Cyberbullying in US Mainstream Media

Abstract

This study relies on content analysis of US print and TV coverage to analyze how cyberbullying has been framed in US mainstream media from 2006 to 2013 (total of 775 newspaper articles and TV transcripts), primarily in terms of who and what causes cyberbullying (causal responsibility) and which individuals, institutions, and policies are responsible for taking care of the issue (treatment responsibility). An analysis of issue frames is presented too. Findings show that the TV coverage is more episodic in nature—triggered by individual cyberbullying incidents—than the print coverage. Episodic frames attribute causal responsibility to individuals rather than institutions or broader social forces. Results show the overall debate on cyberbullying is narrow, focused on incidents that resulted in suicides, and subsequent blaming of individuals involved. Such framing can have implications for audience’s support of punitive policies, inability to comprehend complexity of the issue and moral panic around children’s use of technology.