Empathy in the Prevention of Cyber-aggression

Abstract

The development of life skills is an important factor in the prevention of cyber-aggression. The most important skill is the ability of empathize. Empathy leads to greater sensitivity to other people, altruism, care, tolerance, and acceptance of differences. This ability is thus rightly desirable in a pluralistic cyberspace, allowing people to function together and express opinions without mutual vilification, humiliation, or abuse. The generation of “screenagers” is significantly threatened by modern socio-pathological phenomena. Emotional laxity and failure of emotional life are to blame for all of this. The study presents the results of research on the verification of the effectiveness of preventive activities aimed at the empathetic experience of pupils in the natural and digital environment. The research sample consisted of 30 pupils aged 9 to 10 years. Half of the pupils (N=15) represented the experimental group and the other half (N=15) the control group. The ratio of girls and boys was approximately equal. The research results showed that the experimental group reported a significantly higher level of empathy than the control group after completing the preventive activities (p = 0.04 > α = 0.05). The preventive program used in our research included self-experience activities, which, according to our expectations, increased the ability of empathy in the experimental group. At the same time, our findings confirm previous research verifying the mutual correlation between the level of empathy and experiences with cyber-aggression.