Cyberbullying and Peer Influences in Online and Offline Contexts

Abstract Investigating the impact of peer influence on delinquency perpetration poses new challenges due to the emergence of online platforms, which provide new opportunities for connecting with peers and engaging in delinquent activities. This study investigates the impact of peer influences on cyberbullying, employing two sociological frameworks: the opportunity perspective with the Routine Activity Approach of General Deviance (Osgood et al. 1996) and the normative approach, specifically the Differential Association Theory (Sutherland 1939, 1947). Drawing on data from a representative student survey conducted in 2015 by the Criminological Research Institute of Lower Saxony (N = 10,638), we examine the impact of unstructured socializing with peers in the online context and associations with delinquent peers within the classroom context on the perpetration of cyberbullying by calculating logistic regression models. Furthermore, we model interaction effects and conduct graphical analyses of predicted margins to determine whether delinquent peer associations in the classroom context moderate the relationship between virtual unstructured socializing with peers and cyberbullying perpetration. Our findings provide evidence that aligns with both the opportunity perspective and the normative approach, as significant effects of virtual unstructured socializing with peers and offline exposure to virtual peer delinquency were separately and simultaneously identifiable. The data analysis did not reveal a statistically significant moderating effect of cyberbullies within the classroom environment on the relationship between virtual unstructured socializing with peers and cyberbullying perpetration. The implications of these findings for further research studies are discussed.