Cyber bullying more difficult for teenagers to process psychologically than in-person bullying

"While social media can serve to augment peer relationships in adolescence, it can also provide a forum for negative exchanges that can be quite hurtful," says Hollie Sobel, PhD, a Family Institute clinician who specializes in treating adolescent clients and their families.

"Teenagers can't emotionally process these painful experiences in the same way they do their face-to-face equivalents. There aren't the same opportunities to work it out online."

Sobel lists a number of ways in which these online bullying experiences are different from those that happen in high school cafeterias or parties. For example, the victim can't see the affect on the offender, and can't see or feel the responses of people who may come to his/her aid, rendering that aid less resonant. Additionally, while there is a lack of authority to step in, the quick pace and lack of personal contact involved in cyber bullying allows for more people to join in the taunting in active ways they may not do in person. Negative statements made on-line are more pervasive than those made in person, with little escape.

"Despite these differences, however, a victim's level of assertion doesn't vary whether the bullying occurs online or in person," says Dr. Sobel, who runs a therapy group for adolescents at The Family Institute in Evanston, IL. "The impact is just as resonant, only these incidents happen in the isolation of the Internet where social support, which is so important for coping, is absent."

Recognizing these nuances is important to help teenagers cope with cyber bullying. At The Family Institute, Dr. Sobel considers these issues as she provides teenagers with the strategies and skills they need to cope with these experiences, as well as the issues of self-esteem, family relationships, peer pressure, and friendships so common in adolescence.