Cyberbullying in the student population: Experiences, perceptions, and exposure

The paper focuses on examining how students perceive and evaluate cyber­bullying in the academic environment, while the research aims to investigate their experiences, perceptions, and exposure to cyberbullying, as well as the relations­hips between these aspects and demographic and contextual variables. The sample comprised 106 undergraduate students enrolled in the Pedagogy study program at the Faculty of Philosophy, University of Nis, and the study was conducted during June and July 2025. The data were analyzed using nonparametric tests (Mann-Whit­ney U and Kruskal-Wallis tests) and Spearman’s correlation coefficient. The fin­dings indicate that personal experiences with cyberbullying are significantly asso­ciated with perceptions of this phenomenon, with students who had been victims or perpetrators of cyberbullying reporting higher scores on the composite scale. Differences were also identified with respect to the year of study, whereas the type of secondary school attended and time spent on social media did not show a stati­stically significant effect. The findings highlight the need for preventive activities in higher education.