The Status of Yik Yak and Cyberbullying at Creighton University
Michael Kotrous
Media Research
Rich Johnson
Wednesday, December 17, 2014
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In September 2014, the Creighton Students Union executive committee
addressed an open letter to the Creighton University community asking students to
immediately cease using a new social networking application named Yik Yak. The letter
expressed concerns about an observed increase in the harassment of students, faculty
and organizations on Yik Yak. The letter described the content on Yik Yak as “negative
and anti-mission” and implied the anonymity granted to the app’s users was to blame
for the increase in cyberbullying incidents on Creighton’s campus.1 Following the letter,
the Creighton Students Union (hereafter CSU) publicized a campaign coined “Above
the Yak.” Buttons were handed out, and a petition was circulated in which signers
pledged to uphold the Jesuit values of Creighton University and stop the anonymous
harassment of students and student organizations online.2
Subsequent letters to the editor and opinion columns published in The
Creightonian, the university’s student newspaper, called into question CSU and its
“Above the Yak” campaign. A letter to the editor criticized the campaign because it
focused on silencing the negative comments instead of addressing negative attitudes
towards students and student organizations (Kramme and Weiner, 2014). An opinion
column published the week prior raised similar concerns in addition to questioning
CSU’s motivation for the letter (Spillane and Dongilli, 2014). CSU’s open letter, dated
Sept. 7, 2014, was published one day after its annual Fall Leadership Conference, at
which many posts on Yik Yak critical of the conference and CSU were sent.
To gain insight into student opinions on the use of Yik Yak and the “Above the
Yak” campaign, I distributed a survey in December 2014 completed by 84 Creighton
1. The original letter could not be found on the Creighton Students Union’s website nor its Facebook page.
Full text of the open letter, formatted in the same way as the original letter, is available at
http://michaelkotrous.com/csu-letter.
2. As of Dec. 13, 2014, the petition had 347 signatures, 13.9 percent of its 2,500 signatures goal.
Kotrous 2
students. The survey attempted to measure opinions on Yik Yak, cyberbullying and
CSU’s “Above the Yak” campaign. The detailed results of the survey will be presented
later. The paper will begin with an overview of Yik Yak. The following section will
cover previous research focusing on the use of social media by college students and
cyberbullying. Then, the results of the survey will be presented, followed by discussion
of the implications of those results and my concluding thoughts.
What is Yik Yak?
Yik Yak, launched in November 2013, is a social media service that allows users
to upload posts and comments anonymously. The only information known about the
authors of posts and comments is their location, as only other Yik Yak users within a
1.5-mile radius of posts’ original locations can see and comment on posts (Parkinson,
2014). The small geographic area in which users can communicate on Yik Yak has made
the application very popular on college campuses because it serves as a forum almost
exclusive to students attending the same university. In its first year, Yik Yak has grown
its user base from a handful of universities in the Southeast United States to over 1,000
universities across the U.S. (Crook, 2014; Parkinson, 2014).
The posts on Yik Yak, called “yaks,” are rated by other users with upvotes and
downvotes. Posts with the most upvotes are listed as “hot” and made more visible to
other users, while posts or comments downvoted to a net score of negative five are
removed. The application’s developers cite giving users the ability to downvote
harassing or offensive remarks as one of the ways in which its pools of users can selfregulate. In addition to downvoting, users are allowed to report yaks for violating the
rules users agree to when signing up to use the application (see Figure 1). “Yik Yak says
it removes the majority of reported posts almost immediately to combat racist,
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homophobic or generally abusive content” (Parkinson, 2014). Users whose posts or
comments are regularly downvoted or reported are subject to suspension from Yik Yak
during which they are not allowed to use the application. Critics argue that the current
methods by which users can police each other are not enough to stop the cyberbullying
that occurs on the application. After all, harassing yaks will not be removed if other
users upvote such posts. One way that Yik Yak has responded to concerns about
cyberbullying is by enabling “geo-fences” that block access to locations near secondary
schools (Rafla et al., 2014).
Cyberbullying
Cyberbullying has become the focus of much academic research and media
coverage in recent years after a series nationally covered teenage suicides in which the
victims were harassed online in the weeks or months leading up to their deaths.
Cyberbullying is typically defined as the harassment of a person “through email, instant
messaging, social media, in a chat room, on a website, in an online game, or through a
text message sent to a cell phone” (Whittaker and Kowalski, 2014, p. 14). Simply put,
cyberbullying is harm inflicted through the use of electronic devices (Rafla et al., 2014).
Yik Yak has regularly been criticized because it grants users anonymity, which
critics argue increases cyberbullying among its users. Anonymous attacks have been
shown to be generally much harsher than in-person attacks and more difficult to escape,
as much cyberbullying occurs outside school (Rafla et. al, 2014; Smith et al., 2008).
Online forums provide a larger audience for bullying incidents, which can increase
harm to the harassed (Sticca and Perren, 2013). In addition, the victim is less able to
monitor the harassment (sub-tweeting, for instance. Cyberbullying is believed to cause
higher rates of depression among adolescents, especially girls (Rafla et al., 2014).
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Despite all this, anonymous attacks are less likely to be reported and are viewed
less negatively by bystanders than traditional forms of bullying. A study showed the
online harassment directed towards peers is viewed more negatively than attacks
towards unknown users, random people or celebrities (Whittaker and Kowalski, 2014).
Thus, anonymity on Yik Yak is likely to have two impacts on cyberbullying. The
anonymity granted to users is likely to increase the number of attacks towards others
and decrease concerns among bystanders about those attacks.
Method
The survey was created and responses recorded using the Google Forms service.
The survey was divided into five sections. The first section provided an explanation of
the purpose of the survey and background of the “Above the Yak” campaign. The
respondent was asked if he or she had ever used Yik Yak, even if the respondent had
only used the app to only read posts. If the respondent said he or she had used Yik Yak,
he or she was directed to the second section of the survey, which collected information
on that person’s use of Yik Yak and opinions on the app. All respondents were directed
to the third section, which provided prompts asking respondents to state their opinions
on the “Above the Yak” campaign, and the fourth section included prompts to gather
opinions on cyberbullying. The final section gathered demographic information from
the respondent, including gender, class standing, college of enrollment (e.g. Arts &
Sciences or Business) and if the respondent identified as a victim of cyberbullying. The
results from each step of the survey are detailed in Table 1 at the end of the paper.
The survey was distributed the week of Monday, Dec. 8, 2014, by my personal
social media channels. Links to the survey were posted on my Facebook wall and to two
Creighton University class Facebook groups. In addition, I shared the survey with the
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students in my courses by messaging them in Blueline. In all, 84 students completed the
survey. Of those, 14 identified as never having used the app; 42 identified as active
users; and 28 identified as inactive users. Nineteen respondents identified as having
been victims of cyberbullying. All other breakdowns of the respondents are noted in the
tables displaying the results at the end of the paper.
Results
“Above the Yak” (Table 3)
The responses to the prompts designed to gauge opinion on the “Above the Yak”
campaign suggest that Creighton students at large share the same concerns as those of
The Creightonian columnists described above. On average, the 84 respondents disagreed
with the statement that the “Above the Yak” campaign focused on improving the
university and the well-being of its students. On average, respondents agreed with the
statement that the campaign was only started because the Creighton Students Union
became a target of criticism on Yik Yak. Together, these results show that respondents
believe the motivation for the “Above the Yak” campaign was insincere.
In addition, the results showed that the “Above the Yak” campaign was
ineffective at persuading students to delete the app. Students disagreed with CSU’s call
for students to delete Yik Yak, on average. The survey results also showed that 28
students downloaded the app because of the attention brought to the app by the
“Above the Yak” campaign, while only six stated they had deleted the app because of
the “Above the Yak” campaign. Of the 28 who downloaded Yik Yak, 16 had not even
heard of Yik Yak before the “Above the Yak” campaign.
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Yik Yak and Cyberbullying (Table 4)
Respondents were asked to select the social networks on which they had
witnessed cyberbullying. Yik Yak was the most commonly selected social network; 64.3
percent of respondents identified Yik Yak as a network on which they had seen the
online harassment of others. Facebook was listed by 44 percent of respondents and
Twitter by 36.9 percent of respondents. Other social networks selected included Tumblr
and Instagram. One respondent listed The Creightonian website as a place they had
viewed cyberbullying. Despite these high reports of cyberbullying on a variety of social
networking sites, respondents, on average, did not identify cyberbullying as a prevalent
problem at Creighton University. Specifically, they did not identify Yik Yak as having
increased the number of cyberbullying incidents witnessed or heard about from others,
nor did they identify Yik Yak content as cyberbullying in nature.
The effects anonymity has on cyberbullying behavior noted in the literature
review suggest that users of Yik Yak would not post the same content they post to Yik
Yak on other social networking sites. However, those who identified as active users of
Yik Yak disagreed with the statement they would be uncomfortable publishing the
same content they post to Yik Yak to other social networking sites they use.
Current users of Yik Yak were less likely than inactive users to identify Yik Yak
as a network on which they had witnessed cyberbullying. The results of the Chi-square
test shown in Table 4 find that the difference between whether a user was active or
inactive and that person having witnessed cyberbullying on Yik Yak was statistically
significant at the 5 percent level. This supports the observation shown in Table 3 that
the inactive users on average agreed more than active users that the use of Yik Yak had
increased the number of cyberbullying incidents they had witnessed. This suggests that
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the harassment of other Yik Yak users factored into inactive users’ decisions to stop
using the application. A t-test shown in Table 5 also shows that respondents who had
never used Yik Yak were more likely than those who have used Yik Yak, active or
inactive, to identify the content on Yik Yak as cyberbullying. Factors that may cause this
difference include the rhetoric of the “Above the Yak” campaign, as non-users of Yik
Yak generally agreed with the statement that Yik Yak had increased the number of
cyberbullying incidents they had heard about from others.
Concluding Thoughts
This paper has shown that the consensus of student opinion of the “Above the
Yak” campaign agrees with the concerns raised about the campaign by the articles
published in The Creightonian. The campaign is not believed to have focused on
improving the university or the well-being of its students. In addition, the campaign is
thought to have only started because users of the application criticized the Creighton
Students Union. The second part of the results section showed that a majority of the
respondents listed Yik Yak as a social network on which cyberbullying had been
witnessed, yet the respondents did not identify cyberbullying as a prevalent problem
on Creighton’s campus, nor did they agree, on average, that Yik Yak had increased the
number of cyberbullying events witnessed or heard about. This observation may be
linked to the issues of cyberbullying identified in the literature review. People are less
likely to identify an online post as harassing if it is directed at an anonymous target.
Further research into this area could be of great benefit.
Kotrous 8
Figure 1
Screenshot capture of the rules Yik Yak users agree to before using the application.
Table 1
Descriptive Statistics of Survey Results
Variable
Yik Yak Use
"Yakarma" score
Uncomfortable posting to other social networks
"Above the Yak"
Focused on improving university
Happened only because CSU was criticized by Yik
Yak users
Yik Yak content is harmful to students
Yik Yak is valuable online forum
Creighton students should delete Yik Yak
Allow students to access on Creighton's wireless
networks
"Cyberbullying"
Prevalent on Creighton's campus
Identify content on Yik Yak as "cyberbullying"
Yik Yak has increased number of "cyberbullying"
incidents witnessed
Yik Yak has increased number of "cyberbullying"
incidents heard about from others
Obs.
Mean
Std. Dev.
45
65
2537.71
2.71
4415.78
1.21
84
82
2.76
3.82
1.36
1.16
84
83
84
83
2.75
2.64
2.17
3.89
1.22
1.21
1.18
1.13
84
84
83
2.70
2.81
2.72
1.19
1.33
1.30
82
2.83
1.33
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Table 2*
Responses to "Above the Yak" prompts, by groups
Obs.
Focused
on
improving
university
Happened
only
because
CSU was
criticized on
Yik Yak
Yik Yak
content
is
harmful
Yik Yak
is
valuable
online
forum
Students
should
delete
Yik Yak
Creighton
should
allow Yik
Yak on its
wireless
networks
84
2.76
3.82
2.75
2.64
2.17
3.89
Never
14
3.79
2.57
3.86
1.71
3.07
3.50
Inactive User
28
3.14
3.48
3.11
2.30
2.82
3.30
Active User**
42
2.17
4.12
2.14
3.17
1.43
4.40
First Quartile***
12
1.42
4.25
2.08
3.50
1.08
4.67
Second Quartile
11
2.45
3.91
2.27
3.09
1.82
3.91
Third Quartile
11
2.55
4.60
2.00
3.27
1.45
4.64
Fourth Quartile
11
2.73
3.54
2.64
2.30
1.82
3.91
Male
38
2.29
3.89
2.37
2.92
1.66
4.21
Female
46
3.15
3.76
3.07
2.40
2.59
3.62
Group
Total
Yik Yak Use
Gender
Class Standing
Freshman
1
5.00
3.00
5.00
2.00
4.00
4.00
Sophomore
33
2.64
3.75
2.55
2.82
2.00
3.97
Junior
21
2.38
3.55
2.24
2.85
2.00
3.71
Senior
27
3.22
4.04
3.19
2.22
2.48
3.92
Graduate/Professional
1
2.00
5.00
4.00
2.00
1.00
3.00
I prefer not to say
1
1.00
5.00
5.00
5.00
2.00
5.00
Arts & Sciences
59
3.08
3.79
3.07
2.44
2.42
3.69
Business
17
2.29
3.38
1.94
2.82
1.59
4.24
Nursing
4
1.25
5.00
2.25
4.67
2.00
4.75
Other
3
1.67
4.67
2.33
3.33
1.00
4.33
I prefer not to say
1
1.00
5.00
1.00
3.00
1.00
5.00
Yes
19
2.95
3.95
2.79
2.26
2.32
3.47
No
62
2.76
3.75
2.76
2.72
2.15
4.02
3
1.67
4.33
2.33
3.33
1.67
4.00
College
Victim of Cyberbullying
I prefer not to say
* all responses used a Likert scale, with 1 representing "Strongly Disagree" and five representing "Strongly Agree"
** the number of active users differed from the number of reported yakarma scores. Five inactive users reported yakarma
scores, and two active users did not report a yakarma score.
*** represents top 25 percent of reported yakarma scores.
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Table 3*
Responses to cyberbullying prompts, by groups
Obs.
Prevalent
at
Creighton
Identify content on
Yik Yak as
cyberbullying
Yik Yak has
increased
cyberbullying
witnessed
Yik Yak has increased
cyberbullying incidents
heard about
84
2.70
2.81
2.72
2.83
Never
14
2.79
4.07
2.71
3.64
Inactive User
28
3.21
3.32
3.39
3.33
Active User**
42
2.33
2.05
2.27
2.22
First Quartile***
12
1.83
1.75
2.08
2.08
Second Quartile
11
2.36
2.27
2.45
2.40
Third Quartile
11
2.18
1.91
2.09
1.91
Fourth Quartile
11
3.18
2.55
2.80
2.82
Male
38
2.21
2.24
2.34
2.39
Female
46
3.11
3.28
3.04
3.20
Group
Total
Yik Yak Use
Gender
Class Standing
Freshman
1
4.00
3.00
3.00
4.00
Sophomore
33
2.73
2.61
2.67
2.70
Junior
21
2.48
2.57
2.52
2.60
Senior
27
2.89
3.26
3.08
3.12
Graduate/Professional
1
2.00
4.00
1.00
4.00
I prefer not to say
1
1.00
1.00
1.00
2.00
Arts & Sciences
59
2.98
3.20
3.02
3.18
Business
17
2.24
1.94
2.19
2.12
Nursing
4
1.50
1.50
1.75
2.00
Other
3
2.00
2.33
1.33
2.00
I prefer not to say
1
1.00
1.00
2.00
1.00
Yes
19
2.95
3.00
2.74
3.17
No
62
2.65
2.79
2.75
2.75
3
2.33
2.00
2.00
2.33
College
Victim of Cyberbullying
I prefer not to say
* all responses used a Likert scale, with 1 representing "Strongly Disagree" and five representing "Strongly Agree"
** the number of active users differed from the number of reported yakarma scores. Five inactive users reported yakarma scores, and
two active users did not report a yakarma score.
*** represents top 25 percent of reported yakarma scores (45 total scores)
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Table 4
Chi-square Test: Yik Yak User Status and Witnessing Cyberbullying on Yik Yak
Witnessed Cyberbullying on
Yik Yak
Current User
Yes
Yes
23
No
19
Total
42
No
22
6
28
Total
45
25
70
Chi Square = 4.148; degress of freedom = 1; p = 0.042
Table 5
t-test: Yik Yak use and Yik Yak content as “cyberbullying”
Yik Yak User
Obs.
Mean
Std. Dev.
Yes
70
2.56
1.16
No
14
4.07
1.07
|t| = 4.502; degrees of freedom = 82; p < 0.000
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Works Cited
Creighton Students Union. “Creighton University: Above the YAK!” ipetitions (2014).
http://www.ipetitions.com/petition/above-the-yak.
–––. “An Open Letter to the Creighton Community.” Creighton Students Union (Sept. 7,
2014). http://michaelkotrous.com/csu-letter/.
Crook, Jordan. “Yik Yak Gets a Much-Needed Makeover.” TechCrunch (Jul. 22, 2014).
http://techcrunch.com/2014/07/22/yik-yak-gets-a-much-needed-makeover/.
Kramme, Jesse, and Drew Weiner. “Letter to the Editor: ‘Yak’ debate storms on.” The
Creightonian (Sept. 17, 2014). http://www.creightonian.com/opinion/
article_e0d75db0-3e83-11e4-8529-001a4bcf6878.html.
Parkinson, Hannah J. “Yik Yak: The anonymous app taking US college campuses by
storm.” The Guardian (Oct. 21, 2014): http://www.theguardian.com/technology/
2014/oct/21/yik-yak-anonymous-app-college-campus-whisper-secret.
Rafla, Malak, Nicholas J. Carson, and Sandra M. DeJong. “Adolescents and the Internet:
What Mental Health Clinicians Need to Know.” Current Psychiatry Reports 16
(2014): 472. doi: 10.1007/s11920-014-0472-x.
Smith, Peter K., Jess Mahdavi, Manuel Carvalho, Sonja Fisher, Shanette Russell, and
Neil Tippet. “Cyberbullying: Its nature and impact in secondary school pupils.”
Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry 49, no. 4 (2008): 376-85.
doi: 10.1111/j.1469-7610.2007.01846.x.
Spillane, Austin, and Dominic Dongilli. “Yaks highlight CSU’s issues.” The Creightonian
(Sept. 11, 2014). http://www.creightonian.com/opinion/article_ccd5a4bc-39b911e4-9211-0017a43b2370.html.
Sticca, Fabio, and Sonja Perren. “Is Cyberbullying Worse than Traditional Bullying?
Examining the Differential Roles of Medium, Publicity, and Anonymity for the
Perceived Severity of Bullying.” Journal of Youth and Adolescence 42 (2013): 739-50.
doi: 10.1007/s10964-012-9867-3.
Whittaker, Elizabeth, and Robin Kowalski. “Cyberbullying via Social Media.” Journal of
School Violence 14, no. 1 (2014): 11-29. doi: 10.1080/15388220.2014.949377.