Cyberspace as a generator of changes in the aggressive-victim role

• Identification of new aggressive-victims profiles in the cyberspace.
• Synergistic relationship between abuse suffered and abuse perpetrated.
• Previous abuses predicting the violent behavior of aggressive-victims.
• Identification of potential risk factors for violent behavior in cyberspace.

The interaction of adolescents’ presential and cyberspace contexts accentuates the emergence of the aggressive-victim role. This profile takes on new dimensions as a result of the many combinations involved in the co-existence of bullying and cyberbullying. The twofold object of the present work was to: (i) determine the prevalence of victim-aggressive in the various forms that this role might be found in the context of bullying and cyberbullying; and (ii) explore the synergistic relationship established between the type and frequency of the abuse suffered and the type and frequency of the aggression perpetrated. The sample consisted of 1648 adolescents of from 12 to 16 years in age. The instrument used to acquire the data was a questionnaire. The results revealed the existence of four categories of aggressive victims: traditional aggressive-victims, aggressivecybervictims, cyberaggresive-victims, and cyberaggresive-cybervictims. The types of bullying suffered and perpetrated were found to be directly related and the frequencies of these two classes of attack were positively correlated. This allows one to predict the cyberspace and presential behaviour that will be displayed by adolescents who are being subjected to certain types of bullying and cyberbullying.