Search

The current investigation hypothesized and tested latent bully/victim traits for physical, verbal, or relational bullying/victimization, both cyber and traditional behaviors. Data were collected from 1,356 German students who attended Grades 5 to 10: 48.4% males, 49.3% females from eight different schools in Northern Germany. Based on two samples for cross-validation (N training set = 525, N validation set = 525), study findings provided strong evidence of adequate model fit, both for traditional and cyber behaviors. Consistent with the current state of knowledge, bullying and victimization latent traits highly associated, more so for cyber behaviors than traditional ones. Thus, both the theoretical plausibility as well as statistical evidence support the application of latent modeling to these behaviors. Further research is needed to replicate the applied measurement models proposed in this work and to reveal moderators or measurement invariance across diverse populations. Nevertheless, the current evidence substantiates the importance of the application of a latent modeling approach to overcome known psychometric challenges of reliability and validity in bullying research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Aims: To investigate associations between self-injury and involvement in cyberbullying as a bully, victim or bully-victim among mentally distressed adolescents. Methods: Data from the public health survey of children and adolescents in Scania, Sweden 2016 were used. A questionnaire was answered anonymously in school by 9143 students in 9th grade compulsory school (response rate 77%) and 7949 students in 2nd grade of upper secondary school (response rate 73%). Students with past year (broadly defined) mental distress at least 2 weeks in a row (33% of boys and 63% of girls) were asked if they had performed self-injury (i.e. cut, superficially cut or otherwise injured themselves) past year, and those with data on self-injury and cyberbullying were included in the present study (n=6841). Associations between self-injury and cyberbullying were investigated by multiadjusted logistic regression analysis. Results: Among mentally distressed students, self-injury was reported by 11.7% of boys and 25.9% of girls. Age-adjusted analysis showed increasingly higher odds of self-injury among cyberbullies, cybervictims and cyberbully-victims, using non-involved as reference group (OR boys: 1.8, 2.3, 3.0; girls: 2.1, 3.2, 4.8). Associations weakened after adjustment for several potential confounders but remained significant for all cyberbullying groups except male cyberbullies, among whom significance was lost after adjustment for smoking, alcohol and narcotics. Conclusions: Peer victimization in cyber space is associated with self-injury, especially among victims and bully-victims. Decreasing peer victimization is a priority, and school and health professionals need to be aware of the associations between cyberbullying and self-injury among mentally distressed adolescents. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study categorized school aged children by their bullying-related experiences and examined how such experiences impact their health outcomes and risk behaviors. Participants included 8955 children aged 11-to-16-year-old (50.3% males) from the Health Behavior of School-Aged Children (HBSC) 2009-2010 dataset, a nationally representative U.S. sample. Experiences of bullying and being bullied, health outcomes of minor symptoms, risk behaviors, and number of bullying types were measured. The associations were examined using logistic regression analysis with Bully Only, Victim Only, and Bully/Victim groups across gender. The Bully/Victim group had the worst health and behavioral outcomes among the groups. A clear gradient indicated that participants who experienced more types of bullying had higher possibilities of leading to risk behaviors and poor health, and the phenomenon persists through these studied symptoms. Girls tended to have more internalizing problems while boys tended to have more externalizing problems. The timely identification of minor psychosomatic symptoms may be used in the early detection on whether children are encountering bullying. Preventive interventions for reduce the harm are warranted. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose Traditional school bullying is complex and overlapping, hence research suggests there is a varied definition of the term (Canty et al., 2016). The purpose of this paper is to investigate the potential effects of the term bullying on adolescent experiences of bullying. Additionally, the study examined bully, victim, bully-victim, and bystander identity as a moderating factor of experience of the term.Design/methodology/approach Research appears to seldom offer adolescents the opportunity to discuss bullying using qualitative methods within naturalistic environments. Therefore, the current study adopted a phenomenological framework for adolescents to share their experiences. Data comprised recordings of semi-structured interviews and focus groups with adolescents (n=20) in high-school settings.Findings The current study supported the notion that adolescents perceive a varied use of the term bullying in schools. The sample experience a varied understanding of bullying in which they explain: increases exposure to bullying; impacts social perception of bullying; reduces trust in anti-bullying intervention; reduces coping self-efficacy amongst victims of bullying; and impacts negatively on friendships.Originality/value Findings suggest a knowledge deficit in transferring information about school bullying from experts to non-experts. The sample indicated that a varied use of the term bullying has negative impact on their social and emotional functioning particularly; in managing distress and maintaining relationships. Additionally, inconsistent understanding of the term was said to increase the frequency of bullying, perception of bullying, and trust in intervention amongst the sample. Limitations of the research, recommendations for practice and intervention are briefly discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Adolescents' body image dissatisfaction has an adverse effect on peer relationships. It may lead to changes in behaviour (aggressive or passive) and consequently to bullying behaviour. Our aim was to assess the association between body image dissatisfaction and involvement in bullying and whether this differs by gender. We used data from the Slovak part of the 2010 Health Behaviour in School-aged Children study. The final sample comprised 8050 adolescents aged 11 to 15 years old (mean age 13.57), less than half of whom were boys. The association between self-reported body image and involvement in bullying was determined using multinomial logistic regression. We found a significant association between body dissatisfaction and involvement in bullying. Adolescents dissatisfied with their bodies because due to feeling overweight were more likely to become passive or reactive victims. Self-reported thinness was found to be significantly associated with bully-victims only in boys. Conclusion: Adolescent body dissatisfaction is strongly associated with bullying behaviour. Our findings point out the importance of incorporating at schools different types of intervention programmes supporting positive self-perceptions of adolescents and reducing bullying behaviour. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article examines the prevalence of bullying among high school students in Mexico, through the 2009 National Survey on Exclusion, Intolerance and Violence in High Schools. The study identifies different instances of bullying, as well as the actors involved: bullies, victims, bully-victims and bystanders. This research also uses Bronfenbrenner's ecological model in order to analyze individual, relational and contextual factors associated to the involvement of high school-level students in bullying. The results show there is a strong relationship between the involvement of students in violent experiences in other contexts (neighborhood and family) and their involvement as bullies, victims or bully-victims in the school context. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Electronic Journal of Research in Educational Psychology is the property of Editorial of the University of Almeria (Spain) and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

From the rapidly growing literature on bullying, it is increasingly recognised that peer relationship problems as manifested in being bullied are associated with low self-esteem. However, the literature on self-esteem in relation to children who bully others is controversial. The objective of this paper is to elucidate further our understanding of the relationship between self-concept and bullying behaviour. Data from a nationwide study of bullying behaviour carried out in Ireland during 1993-1994 have been reviewed. The relevant results from 8,249 school children aged 8 to 18 years are presented. The paper examines the global and dimensional nature of self-esteem and how it relates to children and adolescents who either have been victimised or bullied others. A distinction is made between “pure victims,” “pure bullies,” and children and adolescents who were both bullied and who bullied others. In other words, pure victims were those who had not bullied others, and pure bullies had not themselves been bullied. Those who were both bullied and bullied others were subdivided further into victims who bully occasionally, sometimes, and frequently and bullies who are victimised, occasionally, sometimes, and frequently. The results show that children of both primary and post-primary age who were involved in bullying as victims, bullies, or both had significantly lower global self-esteem than did children who had neither bullied nor been bullied. However, the pure bullies, in contrast to the pure victims, placed the same value on their physical attractiveness and attributes and on their popularity as did their peers who had not bullied others or been bullied. The bully-victims of all ages had the lowest self-esteem of the subgroups in the study. Also, the more frequently children were victimised or bullied others, the lower was their global self-esteem. The typology and frequency of bullying and the age of the children when they were involved in bullying influenced the status of the specific domains of self-esteem. There were, e.g., significant differences in anxiety between the pure bullies of post-primary age and their peers who had not bullied others or been bullied. The post-primary children who bullied most frequently were the least anxious. The results indicate that high self-esteem protects children and adolescents from involvement in bullying. Thus, in view of the strong relationship between self-esteem and bullying that has been found in the present paper, it is recommended that top priority be given by parents and teachers to preventing and reducing feelings of poor self-worth among children and adolescents. Aggr. Behav. 27:269–283, 2001. © 2001 Wiley-Liss, Inc. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper addresses the need on a national scale for formal preservice and inservice training programmes for teachers on bullying and victimisation. It also discusses the areas of teacher training that are believed to be most critical in effecting a change in the level of bullying and victimisation in schools. The need for training of teachers was crystallised in Ireland recently by the tragic death of a young student who had been bullied for 5 years at school. Particular attention is paid in this paper to the need for teachers to understand the importance of self-esteem in bullying behaviour. Results are presented that indicate that children and adolescents who bully share with victims lower levels of self-esteem than peers who have never bullied or been bullied. Aggr. Behav. 26:99–111, 2000. © 2000 Wiley-Liss, Inc. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study aimed to identify subgroups based on student's verbal, social, and physical bullying and victimization behaviors using latent class analysis (LCA). The dataset used in this research consists of 3581 8th graders as participants from the 2014 5th annual survey of Seoul Education Longitudinal Study (SELS) in Korea. Broadly speaking, our analysis identified six subgroups: 31.9% of uninvolved, 7.1% of victims, 10.1% of bullies, 37.8% of bully-victims who showed high levels of verbal bullying victimization and perpetration (BV-V), 9.0% of bully-victims who showed high levels of verbal and social bullying victimization and perpetration (BV-VS), and, 4.1% of bully-victims who showed high levels of verbal, social, and physical bullying victimization and perpetration (BV-VSP). Our results indicate that the bully-victim group may not be homogeneous, but rather can be further identified and divided into three characteristic subgroups. Using the identified subgroups, more effective intervention could be made by clarifying the targeted group of students. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]