U.S. upset about online harassment 2020

According to a September 2020 survey of online adults in the United States, stalking was considered to be extremely upsetting by 27 percent of respondents who experienced online harassment. Sustained and sexual harassment were also among the type of abuse that negatively impacted the affected respondents the most. Receiving threats of physical violence was considered very or extremely upsetting by roughly 40 percent, whereas types of online abuse with higher victimization rates, like purposeful embarrassment and offensive name-calling, registered a lower share of extremely upset responders.

Impact of different types of online harassment according to cyber bullying victims in the United States as of September 2020

Characteristic	Extremely upsetting	Very upsetting
Stalking	27%	22%
Sustained harassment	27%	19%
Sexual harassment	25%	20%
Physical threat	22%	21%
Purposeful embarrassment	14%	17%
Offensive name-calling	11%	12%

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Release date

January 2021

More information

Region

United States

Survey time period

September 8 to 13, 2020

Number of respondents

10,093 respondents

Age group

18 years and older

Special properties

relative to most recent encounter

Method of interview

Online panel

Supplementary notes

Data concerning the 41 percent of responding U.S. adults who experienced online harassment, relatively to their most recent encounter with different types of online abuse.

Original question: "Thinking about your most recent experience, how upsetting was this, if at all?"

Data from respondents who did not give an answer are not shown.

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