Vol. 8 No. 4 (2021)
Space and Culture, India

Research

Assessing Psychological Effects of Cyberbullying on the Adolescents of a Cosmopolitan City

Published 2021-03-26

  • Shovan Ghosh
    • ,
  • Sucharita Pramanick

Shovan Ghosh
Associate Professor, Department of Geography, Diamond Harbour Women’s University, Diamond Harbour Road, Sarisha, District: South 24 Pargana, West Bengal, India. Pin-743368

Sucharita Pramanick
Assistant Professor, Department of Geography, Rabindra Mahavidyalaya, Champadanga, District: Hooghly, West Bengal, India, Pin, 71240

Abstract

The popularity of computer-mediated communication and cyber technology has created many new vices in society that obstruct the development of adolescents. One such vice is cyberbullying, which is an insidious and covert form of bullying. The present paper opts to scrutinise cyberbullying's psychological effects on the victim teenagers of minority communities of a cosmopolitan city. Confirmatory factor analysis, for testing the Psychological Effect of Cyberbullying Scale (PECS) comprising 24 direct item pool, was employed to unfold Mild Psychological Effect Scale (MPES) and Intense Psychological Effect Scale (IPES). Cross validating the initial factor structure was conducted with the help of developing standardised coefficient for the two factor model for PECS. Cronbach's alpha reliability coefficient values are above 0.09 for the items of both the Mild Psychological Effect Scale (MPES) and Intense Psychological Effect Scale (IPES). Based on purposive sampling, the study found that all the items taken for conducting the survey are highly co-related to the psychological impact of the victim teens of the minority community of the cosmopolitan city. So the PECS developed for measuring the effect has significance. Study results also indicate that the PECS can serve as a valuable tool for measuring the mental impact of cyberbullying among teenagers.

Keywords

Cyberbullying, Minority Community, Psychological Effect, Cosmopolitan, Teenager, Kolkata Municipal Corporation, India

pdf

Author Biography

Shovan Ghosh

Dr. Ghosh, an Associate Professor in the department of Geography, Diamond Harbour Women’s University, South 24 Pargana, West Bengal, has completed his M.A. and Ph.D in Geography from the University of Burdwan, West Bengal. He has secured first position in both under graduation and post-graduation level. He served as an Assistant Professor for more than ten years at Ramananda Centenary College, Purulia, West Bengal. His area of interests lies in Human Geography, Environmental Issues, Education and Geography, Regional planning, Backward Region Development, Urban Planning. His research topic for doctoral thesis was ‘Spatiality, Dichotomy and Problems of High School Education in Hooghly District, West Bengal—Geographical Appraisal’. He has completed UGC research project on ‘The Physico-Societal Barriers of Access and Success of School Education with Reference to Puncha Block of Purulia District—One of the Backward Districts of West Bengal’. He has more than 30 national and international papers, written five chapters in different books and had attended forty five national and international conferences and seminars. He has keen interest on “Multivariate analysis using SPSS, AMOS & R” and got training on that in several workshops. He is associated with several Professional bodies like Indian Geographical Foundation, (IGF) Kolkata, Indian Institute of Geographers, (IIG) University of Pune, Maharastra, Association of Population Geographers of India, (APGI) Punjab University, Punjab,  National Association of Geographers India (NAGI), Department of Geography, Delhi School of Economics, University of Delhi, Delhi etc. He was awarded Best Paper Presenter in international conference on “Urban development”, organized by Institute for Social development & Research, Ranchi in 2018, India. He performed his duty as Coordinator, NAAC Steering Committee, Ramananda Centenary College College, Purulia and Nodal Officer, for AISHE from 2012 to 2017.  Currently he is supervising 5 research scholars on issues in Human Geography like problems to access to health care facilities of women; urbanisation, technology and quality of life;  cyberspace and cyber culture; language dynamics.

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