VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI VIETNAM JAPAN UNIVERSITY NGO THU TRANG CYBERBULLYING AMONG YOUNG ADULTS DURING COVID-19 PANDEMIC: A CASE STUDY ON VIETNAM MASTER'S THESIS VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI VIETNAM JAPAN UNIVERSITY NGO THU TRANG CYBERBULLYING AMONG YOUNG ADULTS DURING COVID-19 PANDEMIC: A CASE STUDY ON VIETNAM MAJOR: GLOBAL LEADERSHIP CODE: 8310210.01QTD RESEARCH SUPERVISOR: Prof. YASUSHI KATSUMA Dr. NGUYEN THI HUE Hanoi, 2022 STATEMENT OF COMMITMENT With personal honor, I guarantee that this study’s result is my own and it does not violate the Regulation on prevention of plagiarism in academic and scientific research activities at Vietnam Japan University (Issued together with Decision No 700/QĐ-ĐHVN dated 30/09/2021 by Rector of Vietnam Japan University). This study is submitted in fulfillment of the requirements for the master’s degree in Global Leadership.
Signature Ngo Thu Trang Date: September - 2022 ABSTRACT This research aims to study the reality of young people's awareness of cyberbullying. At the same time, examine the perceptions of Vietnamese young adults about cyberbullying mitigation programs promoted by the Vietnamese government and International Organizations during a sensitive time of the COVID-19 pandemic. The study will focus on university students between 18 and 24 years old, with the highest number of social media users. This study will use documentary analysis to understand the reality of cyberbullying programs promoted by the Vietnamese government and international organizations/NGOs.
The cyberbullying awareness level of university students will be examined and collected through a mixed method. This study involved 207 undergraduate students at universities in Vietnam. Research results show that during the COVID-19 pandemic, Vietnam approved the first National Program on online child safety for the period 2021-2025. So far, the program has achieved its goals in preparation, such as implementing some products and tools, such as the Vietnam Cybersecurity emergency Response Teams/Coordination Center (CERT/CC), Code of conduct on social networks, 111 - National Child Helpline, and so on.
At the same time, international organizations/NGOs operating in Vietnam have also implemented programs to raise awareness of young people about cyberbullying. The results after surveying 207 students show that young people in Vietnam are basically aware of the characteristics of cyberbullying. However, more than 50 percent of them are unaware of the programs and tools to mitigate cyberbullying promoted by the Vietnamese government and UNICEF during the COVID-19 pandemic. In-depth interviews with five students showed that almost all of them agreed that UNICEF's awareness program was informative and easy to understand.
However, it needs further promotion in order to reach more young people. Key words: Cyberbullying, Young Adults, awareness, mitigate cyberbullying, university students, Vietnam, Covid-19 pandemic. ACKNOWLEDGMENTS My research would not be complete without the cooperation and guidance of so many people. I would like to take this opportunity to express my gratitude to those who have always accompanied and supported me during my study and thesis work.
First and foremost, I am deeply grateful to my supervisors, Prof. Yasushi KATSUMA and Dr. Nguyen Thi Hue, for their invaluable advice, continuous support, and patience during my Master's study. Their immense knowledge and plentiful experience have encouraged me continually throughout my academic research and daily life.
I would like to thank Dr. JungHyun Jasmine Ryu for her valuable advice, patience, and comments throughout my thesis have helped me better orient my research. I would also like to extend my deepest gratitude to all the lecturers and members of the Global Leadership program for their encouragement, patience, and time to support me tremendously academically and spiritually. I am deeply indebted to Prof.
Pham Hong Tung and Prof. Kazuo KURODA has always given me valuable advice during classes to help me to have the knowledge base to carry out my thesis. Special thanks to Ms. Nguyen Thi Thu Trang and Ms.
Ngo Thien My, our program assistant, who is incredibly responsive and has always silently accompanied me in the process of writing the thesis. I had the great pleasure of working with all my friends in the Global Leadership program. Their kindness and support made my time at Vietnam Japan University memorable. Finally, I would also like to thank my family for always accompanying and encouraging me from behind, giving me a lot of motivation and confidence to complete the thesis.
My thanks go to all the people who have supported me through the research process directly or indirectly. TABLE OF CONTENTS TABLE OF CONTENTS LIST OF TABLES……………………………………………………………………. i LIST OF FIGURES………………………………………………………………….ii LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS ………………………………………………………. iii CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION………………………….……………………… 1 CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW……………………………………………4 2.1 Bullying and Cyberbullying.2 Types of Cyberbullying……………………………………………………….3 Reasons and impact of cyberbullying………………………………………….6 Cyberbullying during the COVID-19 pandemic…………………………….7 Statement of the Problem…………………………………………………….
11 CHAPTER 3: RESEARCH DESIGN AND METHODOLOGY……………….2 Research objectives and significance of the study…………………….2 Significance of the study………………………………………….3 Document analysis method design…………………………………….4 Mixed-methods design………………………………………………….21 CHAPTER 4: RESULTS AND DISCUSSION……………………………………. Respondents' social media usage habits……………………………….2 Cyberbullying mitigation Programs………………………………………….3 Cyberbullying awareness of young adults…………………………………… 41 4.4 Young adults awareness of cyberbullying mitigate programs……………….4 Limitation and future research……………………………………………….66 Appendix A: Survey form in Vietnamese…………………………………………. 66 Appendix B: Survey form in English……………………………………………… 72 Appendix C: Interview guide in Vietnamese………………………………………78 Appendix D: Interview guide in English…………………………………………. 80 LIST OF TABLES Tables Page Table 2.1 Detailed information about types of cyberbullying compiled by the author.1 Analytical framework created by the author……………………………… 15 Table 3.2 Total number of participating samples…………………………………….1 Overview of the main content of documents related to cyber bullying mitigate programs.2 Overview of Programs to mitigate cyberbullying during the COVID-19 pandemic compiled by the author.3 Overview of the legal framework in Vietnam on cyber bullying.4 Describe people who are vulnerable to becoming victims of cyber bullying.5 The relationship between Awareness cyberbullying and Gender………….6 Comparison table of before and after awareness of interviewees about the cyberbullying awareness campaign promoted by UNICEF………………………….
55 i LIST OF FIGURES Figures Page Figure 2.1 Types of cyberbullying (Kumar, A.1 Describullyiption of the target population of the study by the author……18 Figure 3.2 The process of searching and identifying documents was created by the author based on the document selection description framework of Chan et al.3 Academic year…………………………………………………………… 24 Figure 4.4 The most used social media platform per day…………………………… 25 Figure 4.5 Time spent on social media per day…………………………………….6 Social media usage has increased during the COVID-19 pandemic…….7 Descriptive Statistics for Cyberbullying Awareness Of Vietnam Young Adults (N=207).8 Experience being bullied or witness cyberbullying during the COVID-19 pandemic…………………………………………………………………………….9 Places where young people often get information about cyber bullying.10 Level of understanding of young adults regarding the Vietnamese Government's “Program to protect and support children to interact in the cyber environment healthily and creatively in the 2021-2025 period”.11 Level of understanding of young adults regarding Vietnam's National Child Helpline……………………………………………………………………….12 Level of understanding of young adults regarding "Vietnam Network for Child Online Protection (VN-COP) (https://vn-cop.13 Level of understanding of young adults regarding the campaign "Cyberbullying: What is it and how to stop it: 10 things teens want to know about cyberbullying" promoted by UNICEF……………………………………………….14 Suggest the best way to prevent cyberbullying on social media………. 57 ii LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS CB Cyberbullying DCB Direct Cyberbullying ICB Indirect Cyberbullying ICT Information and Communications Technology COVID-19 Coronavirus disease 2019 ii CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION The Internet, mobile phones, and other technologies are increasingly mainstream today. These technologies bring many benefits to people's daily lives, such as accessibility and connectivity with people, entertainment, learning, and supportive services. According to the World Bank (2020), Internet users accounted for 70 percent of Vietnam's population in 2020.
Vietnam is also on the list of Asia's top Internet users, the highest in China with around 939.8 million users, and Vietnam ranked 6th with 68.72 million users in January 2021 (Statista, 2021). In addition, the number of people using social networks in Vietnam is also relatively high, at about 73.7 percent of the total population in January 2021, increasing by 7 million (increase by 11 percent) between 2020 and 2021 (Hootsuite and We Are Social, 2021). Statista (2020) reports that the average time Vietnamese people spend online media is six and a half hours per day using the Internet and 2 hours 22 minutes per day using social networks as of the third quarter of 2019. However, spending more time online and using technology increasingly makes cyberbullying more alarming, especially for young people.
Bullying is psychological or physical coercion through repeated actions of the powerful against the less powerful (Farrington, 1993). As described in the National Safe Schools Framework, there are three types of bullying: direct bullying (face-to-face bullying), indirect bullying (covert bullying), and cyberbullying. Direct bullying includes physical actions such as hitting and punching the victim or direct verbal attacks such as name-calling or insults. Indirect bullying is a type of bullying that is not easily visible, but it also hurts the victim.
This type of bullying is expressed through ostracizing someone from the group or fabricating rumors. Cyberbullying is a dangerous form of bullying and very difficult to prevent. With this type of bullying, the bully can be anonymous, target many different objects at once, post images or materials on social networks, and is difficult to delete. Bullying and cyberbullying are considered global phenomena; it occurs during different educational periods (Kowalski et al.
Social media is the most 1 common platform for cyberbullying worldwide (Ipsos, 2018). Typically, cyberbullying is attracted to social media sites because they provide an open and unsafe environment where victims can be vulnerable. Social networking sites like Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram are frequent places where cyberbullying occurs (Lakitta D. Johnson et al.
As a result of an analysis of 19 million tweets over the past four years, Ditch the Label and Brandwatch (2016) reported 7.7 million racism incidents, 390.296 homophobic incidents, and 19. According to Ipsos (2018), global awareness of cyberbullying is an increasing trend. While 75 percent of respondents were aware of cyberbullying, 25 percent had never heard of it. Young people are vulnerable to cyberbullying.
A Microsoft study titled Civility, Safety, and Interactions Online – 2020 has shown that the two groups hit hardest by cyberbullying are Millennials and Generation Z (Microsoft, 2020). Among the youth (15-24 years old), 71 percent accessed the Internet by 2020, compared with 57 percent of the rest of the population. Accordingly, young people were 1.24 times more likely to connect globally than the rest of the population (International Telecommunication Union, 2021). Contrary to any other demographic group, young adults, those aged 18-29, are more likely to experience online harassment.
In the age group 18-24, that percentage is 70 percent (Duggan, 2014). One-third of young people in 30 countries report that they have been victims of cyberbullying, with one-fifth dropping out of school due to cyberbullying and violence (UNICEF, 2019). Therefore, the high frequency of technology use among young people makes them more vulnerable to attack and bullying on social networks. A survey by Microsoft shows that Vietnam is at the top of the least civilized countries online.
Vietnam ranked in the bottom five of the 2020 Digital Civility Index (DCI) collated by Microsoft, at 21 out of 25 surveyed countries, with a score of 78 percent. In Vietnam, the most common risks online include unwanted exposure; unwanted sex; unwanted sexual attention; sexual solicitation; hoaxes, scams, and fraud. In particular, Misogyny topped the list of the five most painful online risks in Vietnam, with 86% of survey respondents ranking it first, followed by damage to professional reputation, microaggression, damage to personal reputation, and 2 discrimination (Dong Nguyen, 2020). From these figures, it is evident that Vietnamese netizens have not yet behaved civilly on social networks, especially towards women.
The COVID-19 pandemic is causing an increase in cyberbullying. According to UNICEF (2020), due to the lockdown caused by COVID-19, millions of children are at further risk of harm as their lives move increasingly online. In just a few months, cyberbullying has risen by 70 percent (L1ght organization, 2020).