT), as a basic support for educational activities, have influenced the relationships between students, teachers, and the family itself, due to the ease of access to new knowledge, as well as the spread of alterations. psychological conditions that can trigger anxiety, irritation and stress behaviors. Cyberbullying or cyberharassment is an educational and social problem that negatively influences its victims. The objective was to analyze the effect of a program of socio-emotional strategies to reduce cyberbullying, in upper basic level students of an educational institution in Ecuador, during 2023. A mixed methodology with a quasi-experimental approach was used. The sample was intentional, made up of 69 8th year high school students between 10 and 12 years old. A control group and an experimental group to which a socio-emotional strategies program was applied were compared. The variables analyzed were: level of cyberbullying (electronic insults, impersonation and exclusion) and Socio-emotional strategies program. The pre-test and post-test analyzes were contrasted with the non-parametric Mann Whitney U Test, after descriptive analysis. Statistically significant differences were found between the averages of the experimental group compared to the control group, with lower values in the levels of cyberbullying in the post-test in the three dimensions. The results obtained constitute a practical proposal with significant impact to reduce cyberbullying in high school students of a public institution in Ecuador.