Influence of age, gender and personality on young adolescents’ reporting of online risks to third parties

Young people’s exposure to various types of risk on the Internet—including interactions with strangers, inappropriate material, and cyberbullying—is an increasing social concern. Exposure to online risks has been found to increase with age and to correlate with certain personality characteristics. However, adolescents’ own reporting to adults of the risks that they encounter has been much less studied, even though effective communication about online risks is vital to help young people manage them. A survey on online risks, along with a short Big Five personality test (the TIPI), was administered to 193 Colombian adolescents (101 female), aged between 12-15 years and in 7th or 9th grade. Age-related hypotheses were that exposure to online risks and online conflicts would rise between 7th and 9th grade, while reporting of risk exposure to adults would fall. The age-related hypotheses were supported: 9th-graders were exposed to significantly more online risks and participated in significantly more online conflicts than 7th-graders, while reporting such incidents significantly less often to adults (both parents and teachers). However, the only personality-based hypothesis to be firmly supported was that extraversion would be associated with more reporting of online risks. Multiple regression further showed that demographic factors (age and gender) taken together explained significantly more of the variation in online risk exposure, conflict participation and risk reporting than did all personality factors together. Results suggest that young people undergo increased exposure to online risks and conflicts in early-to-middle adolescence, accompanied by a reduction in reporting of such incidents to adults.