Risk behavior of students on the Internet

The aim of this research is to examine risk behaviour of students (adolescents) on the internet, i.e. which risk websites students visit most in their free time, and whether there are differences among students considering the type of school they attend (gymnasium, four-year high school and three-year high school). The research was carried out in the school year 2014/2015 in 18 high schools on a sample of 2,395 participants in Republic of Croatia (two counties). According to research results, students most often visit websites that reproduce movies and music and offer entire channels without having to pay any sort of fee. Websites where they can upload pictures and stories that might affect other people's reputation are the least visited. A difference in visiting risk websites considering the type of school students attend has also been confirmed. According to research results, there are no statistically significant differences among students considering the way they spend their free time and the amount of free time they spend on the internet.

"Gymnasium students more often than others lie about their age in order to gain access to a website and copy content without paying any fee. Students of 4-grade high schools more often than others neglect their school obligations because of the Internet. In comparison to gymnasium and 4-grade high school students, students of 3-grade high schools more often: publish stories, pictures and jokes about other people that can damage their reputation; open groups on Facebook with the goal of mocking and insulting others; send viruses to other people by e-mail; communicate with strangers of the Internet; respond to e-mails from unfamiliar senders; visit virtual chat-rooms which have no moderators; go to private chat rooms after being persuaded to it by a stranger; go to meetings with strangers who they met over the Internet; gamble on the Internet; purposely exclude someone from a group so that they would be isolated; visit websites that offer purchases of narcotics; visit websites that promote violence; visit websites that contain pornographic content; visit websites that encourage racial and national bigotry. According to results of the research, most participants spend their free time hanging out with friends on social networks, 23,7% of them. Aside from hanging out with friends on social networks, the participants indicated that in their free time they: play sports (15,7%), surf the Internet (15,4%), listen to music (12%), watch television (8,4%), hang out with friends (7%), educate themselves (2,5%), read books or magazines (2,1%), send SMS texts (2,0%), while 9,3% of the participants indicated that they do something else. The least of them, 1,9%, indicated that they spend their free time doing hobbies." Đuranović, 2016, 83