From compliance to conscience: Internalizing digital law to prevent cyberbullying in Indonesian elementary schools

This study aims to explore the meanings of elementary school teachers’ lived experiences in internalizing digital legal values as part of efforts to prevent cyberbullying. Employing a qualitative approach within a transcendental phenomenological design, the research was conducted in Mataram, Indonesia. Elementary school teachers served as the primary participants, while principals, legal experts, and psychologists acted as supplementary informants to broaden perspectives on the data. Data were collected through semi-structured in-depth interviews, observations, and document analysis. Data analysis followed Moustakas’ procedures. Bracketing, member checking, and phenomenological reduction were applied to maintain the credibility, confirmability, and dependability of the data. The findings yield three key contributions that address the study’s aim. First, the MFH (Mirror Fence Habit) model posits that teachers’ digital legal awareness develops not from formal instruction but from lived reflective practice in the classroom. Second, the RPR (Rapid Private Restorative) protocol demonstrates how digital legal values are operationalized in policies that are ethical, swift, and uphold children’s dignity. Third, the E‑Law (Ecological Layers of Awareness in Digital Law) model integrates these experiential dimensions within a single ecosystemic framework, explaining that digital legal awareness emerges from interactions across layered values—from relationships within the microsystem, mesosystem, exosystem, and macrosystem to the chronosystem. The implications are multilayered. Theoretically, the findings affirm that digital law at the elementary‑school level is best positioned as lived values centered on children’s dignity, empathy, and responsibility rather than merely a fear‑inducing regime of sanctions. Methodologically, the successful distillation of the essence of teachers’ experiences through phenomenological procedures provides evidence that transcendental phenomenology is effective for uncovering meanings that emerge in digital educational practice. Practically and institutionally, the study indicates the need for school policies that bridge the classroom and the wider digital ecosystem.