Abstract:

Digital art therapy is a new form of art therapy, which uses digital technologies and can take place in the online environment. The objective of the present study was to reduce cyberbullying using digital art therapy. In the presented article we describe the issue of digital art therapy and present the author's three-month art therapy program. The effectiveness of this program was evaluated in the context of reducing the manifestations of cyberbullying. The survey sample consisted of 49 pupils of the 7th year of the elementary school (aged 12-13). The implementation of the program took place during distance (mostly online) education caused by the ongoing second wave of the COVID 19 pandemic. Two groups of pupils were formed, forming an experimental and a control group. In both groups, a high incidence of cyberbullying was found during the first wave of the pandemic. The specific forms of cyberbullying that were identified before the experiment were: excluding a classmate from the group on social networks, not sharing the information needed to teach and complete tasks, sharing offensive and ridiculous comments, false gossip and photos of classmates. According to statistics, up to 73.6 percent of pupils and students in Slovakia have experienced cyberbullying. As part of our research, we used a self-proven questionnaire (Questionnaire on cyberbullying) to test the effect of digital art therapy in the experimental and control group. The digital art therapy was introduced in 12 sessions over 3 months. The result of analysis showed that the existence of cyberbullying among experimental group was reduced but not the control group. The implications of present study are discussed to conclude.

Keywords:

Digital art therapy, art therapy program, prevention, cyberbullying.