Ray, G., McDermott, C. D., & Nicho, M. (2024). Cyberbullying on social media: Definitions, prevalence, and impact challenges. Journal of Cybersecurity, 10(1). https://doi.org/10.1093/cybsec/tyae026

            This article shows us that cyberbullying is not just an issue that is connected to online behavior. It relates to the principles of the social sciences because it actually looks at how different behaviors and identities are shaped online and why people act so differently once they are behind a screen. Their research points out two big problems: first, that there is not a lot of research available on adults who are experiencing cyberbullying, and second, that there are no clear guidelines on what cyberbullying actually means. If we cannot define it clearly, it becomes so much harder to support people, create the appropriate policies, and, most importantly, people won’t take it seriously.

            Their research questions have the main goal of trying to fill the gaps in any existing literature about cyberbullying. The authors focus on five different areas: how cyberbullying is defined, what causes it, do personality traits influence someone’s involvement, how direct or indirect experiences affect it, and what kind of impact it has on people. Instead of trying to explain what cyberbullying is, their research focuses on why it happens, who is affected by it, and what can be done to reduce the harm. Instead of collecting any new data, the authors reviewed existing studies, case reports, and studies.

            One of the main things that stood out to me was how complicated cyberbullying is because so many different things can influence it. People often behave differently online than they do in real life. It becomes “easy” to hide behind a fake profile and to bully someone without actually getting caught. We need more inclusive research and better support systems that are actually helpful for those who are affected the most by it. For example, the article mentions how LGBTQ+ youth and racial minorities are more likely to become victims of cyberbullying. These groups are often marginalized, which means that they face more discrimination but hardly have any support systems in place. This can be done by creating clear definitions and finding better ways for us to prevent cyberbullying. The authors point out that it is not just about stopping the behavior but more so about understanding why it keeps happening and making sure that the solutions work for everyone, no matter their age or gender.

            This article connects to the neutralization theory discussed in class because it talks about how people are justifying cyberbullying by downplaying the harm it can cause or shifting the blame. Social media has made it so easy for people to pretend like they can be someone else or even stay anonymous. Behavior and personality traits play such a big role in this, which can be linked to how people might feel justified in targeting others online. People come up with all kinds of excuses just to avoid feeling guilty.

Sommestad, T., & Karlzén, H. (2024). The unpredictability of phishing susceptibility: Results from a repeated measures experiment. Journal of Cybersecurity, 10(1). https://doi.org/10.1093/cybsec/tyae021

This article looks at how people look at phishing emails and tries to investigate why it is that some people are more vulnerable to scams than others. The researchers used different email styles and several psychological tricks to see if it made a difference in how people would respond to them. Some of the tricks were pushing the urgency of clicking the file or sounding authoritative. They sent several phishing emails to the same group of people over a few months and found that the results were inconsistent, as they could not pinpoint the exact cause of someone clicking on the emails.

I think this article relates to the principles of social sciences because it explores how people make decisions in certain situations. If we are feeling stressed or are distracted, are we more likely to fall for a scam? Human behavior is really hard to predict, even when we think we can. Research like this reveals just how unpredictable it actually is. Our behavior changes constantly, especially depending on the situation and context.

   Their research lasted 16 months, during which they sent phishing emails to the same 102 participants. Their research questions focused on whether certain email features would increase the likelihood of a response. They were under the idea that different influence techniques would report a higher number of responses. The three hypotheses studied in their research were: scam theory (Creation of a Fake story/ scenario), personalization (whether the email was personalized to elicit a specific reaction), and influence techniques (whether a different response would occur if the message sounded urgent). Their data showed, however, that even by personalizing the emails and adding certain triggers, responses were so different that a pattern couldn’t be created, which again shows how complex human decisions really are.

            While this research did not focus on marginalized groups, it does show us that because human behavior is so unpredictable, we might need to adjust the current social engineering training. I think this research made it clear that we shouldn’t focus on who is vulnerable to this type of attack and why, but that we need to do more research on the unpredictability of human behavior towards these scams. By getting a better understanding of this, we can adjust training and make it more geared towards human behavior.