14 DAY TRIAL // A group of British investigators from the University of Kent have recently determined that children who are subjected to the effects of online ostracism tend to have lower levels of self-esteem than their peers. This is the first study ever to look at the correlations between the two phenomena. Previous investigations have only sought to analyze how cyberbullying influences children, but stopped short of looking at ostracism. The data used for the research was collected by analyzing players of online computer games, who are very likely to exhibit this kind of behavior often, AlphaGalileo reports.
For the purpose of the investigation, the researchers looked at how adults, children and teens handled being ostracized. The scientists wanted to catch a glimpse of how these feelings differ among age groups, and what consequences the behavior of others triggered in the test group. The participants were all playing computer games at the time of the study. The investigators motivated choosing this topic of research by saying that, generally, their colleagues focus on things such as direct abuse and insults.
“However, a more indirect and perhaps common form of bullying is ostracism – when people are purposefully ignored by others. Online ostracism affects adults by threatening their basic needs for self-esteem, sense of belonging, sense of meaning and sense of control. We wanted to discover whether children and adolescents have similar reactions,” said professor Dominic Abrams, a member of the study team based at the university's Center for the Study of Group Processes.
Speaking about the results he and his team derived from the research, Abrams said, “For all age groups, online ostracism substantially threatened the four basic needs – esteem, belonging, meaning and control – and also lowered their mood, showing that social exclusion online is very powerful even among children.” He adds that the work featured 41 test subjects aged between eight and nine, 79 teens between the ages of 12 and 14, as well as 46 adults that were twenty years old.
“Whereas adults might be quite skilled at finding a relationship in which to be included after having been ostracized, it could be a bigger challenge for children. This suggests that parents and schools need to be vigilant in case children in their care are experiencing sustained ostracism,” the team leader adds.