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Clinical Psychology and Special Education
2025. Vol. 14, no. 4, 171–189
doi:10.17759/cpse.2025140410
ISSN: 2304-0394 (online)

Adaptation and validation of the cyber-aggression and cyber-victimization scale (CAV)

 
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Abstract

Context and relevance. The article presents the results of adaptation and optimization of the scale for assessing cyber aggression and victimization in an adult sample in Russia. The scale was designed to assess the level of cyber victimization and aggression, and it consists of 24 questions. Methods and materials. The study involved 1,020 people aged 17 to 35 (293 men and 727 women). To verify the convergent validity of the method, translated versions of the Cyberbullying and Online Aggression Surveys, the Retrospective Bullying Questionnaire and the Illinois Bully Scale were used. To verify criterion validity, “Ways of Coping” and Trier Questionnaire was used. Other factors recorded were gender, time spent at school, family relationships, suicide attempts and severity of PTSD symptoms. Results. Exploratory and confirmatory factor analysis showed that two subscales — cyber-aggression and cyber-victimization — are independent of each other. The Cronbach's coefficient showed high consistency of each of the two subscales in the general sample (0.847 and 0.839), as well as in gender (0.807 to 0.861) and age groups (0.817 to 0.852). The internal consistency of the questionnaire was confirmed by correlational relationships between the two scales. Conclusions. The psychometric analysis of cyber aggression and victimization scales showed criterion and convergent validity, which can be applied to the Russian-speaking population. The study is significant for understanding cyberbullying and devising effective strategies to combat it.

General Information

Keywords: cyberbullying, cyber-victimization, cyber-aggression

Journal rubric: Methods and Techniques

Article type: scientific article

DOI: https://doi.org/10.17759/cpse.2025140410

Received 24.03.2025

Revised 17.09.2025

Accepted

Published

For citation: Mikhailova, N.F., Istomina, E.A. (2025). Adaptation and validation of the cyber-aggression and cyber-victimization scale (CAV). Clinical Psychology and Special Education, 14(4), 171–189. (In Russ.). https://doi.org/10.17759/cpse.2025140410

© Mikhailova N.F., Istomina E.A., 2025

License: CC BY-NC 4.0

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Information About the Authors

Nadezhda F. Mikhailova, Candidate of Science (Psychology), associate professor, Associate Professor, Department of Developmental and Differential Psychology, St Petersburg State University, St.Petersburg, Russian Federation, ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4183-8171, e-mail: mail.mikhailova@gmail.com

Elena A. Istomina, Postgraduate Student of the Department of Medical Psychology, Saint Petersburg State University, St.Petersburg, Russian Federation, ORCID: https://orcid.org/0009-0006-7593-0204, e-mail: istomina.e.a@list.ru

Contribution of the authors

Nadezhda F. Mikhailova. — development of the research design; participation in the development of the methodology; participation in conducting statistical analysis; interpretation of the results; crit-ical revision and scientific editing of the manuscript; approval of the final version of the article.

Elena A. Istomina — development of the research design; conducting an empirical study and col-lecting data; primary and advanced statistical processing; writing the article; visualization; approval of the final version of the article.

Both authors participated in the discussion of the results and approved the final text of the manu-script.

Conflict of interest

The authors declare no conflict of interest.

Ethics statement

Written informed consent for participation in this study was obtained from the participants.

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