Cyberbullying is a "huge problem" for adolescents in the United States and one that is happening more often than face-to-face bullying, according to a researcher who visited Chattanooga on Monday.
"Bullying is of course not a new phenomenon -- it's been around for thousands of years," said David Walsh, a child psychologist, author and professor at the University of Minnesota. "What is new, however, is the technology with which to do it."
Walsh discussed cyberbullying and other problems that rapidly evolving technologies are causing for the country's youth as part of the Tennessee Association of Independent Schools Biennial Conference.
The crowd of roughly 100 teachers was awed by statistics presented by Walsh at Baylor School.
Research indicates that 14 percent of adolescents report they have received face-to-face bullying, while 48 percent say they have been bullied via virtual message, said Walsh, a former high school teacher. Those messages could be over social networking websites, cell phones, e-mail or a host of other communication mediums, he said.
There are more children who are cyberbullied than the ones actually doing it, Walsh said.
"What I always tell parents is you should be more worried that your kid will be a perpetrator," he said. "For every one victim, there are at least three perpetrators because kids often do this as a group."
The "rumor mill" spreads extremely quickly because of the instant dissemination provided by the Internet, he said.
Walsh referenced the case of Tyler Clementi, who was an 18-year-old Rutgers University student when he committed suicide in September after classmates broadcast an intimate encounter of his over the Internet.
"That video, everybody on campus was looking at it within an hour," Walsh said.
After Walsh's presentation, attendees offered their reactions.
"The scope of it is scary -- that it can instantly be disseminated to so many people," said Baylor physics teacher Sandy Gardner. "It can instantly make that person a target. You would feel like you don't have a friend in the world."
Deborah Strombers, a teacher at Brainerd Baptist School, said the statistics Walsh conveyed were "startling."
"I hope that if [cyberbullying] does happen in our school," she said, "it will be taken care of."
Contact staff writer Michael Stone at mstone@timesfreepress.com or 423-757-6673.