Authors: Philip E. Banyard, Jean Underwood There are concerns that the Internet has created new risks for our society and in particular for young people. We argue that the way we frame these risks is affected by the way we view young people, in particular their maturity and ability to make choices for themselves.

1. In-depth
E-learning: The Dark Side?
Authors There are concerns that the Internet has created new risks for our society and in par-
ticular for young people. We argue that the way we frame these risks is affected by the
Philip Banyard
way we view young people, in particular their maturity and ability to make choices for
Reader in Psychology
Division of Psychology, themselves.
Nottingham Trent University,
UK A recurrent metaphor concerns the ‘dark-side’ of the Internet which draws on ancient
phil.banyard@ntu.ac.uk and modern myths about the nature of good and evil. We argue that a knowledge
divide between adults and youth has developed concerning the use of digital technolo-
Jean Underwood gies. Digital natives are able to change the power balance of our society: this threatens
Professor of Psychology the status quo and therefore has created a moral panic.
Division of Psychology,
Nottingham Trent University, The key areas of concern for risk include: cyber-bullying, game-playing, social network-
UK ing, sexual solicitation and addictive behaviours. Although these areas present real
jean.underwood@ntu.ac.uk
risks, we note that young people are moderating their own behaviour as they develop
understandings about the possibilities offered by new technologies. The answer to
Tags our concerns should not be to seek to control digital technologies, but rather to edu-
cate adults and young people about what is possible and appropriate, so that they can
risk, learning, moral panic, choose to become responsible, digital citizens of the 21st century.
digital citizens, cyber-bullying
1. Introduction
“There is no dark side of the moon, really. Matter of fact, it’s all dark.”
Pink Floyd, Dark Side of the Moon
Does the Internet have a dark side? Should we be protecting ourselves and our children from
the dangers of the Internet or encouraging them to embrace the opportunity for knowledge
and community that it offers? The way we frame our answers to this question is structured
by our implicit assumptions about human nature and our understandings about self and
society. In this article we will look at these assumptions and review the scientific evidence to
see how much we can bring these two sets of understandings together.
One assumption concerns the power of persuasion and hence the ability of individuals to
resist influences from powerful others. One view sees the person as passive, malleable and
gullible, and the other sees the person as active and capable of making decisions and being
discriminating. The volume of books about persuasion on the psychology, business and self-
help shelves illustrates our concern and interest in the issue. A second assumption about
human behaviour, crucial to our response to the Internet, concerns our view of children and
the maturity they are able to show when given the opportunity to do so. This view affects the
level of responsibility we allow them to exercise.
These assumptions about human behaviour are only partially framed by the scientific evi-
dence available because they touch our core beliefs about what it means to be human. The
‘dark-side’ is therefore a useful phrase to explore because it refers to a modern retelling
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2. In-depth
of judeo-christian ideas about people. The ‘force’ (in the film just found some unwanted material on one of the machines
Star Wars) refers to a universal and metaphysical power that we and was waiting for [the Local Education Authority] to send
have access to, but whose strength is so great that it can turn someone to check it out. The school is assiduous in its at-
us from good people to bad if we don’t use it wisely. Use it un- tempts to keep unwanted material away from the pupils and
wisely and you will go to the ‘dark side’ and become consumed to make sure that they do not inadvertently come across an
by your own darkness such as addiction or a lust for power. This offensive site.” (unpublished research notes)
central story of good and evil about how we see ourselves and
The contrast between teaching children to click-away from in-
our society has a profound effect on the general response to
appropriate material and training all staff to monitor children
the Internet.
and close down the system if there are any concerns could not
be more marked. This was not a unique observation and we re-
2. Perceived risks corded similar contrasting approaches in neighbouring schools
We live in an increasingly risk averse society, and this is par- in other parts of the UK. The different approaches, we argue,
ticularly true in relation to the protection of children. The dif- have less to do with understandings about the Internet than
ferent focus that schools adopt to safety concerns about the with assumptions about human behaviour.
Internet was illustrated by two neighbouring primary schools
that we visited in 2006 as part of a research project for the UK 3. What are the risks?
government (Underwood et al., 2007). Situated in rural East An-
We will look at some of the risks that have been identified to be
glia with similar catchments, demographics and rated as above
associated with the use of internet and then consider whether
average on national criteria, each viewed the computers in their
these represent new challenges for educators or whether they
schools in very different ways. Our contemporaneous observa-
are new expressions of old risks.
tions which we report here are in stark contrast. The first school
was on the ‘opportunity’ end of the spectrum,
3.1 Cyber-bullying
“The school is delightfully unaware of technical details and
only showed a passing recognition of the local broadband Online aggression is a very real danger. In a study of 501 regular
consortium (e2bn) who probably provide their broadband Internet users (aged 10–17 years), 19% were involved in online
link. […] aggression, 3% were aggressor/ targets, 4% targets only, and
12% online aggressors only. Aggressor/targets reported charac-
The school believes that most children have access to com- teristics similar to off-line bully/ victims. Furthermore, cyberbul-
puters at home and many have access to the Internet. Access lying rapidly transfers to real life, leaving children with no place
at school is largely in lesson time though pupils are allowed to hide and teachers with an undercurrent of activity they have
to use the unlocked ICT suite in break-times with permission. no control over (Ybarra & Mitchell, 2004). There are clear sex
The school could not name who carried out the blocking of differences in the acceptance of risk and in cyberbullying, with
unwanted Internet sites. It was presumed to be the LEA [Lo- young males being greater both greater risk takers and more
cal Education Authority]. The school had not experienced any involved in cyberbullying (Dehue et al., 2008).
major problems with the Internet though it was accepted
that unwanted material would occasionally slip through the The question to consider is whether this represents a new and
filters, for example a search for material on waterfalls elic- substantial hazard for children or whether it is a different ex-
ited some mildly erotic images. The policy of the school is to pression of the social negotiation that is part of every child’s
encourage children to respond responsibly to such material development. Furthermore we have to consider whether regu-
and to delete and report it. There has been no need to take lation by adults is the best strategy as in involves the invasion of
any further action so far.” the private worlds of young people, and whether leaving space
for the development of social skills in these young people will
The second school was on the ‘danger’ end of the spectrum provide greater long-term benefit.
“The classroom computers and the mini-suite were not being
used on the day of the visit because the ICT coordinator had
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3.2 Game playing 3.4 Social networking
As the developing child acquires social norms about acceptable Do people behave different when communicating online to
behavior from his or her experiences, any activity that promotes how they do in face-to-face situations? Online interactions
violence is likely to be a risk factor for violent behavior. The re- have been found to generate more self-disclosure and foster
petitive playing of violent games has been reported as leading deeper personal questionings than face-to-face communication
to more aggressive behaviour and the desensitisation of the in- (Tidwell & Walther, 2002). Underwood, et al. (2011) identified 3
dividual demonstrating by decreased brain activity when shown types of Facebook users in young people. One group, the broad-
scenes of real violence. (Bartholew, et al., 2006). Meta-analyses, casters exhibited worrying high risk behaviour which tended to
combining data from hundreds of individual studies, confirm an focus on one-to-many low quality communications, in which
association between exposure to violence in media and antiso- self–promotion and lying were clearly evident. Could it be that
cial tendencies such as aggression (Huesmann, 2009). Although social networking facilities encourage risky behaviour in vulner-
Ferguson (2010) asserts that much of the research on the link able young people and open them up to the possibilities of dan-
between gaming and aggression is inconsistent and hampered gerous relationships and encounters? Another feature of social
by poor methodologies and the intrusion of ideology and dog- networking is the ability to know ever more details about your
ma. partner including their changing moods (status on Facebook),
where they are (Find my iphone) and who they are with. It is
The risks associated with less violent video games, particularly
perhaps no surprise that heavy Facebook use is associated with
those marketed to young children are not well understood, but
increased levels of jealousy (Muise, et al., 2009).
recent research has shown experimental evidence that video
games may displace after-school activities that have educa- Use of social networking sites has been associated with greater
tional value and may interfere with the development of reading levels of social capital, or benefits made possible by the exist-
and writing skills in some children (Weis & Ceranksoky, 2010). ence of a social structure. For example, Ellison et al. (2007) have
It is worth reflecting, however, whether previous generations of show that students who are active on Facebook feel higher lev-
children have also turned away from educational activities to els of both forms of social capital, and the effects are greater for
play football or tiddlywinks or French skipping. students with lower self-esteem. However, the perceived ben-
efits may depend on the nature of the interactions. A survey of
3.3 Unwelcome sexual solicitation 1,193 students found users who engaged in directed interaction
with others, such as leaving wall posts or messaging friends,
It is difficult to collect reliable data on sexual solicitation via the reported lowered feelings of loneliness and increased feelings
Internet. One large-scale study in the USA (Finkelhor, Mitchell of social capital. On the other hand, students who engaged in
and Wolak, 2000) carried out interviews with a sample of 1,501 passive viewing of others’ content, such as status updates and
youths aged 10 to 17 years who use the Internet regularly (at photos reported feelings of increased loneliness and reduced
least once a month for the past 6 months). They reported that social capital (Burke, Marlow & Lento, 2010).
19 per cent of their sample received an unwanted sexual solici-
tation or approach over the Internet in the previous year. The
3.5 Addictive behaviour
definition was extremely broad and included someone trying
to get them to unwillingly talk about sex; asking unwanted inti- Addiction is a perceived danger of Internet use that is fuelled by
mate questions; requests to do sexual things they did not want parental concerns about the amount of time their children ap-
to do; and invitations to run away. In addition, 3 per cent (one in pear to spend online. Recent surveys suggest that about 2% of
seven of all the solicitations) included an attempt to contact the youth can be described as having Internet addiction with 10%–
youth via telephone/postal mail and/or in person so the vast 20% engaging in at-risk Internet use (Johansson & Götestam,
majority were associated with the Internet. However, the sur- 2004; Cao & Su, 2007, Christakis et al., 2011). There is some
vey found few sexually orientated relationships between young evidence that adolescents and college students that are heavy
people and adults. This last point appears to support the idea users of the internet have lower self-esteem and are more so-
that children are able to insulate themselves from the more se- cially disinhibited (Niemz, et al., 2005), but a recent review of
rious hazards. the area (Widyanto & Griffiths, 2009) concluded that if internet
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addiction does indeed exist, it only affects a relatively small pro- 2004) because it is also strongly associated with risk-taking, sen-
portion of the population and there is very little evidence that it sation seeking and reckless behaviour. All of which can have life-
is problematic among adolescents. changing consequences for the individual. While adolescents
are good at assessing risk under conditions of low arousal and
4. Digital natives and moral panics cool emotions, under intense emotional arousal they can fail to
make a responsible choice.
There are perhaps two features of the digital world that en-
hance the fears of the general population. In the first instance The fear about young people and their behaviour has been a
it belongs to the young. Yes, we all use digital technologies but recurrent theme. Sociologists observe the moral panic (Cohen,
the learning environment has been transformed by them and as 2002) that is created when people fear a threat to the social
Prensky (2001) notes today’s young people “are no longer the order. The term was originally used to describe the reaction to
people our educational system was designed to teach” (page 1). youth culture as it developed mid-way through the twentieth
They “are all ‘native speakers’ of the digital language of comput- century as young people became independent consumers in the
ers, video games and the Internet” (page 1). In our research on new age of prosperity. In today’s world it is digital technologies
the impact of digital technologies in schools (Underwood, et al., that present a clear and present danger to the social order and
2007) we observed a class of 27 four and five year old children the demonisation of the Internet is a response to that threat.
log on to their laptops and develop new versions of the song
The digital technologies represent a threat to the social order
‘Twinkle, twinkle little star’ for a full hour despite having very
because they create a shift in power. There is a loss of adult
limited reading and writing skills. For example it was noted at
power over children because much of the digital word is a mys-
the time,
tery to parents. There is also the democratisation of knowledge
“During a demonstration to the whole class, the teacher had that the Internet offers through facilities such as Twitter. Gov-
difficulty in making the programme work. She was able to ernments, even repressive governments, are no longer able to
problem-solve in front of the class and finally demonstrate control the flow of information. The loss of power from people
how to move the words around on screen and put them into and organisations who are used to exerting it creates uncertain-
cells in the on-screen grid. This did not trouble either the ty and fear.
teacher or the children. The solution was to move the cur-
sor over the cell and then press SHIFT and LEFT CLICK at the 5. What’s to be done?
same time to select it. This was initially taxing for the chil-
To reiterate, we live in a risk averse society and so one of the
dren when they returned to their laptops but some of them
first responses to a threat is to restrict access to digital tech-
picked it up very quickly and were soon confidently putting
nologies and to try and control them. The metaphor we would
text into the various cells.” (unpublished research notes).
suggest here, however, is of the outdoor world. Mountains are
These digital natives have a different experience of dealing with very good to look at but can be dangerous if you climb up them.
information and technology to previous generations. Technol- People sometimes get lost on them and occasionally fall off
ogy use is associated both with transient changes in arousal/ them. There is no suggestion that we should fence them off and
mood and with long-term changes in behavior/brain function. protect people from themselves, rather we urge walkers to have
Prensky (2001) goes on to suggest that this change is having an the right kit and to develop relevant skills such as the ability to
effect on brain structure but whether this is the case or not, it is read maps. However, with the Internet we consider this a pos-
clear that young people bring a different skill set to school and sibility because of the moral panic that has been generated to
to life in general. demonise it.
The second feature that enhances fears about the digital tech- If we consider again the risks associated with the Internet that
nologies comes from this association of the changes in technol- we looked at above, then we must ask to what extent these
ogy with the age-group who are the principle users. Adolescence risks are exclusive to the Internet, and how great the risk really
is a period of rapid increases in physical and mental capabilities. is. We must also ask who is at risk. The youngest children have
Yet, despite having the cognitive ability to understand risk, mor- low exposure, but risk rises as children approach adolescence.
tality rates increase by over 200% in this dangerous age (Dahl, As Ferguson (2010) remarks we are at risk that concerns about
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technology use could move beyond objective examination and 6. Are Internet dangers different to real-
into the realm of ideology, dogma and moral panic life dangers?
One aspect of the moral panic concerns the impact of video Many hazards and associated risks offline are relatively well
from television and YouTube. Newspaper reports suggest that known and understood but we have yet to fully explore whether
over ten hours of video is posted on YouTube every minute and online hazards and risks are essentially the same or, in some
the 20 million daily viewers in the UK watch more than 3.6 bil- important ways, different from those in the non-virtual world.
lion videos online every month (Johnson, 2008). The fear is that However, one area where there appears to be a difference in
we have created a cult of the amateur where what we see on the level and quality of risk between off and online worlds is the
YouTube is given equal weight to the considered evaluation of area of cyberbullying. Bullying is a phenomena in all walks of life
journalists. If we all become amateur journalists and critics then but technology brings a new dimension to this problem in that
there are no experts, and the prevailing view is formed by the the victims of bullying feel unable to escape and the perpetra-
loudest and most opinionated (Keen, 2007). tors feel invulnerable due to anonymity.
A counter view comes from the report on the Video Republic Recent data from the UK suggests that 19% of children between
by the UK think-tank Demos (Hannon et al, 2008). They note the ages of 9 and 19 say that have been bullied in the last 12
the problems with the rise of video culture but comment that it months. Interestingly for this debate when you break down that
offers hope for new forms of democratic expression and partici- figure you find that 13% of those instances were face to face,
pation. They provide many recommendations for how we can 3% were via mobile phones and only 6% were via the Internet
embrace the technology and better prepare our young people (Livingstone et al., 2011). The report, which included data from
for work and for life. For example they recommend countries across Europe goes on to note that “Bullying online
appears more common in countries where bullying in general is
“Schools, universities and businesses should prepare young
more common (rather than, say, in countries where the Internet
people for an era where CVs may well be obsolete, enabling
is more established).” (page 62)
them to manage their online reputation. They should pass
on guidance from recruitment agencies and other experts to The evidence for the other areas we suggested above, addictive
help them make informed decisions about what they put on- behaviours, game playing, social networking and unwelcome
line and contribute to the Video Republic.” (page 66) sexual solicitation is much less clear. These are all issues for off-
line behaviour and so our focus on the potential damage cre-
The Demos report also uses the ubiquitous ‘dark-side’ rhetoric
ated by the Internet means we are focusing on the medium and
but they come up with a solution to the fear of harmful and
not the real problem. If we return to the ‘dark-side’ metaphor
objectionable material.
then just as with these myths, the dark side is not out there but
“Currently the tools we have to distinguish between harmful inside people. And this brings us back to the assumptions we
content are too blunt: content is either deemed ‘inappropri- hold about people, their ability to deal with persuasion and the
ate’ or is for over-18s only. People should have the ability to responsibility they have for their actions. Do we see people as
select age-rating systems for videos on websites. The aver- passive, malleable and gullible, or as active, discriminating and
age of these ratings could then be translated into a region’s capable of making intelligent decisions?
film-rating classification system.” (page 70)
In other words, use the facility developed by TripAdvisor and
7. Dealing with risk
Amazon and other consumer sites to allow users to post evalu- We argue in this paper that the Internet does not pose a spe-
ations and view the evaluations of others. The expert judge is cial threat in and of itself. It is not the dark side but is another
replaced by the collective expertise of the users. Although there stage on which people display the full range of social and inter-
are concerns about the ability of the crowd to make good deci- personal behavior. As such it is also the stage where some nega-
sions (Keen, 2007) it is part of the modern democratisation of tive and distressing behaviours can occur. The issue we argue is
knowledge that allows us to comment on things and events and about identifying who is particularly vulnerable to these risks
see the comments of others. and how we can provide some structure that limits the ex-
tremes of negative behavior.
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The first challenge is for adults to be aware of what happens of students had private profiles of which less than 10% allowed
on the Internet and to offer the same guidance for interactions some level of restricted searching, while Dey, Jelveh and Ross
online that they would offer for face to face interactions. Par- (2012) report that in 2010 less than 20% of their 1,700 users hid
ents appear to be overconfident, for example, about the extent their friend lists but that this had increased to over half using
of bullying. Among the 3% of European children who reported this form of self-protection some 15 months later. This move
that they had been bullied on the Internet, less than a third of away from the default privacy settings to more restrictive set-
their parents (29%) were aware of this with over half asserting tings is evidence of increasing awareness of privacy and security
that their child had not been bullied (Livingstone et al., 2011). issues had increased. Our young can and do learn. We need to
provide convincing evidence for them to so.
As noted above, the Internet belongs to the young and parents
and teachers are only partially aware of what children are do-
ing. This lack of knowledge can create a sense of threat in those 8. Conclusions
who are aware of their lack of knowledge. It is worth noting We argue here that it is important for teachers and parents to
however that a detailed analysis of the 3% of children who were make themselves more familiar with the Internet and hence of
bullied online found that over 90% reported that they were not the potential risks. Currently in the UK half of parents with chil-
bothered by the event after a few days (Livingstone et al., 2011). dren aged 5-15 who use the Internet believe that they know less
They were commonly able to do something about it by, for ex- about the Internet than their children (Ofcom, 2011). It is clear
ample, blocking the person who sent the message. So the threat that parents are becoming more aware of the risk and the 2011
is out there, but it is much less than the face-to-face threat and Ofcom survey showed an increase in homes using passwords
children are commonly able to find ways of dealing with it. on their multichannel televisions (36% to 44%) but no change
in the use of parental controls on Internet use (steady at 39%).
Further evidence on the different approaches of parents and
Simple controls and observations of behavior can manage the
children comes from the ongoing Ofcom Media Literacy Studies
majority of risks.
in the UK (Ofcom, 2011). In the most recent study they find that
parents are more likely to be concerned about the television We argue here that the most effective way to manage risk on
content their child watches (31%) compared to Internet content the Internet is to help the young to gain an understanding of
(23%). The issue to consider is whether the reduced concern the risks related to the Interent and then trust in the maturity
about Internet use is justified. The responses of the children to of young people, and trust in their overall judgement and social
the survey suggest that there are, indeed, reasons to be cheer- skills to negotiate these news ways of relating and behaving.
ful. For example, close to half of 12-15 year olds who use search Apgar (2006) coined the term risk intelligence, that is the ca-
engines make critical judgements about the results concerning pacity to learn about risk from experience. We need to expose
the truthfulness of sites. Also when asked about their attitude the young to risk in safe environments such as schools so that
towards sharing personal information online, the majority of they become risk intelligent. In this way they can be guided to
children in this age range said they would either want nobody become responsible, digital citizens of the twenty first century.
or only friends to see their information (Ofcom 2011).
The second challenge is to help young people to understand the
risks related to the Internet. That such an understanding is de-
veloping is shown by a set of studies on student use of social
networking sites. In 2005 Gross and Acquisti (2005) surveyed
4,000 student Facebook users and found a disturbing degree of
naivety about personal information. These students openly pro-
vided sensitive data: over 50% broadcast their address and very
few used the privacy settings. By 2007 Fogel and Nehmad (2009)
found only 10% of students were openly distributing their per-
sonal address. Use of the privacy settings is also increasing. In
2007 Lewis, Kaufman and Christakis (2008) found that a third
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