Bullying has gotten easier and more serious as a result of social media, gaming platforms, and other online communication technologies, affecting many of our schools, families, and communities. According to a research published in the Journal of Early Adolescence, cyberbullying, the online equivalent of school-based bullying, is associated with a host of detrimental emotional, psychological, physiological, and behavioural consequences.

While the topic has received widespread attention in the last decade, little is known about its relationship with empathy. Even less is known about how empathy is related to bias-based cyberbullying: harm and abuse toward others because of one's identity (e.g., race/ethnicity, gender or religion) - a phenomenon of increasing concern against the backdrop of rising hate speech and hate crimes across the nation.