bullying research paper topics

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Published: 14 December 2021

Bullying at school and mental health problems among adolescents: a repeated cross-sectional study

Håkan Källmén 1 &
Mats Hallgren ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0002-0599-2403 2

Child and Adolescent Psychiatry and Mental Health volume 15 , Article number: 74 ( 2021 ) Cite this article

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To examine recent trends in bullying and mental health problems among adolescents and the association between them.

A questionnaire measuring mental health problems, bullying at school, socio-economic status, and the school environment was distributed to all secondary school students aged 15 (school-year 9) and 18 (school-year 11) in Stockholm during 2014, 2018, and 2020 (n = 32,722). Associations between bullying and mental health problems were assessed using logistic regression analyses adjusting for relevant demographic, socio-economic, and school-related factors.

The prevalence of bullying remained stable and was highest among girls in year 9; range = 4.9% to 16.9%. Mental health problems increased; range = + 1.2% (year 9 boys) to + 4.6% (year 11 girls) and were consistently higher among girls (17.2% in year 11, 2020). In adjusted models, having been bullied was detrimentally associated with mental health (OR = 2.57 [2.24–2.96]). Reports of mental health problems were four times higher among boys who had been bullied compared to those not bullied. The corresponding figure for girls was 2.4 times higher.

Conclusions

Exposure to bullying at school was associated with higher odds of mental health problems. Boys appear to be more vulnerable to the deleterious effects of bullying than girls.

Introduction

Bullying involves repeated hurtful actions between peers where an imbalance of power exists [ 1 ]. Arseneault et al. [ 2 ] conducted a review of the mental health consequences of bullying for children and adolescents and found that bullying is associated with severe symptoms of mental health problems, including self-harm and suicidality. Bullying was shown to have detrimental effects that persist into late adolescence and contribute independently to mental health problems. Updated reviews have presented evidence indicating that bullying is causative of mental illness in many adolescents [ 3 , 4 ].

There are indications that mental health problems are increasing among adolescents in some Nordic countries. Hagquist et al. [ 5 ] examined trends in mental health among Scandinavian adolescents (n = 116, 531) aged 11–15 years between 1993 and 2014. Mental health problems were operationalized as difficulty concentrating, sleep disorders, headache, stomach pain, feeling tense, sad and/or dizzy. The study revealed increasing rates of adolescent mental health problems in all four counties (Finland, Sweden, Norway, and Denmark), with Sweden experiencing the sharpest increase among older adolescents, particularly girls. Worsening adolescent mental health has also been reported in the United Kingdom. A study of 28,100 school-aged adolescents in England found that two out of five young people scored above thresholds for emotional problems, conduct problems or hyperactivity [ 6 ]. Female gender, deprivation, high needs status (educational/social), ethnic background, and older age were all associated with higher odds of experiencing mental health difficulties.

Bullying is shown to increase the risk of poor mental health and may partly explain these detrimental changes. Le et al. [ 7 ] reported an inverse association between bullying and mental health among 11–16-year-olds in Vietnam. They also found that poor mental health can make some children and adolescents more vulnerable to bullying at school. Bayer et al. [ 8 ] examined links between bullying at school and mental health among 8–9-year-old children in Australia. Those who experienced bullying more than once a week had poorer mental health than children who experienced bullying less frequently. Friendships moderated this association, such that children with more friends experienced fewer mental health problems (protective effect). Hysing et al. [ 9 ] investigated the association between experiences of bullying (as a victim or perpetrator) and mental health, sleep disorders, and school performance among 16–19 year olds from Norway (n = 10,200). Participants were categorized as victims, bullies, or bully-victims (that is, victims who also bullied others). All three categories were associated with worse mental health, school performance, and sleeping difficulties. Those who had been bullied also reported more emotional problems, while those who bullied others reported more conduct disorders [ 9 ].

As most adolescents spend a considerable amount of time at school, the school environment has been a major focus of mental health research [ 10 , 11 ]. In a recent review, Saminathen et al. [ 12 ] concluded that school is a potential protective factor against mental health problems, as it provides a socially supportive context and prepares students for higher education and employment. However, it may also be the primary setting for protracted bullying and stress [ 13 ]. Another factor associated with adolescent mental health is parental socio-economic status (SES) [ 14 ]. A systematic review indicated that lower parental SES is associated with poorer adolescent mental health [ 15 ]. However, no previous studies have examined whether SES modifies or attenuates the association between bullying and mental health. Similarly, it remains unclear whether school related factors, such as school grades and the school environment, influence the relationship between bullying and mental health. This information could help to identify those adolescents most at risk of harm from bullying.

To address these issues, we investigated the prevalence of bullying at school and mental health problems among Swedish adolescents aged 15–18 years between 2014 and 2020 using a population-based school survey. We also examined associations between bullying at school and mental health problems adjusting for relevant demographic, socioeconomic, and school-related factors. We hypothesized that: (1) bullying and adolescent mental health problems have increased over time; (2) There is an association between bullying victimization and mental health, so that mental health problems are more prevalent among those who have been victims of bullying; and (3) that school-related factors would attenuate the association between bullying and mental health.

Participants

The Stockholm school survey is completed every other year by students in lower secondary school (year 9—compulsory) and upper secondary school (year 11). The survey is mandatory for public schools, but voluntary for private schools. The purpose of the survey is to help inform decision making by local authorities that will ultimately improve students’ wellbeing. The questions relate to life circumstances, including SES, schoolwork, bullying, drug use, health, and crime. Non-completers are those who were absent from school when the survey was completed (< 5%). Response rates vary from year to year but are typically around 75%. For the current study data were available for 2014, 2018 and 2020. In 2014; 5235 boys and 5761 girls responded, in 2018; 5017 boys and 5211 girls responded, and in 2020; 5633 boys and 5865 girls responded (total n = 32,722). Data for the exposure variable, bullied at school, were missing for 4159 students, leaving 28,563 participants in the crude model. The fully adjusted model (described below) included 15,985 participants. The mean age in grade 9 was 15.3 years (SD = 0.51) and in grade 11, 17.3 years (SD = 0.61). As the data are completely anonymous, the study was exempt from ethical approval according to an earlier decision from the Ethical Review Board in Stockholm (2010-241 31-5). Details of the survey are available via a website [ 16 ], and are described in a previous paper [ 17 ].

Students completed the questionnaire during a school lesson, placed it in a sealed envelope and handed it to their teacher. Student were permitted the entire lesson (about 40 min) to complete the questionnaire and were informed that participation was voluntary (and that they were free to cancel their participation at any time without consequences). Students were also informed that the Origo Group was responsible for collection of the data on behalf of the City of Stockholm.

Study outcome

Mental health problems were assessed by using a modified version of the Psychosomatic Problem Scale [ 18 ] shown to be appropriate for children and adolescents and invariant across gender and years. The scale was later modified [ 19 ]. In the modified version, items about difficulty concentrating and feeling giddy were deleted and an item about ‘life being great to live’ was added. Seven different symptoms or problems, such as headaches, depression, feeling fear, stomach problems, difficulty sleeping, believing it’s great to live (coded negatively as seldom or rarely) and poor appetite were used. Students who responded (on a 5-point scale) that any of these problems typically occurs ‘at least once a week’ were considered as having indicators of a mental health problem. Cronbach alpha was 0.69 across the whole sample. Adding these problem areas, a total index was created from 0 to 7 mental health symptoms. Those who scored between 0 and 4 points on the total symptoms index were considered to have a low indication of mental health problems (coded as 0); those who scored between 5 and 7 symptoms were considered as likely having mental health problems (coded as 1).

Primary exposure

Experiences of bullying were measured by the following two questions: Have you felt bullied or harassed during the past school year? Have you been involved in bullying or harassing other students during this school year? Alternatives for the first question were: yes or no with several options describing how the bullying had taken place (if yes). Alternatives indicating emotional bullying were feelings of being mocked, ridiculed, socially excluded, or teased. Alternatives indicating physical bullying were being beaten, kicked, forced to do something against their will, robbed, or locked away somewhere. The response alternatives for the second question gave an estimation of how often the respondent had participated in bullying others (from once to several times a week). Combining the answers to these two questions, five different categories of bullying were identified: (1) never been bullied and never bully others; (2) victims of emotional (verbal) bullying who have never bullied others; (3) victims of physical bullying who have never bullied others; (4) victims of bullying who have also bullied others; and (5) perpetrators of bullying, but not victims. As the number of positive cases in the last three categories was low (range = 3–15 cases) bully categories 2–4 were combined into one primary exposure variable: ‘bullied at school’.

Assessment year was operationalized as the year when data was collected: 2014, 2018, and 2020. Age was operationalized as school grade 9 (15–16 years) or 11 (17–18 years). Gender was self-reported (boy or girl). The school situation To assess experiences of the school situation, students responded to 18 statements about well-being in school, participation in important school matters, perceptions of their teachers, and teaching quality. Responses were given on a four-point Likert scale ranging from ‘do not agree at all’ to ‘fully agree’. To reduce the 18-items down to their essential factors, we performed a principal axis factor analysis. Results showed that the 18 statements formed five factors which, according to the Kaiser criterion (eigen values > 1) explained 56% of the covariance in the student’s experience of the school situation. The five factors identified were: (1) Participation in school; (2) Interesting and meaningful work; (3) Feeling well at school; (4) Structured school lessons; and (5) Praise for achievements. For each factor, an index was created that was dichotomised (poor versus good circumstance) using the median-split and dummy coded with ‘good circumstance’ as reference. A description of the items included in each factor is available as Additional file 1 . Socio-economic status (SES) was assessed with three questions about the education level of the student’s mother and father (dichotomized as university degree versus not), and the amount of spending money the student typically received for entertainment each month (> SEK 1000 [approximately $120] versus less). Higher parental education and more spending money were used as reference categories. School grades in Swedish, English, and mathematics were measured separately on a 7-point scale and dichotomized as high (grades A, B, and C) versus low (grades D, E, and F). High school grades were used as the reference category.

Statistical analyses

The prevalence of mental health problems and bullying at school are presented using descriptive statistics, stratified by survey year (2014, 2018, 2020), gender, and school year (9 versus 11). As noted, we reduced the 18-item questionnaire assessing school function down to five essential factors by conducting a principal axis factor analysis (see Additional file 1 ). We then calculated the association between bullying at school (defined above) and mental health problems using multivariable logistic regression. Results are presented as odds ratios (OR) with 95% confidence intervals (Cis). To assess the contribution of SES and school-related factors to this association, three models are presented: Crude, Model 1 adjusted for demographic factors: age, gender, and assessment year; Model 2 adjusted for Model 1 plus SES (parental education and student spending money), and Model 3 adjusted for Model 2 plus school-related factors (school grades and the five factors identified in the principal factor analysis). These covariates were entered into the regression models in three blocks, where the final model represents the fully adjusted analyses. In all models, the category ‘not bullied at school’ was used as the reference. Pseudo R-square was calculated to estimate what proportion of the variance in mental health problems was explained by each model. Unlike the R-square statistic derived from linear regression, the Pseudo R-square statistic derived from logistic regression gives an indicator of the explained variance, as opposed to an exact estimate, and is considered informative in identifying the relative contribution of each model to the outcome [ 20 ]. All analyses were performed using SPSS v. 26.0.

Prevalence of bullying at school and mental health problems

Estimates of the prevalence of bullying at school and mental health problems across the 12 strata of data (3 years × 2 school grades × 2 genders) are shown in Table 1 . The prevalence of bullying at school increased minimally (< 1%) between 2014 and 2020, except among girls in grade 11 (2.5% increase). Mental health problems increased between 2014 and 2020 (range = 1.2% [boys in year 11] to 4.6% [girls in year 11]); were three to four times more prevalent among girls (range = 11.6% to 17.2%) compared to boys (range = 2.6% to 4.9%); and were more prevalent among older adolescents compared to younger adolescents (range = 1% to 3.1% higher). Pooling all data, reports of mental health problems were four times more prevalent among boys who had been victims of bullying compared to those who reported no experiences with bullying. The corresponding figure for girls was two and a half times as prevalent.

Associations between bullying at school and mental health problems

Table 2 shows the association between bullying at school and mental health problems after adjustment for relevant covariates. Demographic factors, including female gender (OR = 3.87; CI 3.48–4.29), older age (OR = 1.38, CI 1.26–1.50), and more recent assessment year (OR = 1.18, CI 1.13–1.25) were associated with higher odds of mental health problems. In Model 2, none of the included SES variables (parental education and student spending money) were associated with mental health problems. In Model 3 (fully adjusted), the following school-related factors were associated with higher odds of mental health problems: lower grades in Swedish (OR = 1.42, CI 1.22–1.67); uninteresting or meaningless schoolwork (OR = 2.44, CI 2.13–2.78); feeling unwell at school (OR = 1.64, CI 1.34–1.85); unstructured school lessons (OR = 1.31, CI = 1.16–1.47); and no praise for achievements (OR = 1.19, CI 1.06–1.34). After adjustment for all covariates, being bullied at school remained associated with higher odds of mental health problems (OR = 2.57; CI 2.24–2.96). Demographic and school-related factors explained 12% and 6% of the variance in mental health problems, respectively (Pseudo R-Square). The inclusion of socioeconomic factors did not alter the variance explained.

Our findings indicate that mental health problems increased among Swedish adolescents between 2014 and 2020, while the prevalence of bullying at school remained stable (< 1% increase), except among girls in year 11, where the prevalence increased by 2.5%. As previously reported [ 5 , 6 ], mental health problems were more common among girls and older adolescents. These findings align with previous studies showing that adolescents who are bullied at school are more likely to experience mental health problems compared to those who are not bullied [ 3 , 4 , 9 ]. This detrimental relationship was observed after adjustment for school-related factors shown to be associated with adolescent mental health [ 10 ].

A novel finding was that boys who had been bullied at school reported a four-times higher prevalence of mental health problems compared to non-bullied boys. The corresponding figure for girls was 2.5 times higher for those who were bullied compared to non-bullied girls, which could indicate that boys are more vulnerable to the deleterious effects of bullying than girls. Alternatively, it may indicate that boys are (on average) bullied more frequently or more intensely than girls, leading to worse mental health. Social support could also play a role; adolescent girls often have stronger social networks than boys and could be more inclined to voice concerns about bullying to significant others, who in turn may offer supports which are protective [ 21 ]. Related studies partly confirm this speculative explanation. An Estonian study involving 2048 children and adolescents aged 10–16 years found that, compared to girls, boys who had been bullied were more likely to report severe distress, measured by poor mental health and feelings of hopelessness [ 22 ].

Other studies suggest that heritable traits, such as the tendency to internalize problems and having low self-esteem are associated with being a bully-victim [ 23 ]. Genetics are understood to explain a large proportion of bullying-related behaviors among adolescents. A study from the Netherlands involving 8215 primary school children found that genetics explained approximately 65% of the risk of being a bully-victim [ 24 ]. This proportion was similar for boys and girls. Higher than average body mass index (BMI) is another recognized risk factor [ 25 ]. A recent Australian trial involving 13 schools and 1087 students (mean age = 13 years) targeted adolescents with high-risk personality traits (hopelessness, anxiety sensitivity, impulsivity, sensation seeking) to reduce bullying at school; both as victims and perpetrators [ 26 ]. There was no significant intervention effect for bullying victimization or perpetration in the total sample. In a secondary analysis, compared to the control schools, intervention school students showed greater reductions in victimization, suicidal ideation, and emotional symptoms. These findings potentially support targeting high-risk personality traits in bullying prevention [ 26 ].

The relative stability of bullying at school between 2014 and 2020 suggests that other factors may better explain the increase in mental health problems seen here. Many factors could be contributing to these changes, including the increasingly competitive labour market, higher demands for education, and the rapid expansion of social media [ 19 , 27 , 28 ]. A recent Swedish study involving 29,199 students aged between 11 and 16 years found that the effects of school stress on psychosomatic symptoms have become stronger over time (1993–2017) and have increased more among girls than among boys [ 10 ]. Research is needed examining possible gender differences in perceived school stress and how these differences moderate associations between bullying and mental health.

Strengths and limitations

Strengths of the current study include the large participant sample from diverse schools; public and private, theoretical and practical orientations. The survey included items measuring diverse aspects of the school environment; factors previously linked to adolescent mental health but rarely included as covariates in studies of bullying and mental health. Some limitations are also acknowledged. These data are cross-sectional which means that the direction of the associations cannot be determined. Moreover, all the variables measured were self-reported. Previous studies indicate that students tend to under-report bullying and mental health problems [ 29 ]; thus, our results may underestimate the prevalence of these behaviors.

In conclusion, consistent with our stated hypotheses, we observed an increase in self-reported mental health problems among Swedish adolescents, and a detrimental association between bullying at school and mental health problems. Although bullying at school does not appear to be the primary explanation for these changes, bullying was detrimentally associated with mental health after adjustment for relevant demographic, socio-economic, and school-related factors, confirming our third hypothesis. The finding that boys are potentially more vulnerable than girls to the deleterious effects of bullying should be replicated in future studies, and the mechanisms investigated. Future studies should examine the longitudinal association between bullying and mental health, including which factors mediate/moderate this relationship. Epigenetic studies are also required to better understand the complex interaction between environmental and biological risk factors for adolescent mental health [ 24 ].

Availability of data and materials

Data requests will be considered on a case-by-case basis; please email the corresponding author.

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Acknowledgements

Authors are grateful to the Department for Social Affairs, Stockholm, for permission to use data from the Stockholm School Survey.

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Håkan Källmén

Epidemiology of Psychiatric Conditions, Substance Use and Social Environment (EPiCSS), Department of Global Public Health, Karolinska Institutet, Level 6, Solnavägen 1e, Solna, Sweden

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HK conceived the study and analyzed the data (with input from MH). HK and MH interpreted the data and jointly wrote the manuscript. All authors read and approved the final manuscript.

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Principal factor analysis description.

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Källmén, H., Hallgren, M. Bullying at school and mental health problems among adolescents: a repeated cross-sectional study. Child Adolesc Psychiatry Ment Health 15 , 74 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1186/s13034-021-00425-y

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165 Bullying Research Topics: Qualitative & Quantitative

Have you ever witnessed someone face unwanted aggressive behavior from classmates? According to the National Center for Educational Statistics, 1 in 5 students says they have experienced bullying at least once in their lifetime. These shocking statistics prove that bullying is a burning topic that deserves detailed research.

In this article, you will find as many as 165 bullying research paper topics created by our custom-writing experts especially for students. We will also provide actionable writing tips. Check them out!

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🚀 Bullying Research Paper Outline

🔗 references, 🔝 top 12 bullying research topics.

Long-term effects of bullying.
Bullying as a cause of addiction.
Workplace harassment prevention.
Bullying and domestic violence.
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Anti-bullying laws and their importance.
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Emotional and physical forms of bullying.
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❓ Top 12 Bullying Research Questions

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What is the connection between school bullying and relationship problems in adulthood?
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There are several types of bullying, each with their own methods and characteristics:

	This type typically involves name-calling, insulting, teasing, or derogatory comments.
	This can include hitting, pushing, or other physical aggression.
	This type of bullying focuses on exclusion, spreading rumors, and using other ways to isolate the victim.
	This type includes sending threatening or offensive messages and sharing embarrassing information online.
	This typically includes unwanted sexual comments, advances, or harassment.

💡 Qualitative Bullying Topics for Research Papers

Common characteristics of school bullies.
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How did COVID-19 impact workplace bullying?
Anti-bullying measures in schools and their effects.
Analyze the causes of bullying and harassment at work.
Parental feeling and perceptions of bullying incidence.
Explain the impact of harassment acts on the perpetrators.
The psychological effect of the bystander effect on empathy levels.
Domestic abuse and interparental violence’s impact on bullying.
Look into the effect of protective factors in victimization experiences.
The strength of parental relationships and bullying perpetration.
What are the long-term behavioral effects of school bullying on children?
Bullying response patterns from parents of victims and perpetrators.
The impact of bullying on children with developmental disabilities.
Explain the emotional effects of workplace bullying.
Personal ways of coping with bullying among adolescents.
Study the alleviating effect of community on harassment.
The emotional and mental state of workplace bullies.
Discuss the impact of ineffective organizational practices on bullying incidence.
Review the victims’ views on interventional approaches to workplace bullying.
What are the factors in group bullying participation?
Provide an overview of key features of adolescent bullying of students with disabilities.
Organizational factors impacting the solutions to bullying.
Research the factors of investigating the cases of nurse bullying.
What is the role of friendship bonds in bullying experiences?
Provide an insight into the primary causes of bullying.
The physical health impacts of bullying on adolescents.
The experiences of teenagers with bullying and suicidal ideation.
Explore the features of social isolation as a form of bullying.
Challenges in finding support for aggression experienced by teenagers.
Study the impact of cyberbullying on the physical health of children.
Power, control, and purpose as factors in bullying.
What is the impact of teacher-initiated bullying reduction strategies?

Bullying is a serious issue that has gotten a lot of academic attention. In particular, the need for qualitative research on this topic has significantly grown. Qualitative approaches use methods to identify and evaluate crucial aspects of adolescent bullying and find solutions to decrease this problem. Feel free to use any of our qualitative bullying research topics to kickstart the writing process.

The picture enumerates common reasons for bullying.

📊 Quantitative Bullying Research Paper Topics

Bullying of LGBTQ+ adolescents.
Gender differences in harassment behavior.
Depression as a long-term effect of victimization.
Long-term effects of bullying in adulthood.
Quantitative research on bullying and mental health.
Analyze the effects of bullying on victim’s physical health.
Aggression and substance use: a structural equation modeling study.
Study the correlation between parental involvement and the frequency of bullying.
Frequency of victimization depending on ethnicity.
Conduct quantitative analysis of bullying according to school types.
Bullying and academic achievement : a longitudinal study.
Research the prevalence of anxiety among victims of interpersonal aggression.
Provide a quantitative examination of bullying by country.
Compare the prevalence of intimidation in urban vs. rural schools.
Frequency of bullying incidents in relation to school size.
Quantitative association between intimidation and self-esteem.
Write a regression analysis of victimization phenomenon.
Impact of bullying on academic performance of teenagers.
Bullying prevention programs: a quantitative evaluation.
Analyze the impact of harassment on anxiety symptoms.
Evaluate the effectiveness of popular anti-bullying PSAs.
Write a quantitative study of the median age of cyberbullying victims.
School strategies for preventing intimidation between students.
Study the correlation between racial differences in aggression experiences.
Evaluate the efficiency of legislation to reduce bullying.
How interpersonal aggression affects peer relationships.
Harassment in third-world countries’ schools.
Evaluate the effectiveness of family interventions in addressing bullying.
Assess the productivity of school-based anti-bullying support programs.
Aggression and social media use : a quantitative assessment.
Degree of dependence on bullying and academic outcomes.
Effects of abuse on body mass index in adolescence.
Study the frequency of victimization among students with disabilities.
Review of the association between harassment and physical health.
Provide a quantitative examination of bullying and peer support.
What is the impact of intimidation on social adaptation?
Assess the efficiency of strategies to cope with bullying.
Provide a quantitative investigation of bullying and school attendance.
Effects of interpersonal aggression on sleep quality: a longitudinal study.

Quantitative research analyzes the issue based on statistics, percentages, and ratios. This type of research often defines bullying in the context of social behaviors and relationships. Choose any idea from our list of quantitative bullying research topics and study the issue using numerical data. 

🖥️ Bullying Research Topics: Cyberbullying

Cyberbullying in the form of ghosting.
Why are online abusers challenging to identify?
Factors that help identify online abuse.
Who are the main targets of online harassment?
Laws and regulations that prevent and penalize cyberbullying .
Present the reasons behind increasing cases of cyberbullying in modern society.
Study the facts about cyberbullying issues in the LGBTQ+ community.
Is age a determinant when it comes to the problem of cyberbullying?
The effects of cyberbullying and violent behavior on victims.
Are the ethics of cyberbullying the same as with regular bullying?
Teenage cyberbullying is a cause of mental disorders.
Study social media as one of the most common places for online harassment.
Research computer games as a place of online abuse.
Explore the reasons why the public is becoming more concerned about cyberbullying of children.
What is the frequency of cyberbullying vs. traditional bullying?
Boys and girls: who are more prominent victims of digital harassment?
Cyberbullying is a manifestation of internal frustration.
How does anti-social behavior result in online victimization?
What are the consequences for individuals who cause cyberbullying?
Explore the connection between juvenile delinquency and cyberbullying.
Initiatives that can be taken to reduce the occurrence of digital harassment2.
What is cyberbullying among university students connected to?
The difference between offline and online bullying.
How does cyberbullying affect the social lives of the victims?
Study cyberbullying as one of the reasons behind high school absenteeism.
Evaluate the organizations that provide support to victims of cyberbullying.
Discuss cyberstalking as a distinct kind of cyberbullying.
Education on cyberbullying as one of the measures to prevent it.
Is there online etiquette to prevent digital harassment?
Can blocking the cyberbully protect the victim?
Are nonconsensual sexual messages considered cyberbullying?
The role of educators in the issue of online abuse.
Should parents be involved in the resolution of cyberbullying issues?
Is peer pressure the reason behind digital abuse?
Anonymity as a facilitator of cyberbullying.
Ridiculing with insults as a subtype of cyberbullying.
Case study: celebrities who were affected by online harassment.
Research the psychology of aggressors who initiate and support cyberbullying.
Suggest the actions of a parent whose child was subjected to online abuse.

According to statistics, 15% of kids between 12 and 18 who reported being bullied at school said they were harassed online or via text messages. Writing essays on cyberbullying may assist in raising awareness and drawing people’s attention to this issue.

🕵️ Bullying Research Titles: Crime and Law

The impact of abuse on troubled adolescents.
Bullying as a form of relational aggression.
The social concepts of harassment and its types.
The “Mean Stinks” program and girl-to-girl bullying.
Rank American states by their anti-bullying laws.
Suggest intervention techniques for preventing bullying in elementary and middle schools.
How can we prevent sexual harassment and aggression in the workplace?
Consider ways to resolve conflicts and stop bullying within an organization.
How can we address aggression among children in school settings?
The Dumfries and Galloway Council’s anti-bullying policy.
Evaluate the effectiveness of cognitive behavioral therapy to help victims of harassment.
What is the role of parenting styles in bullying?
Explore the prevalence of bullying in modern society.
How can we use anti-bullying measures to deter juvenile crime and delinquency?
Ways to deal with workplace bullying and the “office bully.”
Anti-bullying practices in the criminal justice system.
Research the negative impact of workplace bullying on mental health.
The persistence of bullying in modern communities: an editorial.
Nurse bullying as unprofessional conduct.
Why should we recognize harassment as a serious social problem?
The physical, emotional, and social aspects of intimidation.
Do we need government regulations to prevent bullying?
How does bullying affect the social learning theory?
Study the changing landscape of aggression in the modern world.
Research cyberbullying through anonymity on social media.
Is abuse a social determinant of health?
Evaluate factors that increase the likelihood of interpersonal aggression.
Bullying as a form of social and criminal deviance.
Suggest ways of balancing free speech and anti-bullying laws.
Study the link between bullying and substance abuse.

Bullying incidents are typically not crimes. Nonetheless, some forms of bullying are prohibited by law and must be reported to the authorities. This includes bullying that involves physical harm or assault, theft, long-term harassment, intimidation, etc. If this interests you, choose any of our bullying topics connected to crime and law and write a paper about it!

"No one heals himself by wounding another." - St. Ambrose.

Have you been assigned to write an essay about bullying? If you need help with this task, you’re in luck: check out our practical guide with practical tips and examples! 

Bullying Research Paper Introduction

Let’s start from the very beginning. A strong introduction must include the following components: 

A hook. The opening sentence of an introduction paragraph should contain something attention-grabbing. It can be a piece of statistics, a shocking fact, a quotation, or a powerful statement related to your topic.

The internet has transformed the landscape of human interaction, giving rise to a realm where words can wound or even kill.

You can also check out our free attention grabber generator to help you develop catchy hooks!

A brief overview . An introduction should provide background information on the paper’s significance within a specific field.

Teenagers spend more and more time navigating a complex virtual world online via social media sites like Twitter, YouTube, and TikTok. According to recent studies, these hours of increasing online usage may be linked to cyberbullying behaviors.

An explanation of your position . The introduction needs to transition smoothly from background information to the specific argument of the paper. 
A thesis statement . Finish your introductory paragraph with a short summary of the paper’s main ideas. Read on to learn how to write it!

Bullying Thesis Statement: How to Write

A thesis statement is a sentence that summarizes the arguments in your essay. Follow these steps to create a compelling and informative thesis statement: 

Examine the primary sources.
Choose the most compelling arguments.
Formulate your own position based on the information you’ve found.
Turn it into a short persuasive statement.

Most of the time, cyberbullying goes unreported, but it is still an extremely destructive and, in some cases, fatal phenomenon.

To make the writing process easier, try using our free thesis generator .

Main Body & Topic Sentences for Bullying Research Paper

The main body of your text should contain topic sentences, compelling evidence, and a description of your research and findings. To write a good body paragraph, follow our tips:

📌 Give plenty of detail on the points raised in your introduction.

📌 Gather all the facts you’ve learned from different sources during your investigation.

📌 Create a logical structure for your argument.

When adolescents connect with their peers in person, they adopt social norms that differ significantly from those used in online communication. Social media tends to make them more aggressive due to their anonymity and ability to avoid retaliation. Furthermore, because they cannot see the actual consequences of their activities, cyberbullies may feel less remorse or empathy when engaging in bullying behaviors.

Bullying Conclusion Paragraph: Writing Tips

To create an effective research paper conclusion , you will need to rewrite your thesis and summarize your main arguments. But that’s not all of it: it is also necessary to leave a lasting impression on the reader. Here’s how you can do it:

🎯 Finish by connecting the last paragraph to the first.

🎯 Conclude with a statement that is made up of one-syllable words.

🎯 End with a sentence that summarizes your main points.

Cyberbullying is a grave problem that can happen to anyone but is especially widespread among young people. For this reason, schools and parents must be aware of this issue and take appropriate action to avoid negative consequences. But we must also remember that the power to combat cyberbullying lies in our empathy, vigilance, and kindness towards each other.

We hope that our list bullying topics for research papers will be helpful to you! If you haven’t found a suitable topic here, you can also try our free research question generator to help you develop a writing idea. Feel free to comment below or share this article with your friends!

Tackling Bullying from the Inside Out: Shifting Paradigms in Bullying Research and Interventions

James o’higgins norman.

UNESCO Chair on Tackling Bullying in Schools and Cyberspace, Dublin City University, Dublin, Ireland

Introduction

The decision to have a university Chair dedicated to tackling bullying and cyberbullying was achieved through a partnership between the Government of Ireland, Dublin City University and the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO). Research by UNESCO shows that one-third of children globally experience bullying in schools (UNESCO 2019 ), so one of the reasons the Chair was established was to ensure that all of the important work being done around the globe to tackle bullying and cyberbullying is amalgamated in one place to create a critical mass of researchers so that we can work internationally to address these problems. In the past, bullying was a very local issue, but today it is understood as an issue that crosses boundaries between nations, time and space and that occurs online as well as offline.

UNESCO awards the status of a Chair to select universities around the world when they assess the university to have reached a high enough standard in research and teaching in a specific area that relates to the goals of the UN. In our case at DCU, it is sustainable development goal number four to ‘ensure inclusive and equitable quality education and promote lifelong learning opportunities for all’ ( United Nations Sustainable Development Goal 4 ). DCU’s Annual Impact Review 2018 /2019 outlines how the university is providing quality education for all through a range of research and teaching initiatives including the work at the National Anti-Bullying Research and Resource Centre (DCU Impact Review 2018 ).

The aim of a UNESCO Chair is to promote international inter-university cooperation and networking, to enhance institutional capacities through knowledge sharing and collaborative work, in key priority areas related to UNESCO’s fields of competence, and to serve as think-tanks and bridge-builders between academia, civil society, local communities, research and policy-making to inform policy decisions, establishing new teaching initiatives, generating innovation through research and contributing to the enrichment of existing university programmes while promoting cultural diversity.

The specific work of DCU’s UNESCO Chair will be to lead a major systematic review of the international evidence in relation to the effects of bullying on how migrant children experience equality and wellbeing in schools, to explore the possibility for whole-school anti-bullying interventions and to support local-level delivery through partner institutions in different countries. The aim is also to consolidate materials and resources for delivery in terms of high-quality training courses. These aims will be achieved through a number of funded projects currently being delivered by the UNESCO Chair which is located at the National Anti-Bullying Research and Resource Centre in DCU. Chief among these projects is TRIBES , a project focused on migrant experiences of school bullying across the European continent. The project is funded by COST and involves 120 partners in over 40 countries, all of whom are working together to understand the increased vulnerability experienced by migrants and to prevent and intervene where bullying is concerned.

In this lecture, I will revisit our understanding of childhood and how our assumptions have influenced our approach to undertaking research and initiatives to tackle bullying in schools and cyberspace. I will explore how the dominant discourse in the field of bullying studies has for almost 50 years been based on traditional assumptions about childhood and has also perpetuated a particular type of research that tends to ignore the realities of childhood as experienced by children today. I will set out a newer view of childhood that has already established itself in other fields, and I will explain how we can apply this new sociology of childhood to our work on tackling bullying in schools and cyberspace.

Defining and Contextualising Bullying

While certain individuals are more likely to bully ( psychological dimension ), the structures in which they exist ( sociological dimension ) can also contribute towards an environment ( educational dimension ) where bullying is more acceptable. Furthermore, social media and other online spaces ( technological dimension ) are now extending the nature and scope of bullying beyond the built environment into cyberspace. Bullying has been defined for some time now as:

occurring when an individual is repeatedly exposed to intentional negative actions by another person(s), creating an imbalance in power between the perpetrator and victim. (Olweus 2007 )

This definition comes from the work of Dan Olweus who is generally recognised as a seminal figure in anti-bullying studies. The definition is not perfect and I will contest it somewhat later on, but for now, we can say that there are four things that characterise bullying behaviour and these are:

Intentionality
Repetitiveness
Power imbalance
Negative effects

We could spend some time exploring what each of these means, for example, to what extent can a once off event be said to be bullying? Where is the repetition in that? Some would say that as it is just a one-off event, then it is aggression and conflictual but not bullying. On the other hand, it can be argued that the threat of its being repeated in itself means that effect of repetition is present, and so an apparent once off event can be considered to be bullying.

The first case of bullying ever to be named as such involved a young soldier in the British Army who was reported in The Times newspaper in 1862 to have taken his own life because he had been subject to ‘systematic bullying’ and had been the object of constant ‘vexations and attack’. Interestingly the tone of the newspaper article was non-condemnatory with regard to those who had carried out these vexations concluding that bullying was a part of human nature frequently found in a ‘school or a camp, or a barracks, or a ship’s crew’ as cited in Koo ( 2007 ).

Similarly, cyberbullying is defined as:

wilful and repeated harm inflicted through computers, cell phones, and other electronic devices. (Hinduja and Patchin 2015 :11)

The key differences here between bullying and cyberbullying relate to the fact that victims often cannot tell who is bullying them online, and this increases the power imbalance between the bully and the victim, and as such, this anonymity can cause much trauma to the victim. Another key difference is that the potential audience is much larger when the bullying takes place online, and this increases the scope of humiliation for the victim. Finally, the fact that the internet is everywhere in our lives is key, it is virtually impossible in many countries to avoid the internet. As such cyberbullying can be extremely pervasive —in other words, there is no getting away from it. The extensive lockdown as a result of COVID-19 means that young people have more time and opportunity to engage in cyberbullying.

So how big of a problem is bullying for our young people. Research from UNESCO in 2018 that relied on individual country reports found that one-third of children and young people are victimised in school. Clearly, if we consider the mental health effects and diseases that can result from being bullied, then bullying can be understood in some ways as a problem of pandemic proportions. If one-third of children globally were starving or contracted a disease, we would immediately close our airports and send in the army to tackle the problem—but yet we often accept that bullying is a fact of life and there is little that can be done about it. The number of victims, however, is not consistent across all countries. UNESCO’s report looked at the individual countries where data is available to see what the more local situations are like.

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(UNESCO 2019 )

We see that the Middle Eastern countries have a very high prevalence rate of bullying, followed by the US and then Europe and Caribbean countries. It is interesting to drill down into some of those figures and look at Ireland as an example from Europe. In our own meta-analysis of all bullying and cyberbullying studies in Ireland, we found that 26% of primary school children and 12% of post-primary school children had been bullied offline, with 14% of primary and 10% of post-primary being bullied online (Foody et al. 2017 ).

Furthermore, in a more recent study, we found that 57% of 15–18-year-olds were asked to share a sexual image, 24% shared a sexual image and 13% had a sexual image shared without their consent (O’Higgins Norman et al. 2019 ). Reaction to the increased participation in sexting, that is, sending sexual content online, among young people naturally raises concern about young people and their safety online and how best to support them. Colleagues in the USA at the Cyberbullying Research Centre are now beginning to suggest that we should educate young people how to sext safely (Patchin and Hinduja 2020 ). This view is based on data that shows that a large number of students in our schools are sending sexts and so it is argued that it would be be better and more responsible to teach them how to do it safely, and in doing so, minimise the risks to their safety and privacy. This is somewhat controversial. In Ireland many schools take a traditionalist approach to sexual matters where children are concerned and sex education in schools has been found to be poor, focused narrowly on biology and avoiding sensitive topics (Keating et al. 2018 ).

If we return to the Behind the Numbers ( 2019 ) report from UNESCO, we find that similar to the Middle East, North Africa and sub-Saharan Africa unclear have very high reported prevalence rates of bullying, while South America and Central America report the lowest rates. As a sociologist, I have to ask what are the societal and cultural factors that lead to such high prevalence rates in some countries and lower rates in other countries. If we look to the work of Emile Durkheim on suicide and society, we can see that he was able to link suicide rates in different countries to societal norms (Pickering et al. 2000 ), and there is a similar task to be undertaken for those interested in why prevalence rates vary from one country to another.

If we turn our attention to Asia, we find that the rate of bullying reported there is higher than in Europe but not as high as in the Middle East and African countries. Looking specifically at Japan and relying on data from the Government, we find that the number of cases that were reported in 2018 increased by 28%, with 478 of these cases being investigated and found to be serious. Again this marks an increase from previous years. Of these 55 cases were deemed to be life threatening (Government of Japan 2018 ). In order to understand the situation with school bullying in Japan, I turn to the work of Japanese colleagues who help us to get behind the numbers for Japan (MEXT 2018 ).

In Japan conformity is traditionally valued over individual identity, and this can cause problems for people who do not easily fit in or who identify with a minority outlook. An old Japanese saying, the nail that sticks up gets hammered down , is suggested as one way of explaining, at least partially, how children who seem to be different might be treated in schools in Japan (Naito and Gielen 2005 ) Of course, this is not a problem unique to Japan. There are aspects of this in homogeneous Western societies and certainly in Ireland where until recently we had a very homogeneous society. The Western philosopher René Girard advances the notion of ‘scapegoats’ and how people who are perceived to be different to the norm can be pushed out or excluded from society (Girard 1989 ). Another societal and cultural explanation for why students in schools in Japan may not report bullying to parents or teachers is that culturally it is not acceptable to burden others with one’s own problems. Finally, it is reported that bullying in Japan can be more extreme physically and as such cause school boys and girls to consider suicide as a means of escape from physical pain (Naito and Gielen 2005 ).

Clearly, the cost of bullying to the individual in terms of mental health and life opportunities can be significant, resulting in low self-esteem, depression, social isolation and even suicidal ideation. Furthermore, the cost can be economic too. Recent research in Sweden found that, if it is not tackled, the cost to the State of 1 year of bullying in schools can be up to two billion euro over the following 30 years (Nilsson Lundmark et al. 2016 ).

The current geopolitical context is more challenging than ever before to promote inclusion and address discrimination as a form of bullying in schools and cyberspace. In 2017, bullying rates among middle school students in the USA were 18% higher in localities where voters had favoured Donald Trump than in those that had supported Hillary Clinton (Huang and Cornell 2019 ). Similarly, student reports of peers being teased or put down because of their race or ethnicity were 9% higher in localities favouring the Republican candidate. Research by UNESCO found that appearance and race were the top reasons for bullying in school (2019). Children and young people are rarely bullied because they are perceived to be the same as everyone else. They are often bullied because they stand out in their environment for being different from their peers and the normative life that dominates in a society. In fact, there is now a body of research that shows that racism harms children’s health even from before they are born (Trent et al. 2019 ). This points to the need for schools to promote inclusion and diversity. Research shows that where young people are provided with an opportunity to reflect on difference as a positive aspect of life, levels of bullying and other forms of discrimination decrease (O'Higgins Norman 2008 ).

Bullying Research

Over the last 50 years, there have been many major studies into school bullying. These have been mostly quantitative in nature with little attention paid to the experience or understanding of bullying and cyberbullying by children and young people (Smith and Berkkun 2020 ). If we look at the first studies of note by Dan Olweus in Norway in the 1970s, these resulted in his now famous Olweus Bullying Questionnaire (Olweus 2007 ). These early studies by Olweus were so ground-breaking and significant that most of the international studies that followed just repeated the same type of empirical data collection and analysis. While this was useful, the nature of bullying was not addressed in a deep enough way. Certainly, the recent data from UNESCO shows that school bullying is still a major global problem globally affecting children in schools in most countries (2019).

In order to move our efforts to tackle bullying in school and cyberspace forward we need to return to three basic questions and try to answer them.

What assumptions have we been making about childhood?

How best to undertake research on childhood?

What do we do about it now?

In terms of the assumptions we have been making about children in our research, we can trace these assumptions in the West back to the seventeenth century and the very influential writings of John Locke (1632–1704). Locke argued that all knowledge comes from experience and perception of the world around us. According to him, humans are born as a tabula rasa , a blank slate, and as such, they have no built in content or internal processes, just an open space waiting for the world to fill it in. As such he emphasises nurture over nature and saw children as lacking any ability to make sense of the world around them (Winkler 1996 ). These ideas were taken up by others such as Jean-Jacque Rousseau (1721–1778) who argued that children were born innocent and pure but with the capacity to be formed by experience (Rousseau 1991 ). But even before this, from a theological perspective, John Calvin (1509–1564) understood children to be born with the ‘seed of sin’ in them and therefor needing to be guided and stewarded away from evil towards good (Reeves 2018 ). All of this led to a situation where children were understood to be incomplete and uninteresting. Children should be seen and not heard is an often quoted Victorian phrase, and, in many ways, it sums up the reasons why social scientists have often neglected to enquire from children themselves as to what they know, understand and experience. Returning to Japan, we find that the influence of Shintoism resulted in similar assumptions about childhood. Traditional beliefs about childhood in Japan assumed that a child was a gift from the gods, and as such the child was understood in society to be born pure in nature. In fact, a child was traditionally believed to exist in the realm of the gods until the age of 7 years (Nigosian 1994 ). This view is not unlike Western Christian beliefs where it was also believed that the age of reason was 7 years and that this age marked was the point when a child would know right from wrong (Shapiro and Perry 1976 ). The implications of these traditional beliefs for society and child rearing were significant. It was believed that adults needed to protect children from evil influences so that the children could develop their own innate good nature. In this context, mothers, mainly, were responsible for raising their children to become respectable adults. They were also responsible for raising the first boy to excel as the successor in patriarchal family systems.

Because of these assumptions about childhood both in the West and in the East, researchers have tended to focus on questions regarding the socialisation of children, i.e. to what extent have children acquired the requisite knowledge and skills to become competent members of society. The socialisation perspective defines children as ‘incomplete’ or ‘in process’ rather than as full members of society. We have only had an interest in measuring and observing children from the outside in terms of their future capacity as adults. Until recently, generally speaking, children’s voices have not been recognised as important either in research or in education and wider society. Children, as is said in German, lacked Mündigkeit which means maturity or, more literally, the capacity of speaking for themselves. It is the case that others tend to speak for them, and these tend to be mothers and/or female teachers who will often carry and transfer an unconscious bias developed in their socialisation into normative cultures. In research on school children, teachers (mostly female) assess children’s personalities, abilities and promise. These unconscious biases have been found to influence how teachers relate to and represent the children in their classrooms, particularly in terms of gender and social class (Renehan 2006 ; Skelton et al. 2009 ; Schmude and Jackisch 2019 ), reinforcing normative lifestyles with little attention to the voice of children.

I mentioned earlier the seminal works conducted by Dan Olweus and how his early work has influenced so much of the research on bullying that has followed over the past 40 years. It could be said that a singular model of research has been applied to most subsequent studies on bullying. Use of Olweus’ definition and related self-report questionnaire on bullying has been extensive in international research. This approach, however, has been critiqued on the basis that it does not account for nuances in different cultural meanings and terminology associated with the concept of bullying. For example, Smith et al. ( 2002 ) point to the fact that in Japan, the term ‘ ijime ’ is used as a bullying equivalent, but the term implies less of a focus on physical violence and greater emphasis on social manipulation. So given just these different cultural meanings and terminology, it is difficult to apply a single research instrument in every context with every child as if they were all the same. Furthermore, the criticism by Lee ( 2004 ) of the approach recommended by Olweus ( 1993 ) argues that such an approach could possibly be regarded as value-laden and reflects the power of the researcher to define bullying, and this leads to the exclusion of related behaviours. Olweus’ Bullying Questionnaire and other frequently used research instruments such as the Moods and Feelings Questionnaire often carry gendered assumptions about what is considered good behaviour for males and females. This can set up boys and girls to be considered only in terms of narrow binary conceptions of gender, ignoring sexuality and other individual and social traits. Essentially in this type of research, children are subjects rather than collaborators in that research is done on them rather than with them. This has implications for those who are being asked to create policies and procedures that include definitions of bullying. Maybe some of our policies and programmes in the West have not been as successful as they could have been because they are based on data from studies where the local culture and experience of the child were not considered as much as it should have been. This was a lesson learned in Japan where initial efforts to tackle bullying were purely adaptations of programmes from the West. In recent years, however, greater attention has been given to the specific experience and culture of school children in Japan resulting in some new successful child-centred initiatives (Toda 2019 ). The core challenge here for policymakers and schools is how to develop a workable definition that sufficiently covers various types of aggressive behaviour and shapes effective school-based programmes to tackle bullying and cyberbullying.

Recent Influence of the New Sociology of Childhood

A new sociology of childhood approach rejects a transmission model of development and education (Durkheim 1975 ) where children are understood to merely internalise the values and normative behaviours of society. More recent research and theories show that children are not just passive recipients but active agents in their socialisation process. It is now argued that children are both constructed by structure and also active agents, acting in and upon structure. They do not simply internalise the world, but strive to make sense of the world and to participate in it. By active participation in social interactions, children and teenagers incorporate and co-construct many social constructions of various aspects of their social life. It is argued then that we need to investigate how they make sense of social situations in order better to understand their actions and interaction patterns.

According to the new sociology of childhood, children are social actors in their world. We talk about the idea of interpretive reproduction as the means by which children make sense of their world and their experiences. The term interpretive captures innovative and creative aspect of children’s participation in society. Children produce and participate in their own unique peer cultures by creatively appropriating information from the adult world to address their own peer concerns. The term reproductive captures the idea that children do not simply internalise society and culture but also actively contribute to cultural production and change. For example, children are known to play with gender rather than simply accepting adult definitions, they establish within their own peer group cultures and systems that make sense to them (Corsaro 2012 ).

Both the socialisation and the developmental psychology perspectives have tended to prompt scholars to write about children as if all children were the same regardless of social location or context. The ‘new’ sociological perspective stresses ‘a plurality of childhoods’ not only within the same society but also across the settings in which children conduct their everyday lives. Using a social constructionist view, scholars focus on how particular cultural representations of children affect children’s relationships, rights and responsibilities. Scholars in the ‘new’ sociology advocate recognising that children in different social locations have different childhoods and that their experience of childhood changes from one context to another. Children are not all the same in every situation and context.

Scholars argue that no matter how benign parents, teachers and other adults may be, relationships between adults and children are characterised by differential power resources. Hence, based on the situation, dependence in relationships with adults may capture the experience of children better than socialisation, which characterises children as deficient relative to adults rather than disadvantaged or oppressed by them. The crucial distinction that makes children children is that they are not adults ; as individuals and as a social group, they lack adulthood. This lack can be defined variously as deficiency, disadvantage and/or oppression. The components may vary according to individual and societal standpoint, but intergenerational relationships between children and adults are established in such a way that children are always inferior to adults and find it harder to have their rights vindicated (Mayall 1994 ; Quennerstedt and Quennerstedt 2014 ).

This view of childhood as oppression is countered in the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child ( 1989 ). The four foundational principals of the Convention are key to understanding how to undertake research with children and to plan initiatives to improve their lives such as in an anti-bullying programmes. The four general principles (United Nations 1989 ) are:

That all the rights guaranteed by the Convention must be available to all children without discrimination of any kind (Article 2)
That the best interests of the child must be a primary consideration in all actions concerning children (Article 3)
That every child has the right to life, survival and development (Article 6)
That the child’s views must be considered and taken into account in all matters affecting him or her (Article 12)

So, if we start our anti-bullying research and initiatives to tackle bullying with a new sociology of childhood perspective as represented in the UN Convention, we find ourselves starting our work with children with their rights. We now begin to plan our research and anti-bullying programmes differently.

Involving children and young people as respondents, co-researchers and commissioner of research.
Avoid privileging adults and instead interact directly with children.
Think carefully about suitable ways to gather data from children.
Use qualitative, participatory and ethnographic approaches as they seem most appropriate.
Making children visible through the way statistics are collected and reported.

In some studies, we have asked the children to explain to us why bullying happens, and the answers they give us are very interesting and important from the point of view of planning anti-bullying programmes.

They tell us that being perceived by their peers as different, odd or deviant in some way can lead to being bullied at school. This ties in with the image mentioned previously of the ‘nail that stands out’ and the need for conformity. According to stigma and labelling theories, when a social group labels a person as deviant, then he or she is understood to have violated important taken for granted social norms of the peer culture. Once the label is applied, the person can be justifiably victimised. Stigma theory (Goffman 1963 ) and labelling theory (Phelan and Link 1999 ) explain that it is almost impossible for individuals to improve their situation once they have had a stigmatised label assigned to them (Thornberg 2015 ). This highlights the importance of diversity education programmes to prevent these exclusionary situations occurring in schools (O'Higgins Norman 2008 ; Thornberg 2010 ).

Children also tell us that those who bully often do it because they want to increase their social positioning (Thornberg 2019 ), that is, to be more powerful than other children in the classroom and that bullying others serves to enable this. Schools are hierarchical in nature with children at the bottom of the pyramid. They often want to appear cool and are driven to obtain a higher social position in the school than other students, seeking to enhance, maintain or show off their power, status and popularity. Being seen to be cool and to have lots of friends can be a way to improve social position in school.

Finally, in our studies, we find children also explain that bullies have psychosocial problems and as such their acting out represents some deeper emotional problem. It is interesting that children can show such understanding and appreciation for mental health and emotional problems. This points us to the need to develop classroom programmes that allow children to grow and express their emotions while at the same time providing counselling and support for children at a school and community level (Thornberg 2019 ).

In terms of interventions to tackle bullying and cyberbullying, international research has reported that if a school is to tackle these issues with any success, a whole school and community approach is often recommended (Smith 2014 ). This is described in different ways by different authors (Smith 2014 ), but the characteristics that are constant can be described as follows (O’Higgins Norman & Sullivan 2017 ):

Leadership and change management
Policy development
Curriculum planning
School ethos
Student voice and bystanders
Student support services
Partnership with parents and local communities

What has been missing from many of these whole school approaches is a recognition of the importance of the voice and agency of the child. Anti-bullying initiatives will be more successful if they are commissioned, designed and evaluated with children. I realise that this is challenging for us as researchers and educators who have honed our skills and expertise over many years. However, if our work is to really make a difference, we need to extend the scope of our expertise to include partnership with children and young people who are ultimately the experts in what is like to be a child today (Kellett 2010 ). While other fields of study have made considerable progress in adopting this approach (Lundy et al. 2019 , I think many of us who work in the field of bullying studies have come to it later than in other fields. This is due to a number of factors not least an over reliance on quantitative research methods and the related dominance of particular branches of sociology and psychology in driving research and initiatives in our field.

Furthermore, now that we are coming around to the realisation that research and responses to bullying and cyberbullying must include at least an acknowledgment of the importance of the voice and agency of children, O’Brien and Dadswell ( 2020 ) warn that it is not enough to merely acknowledge that children and young people have a right to be heard and to actively participate in research and initiatives to tackle bullying and cyberbullying, but they must be provided with opportunities that are not ‘one off’ or ‘add on’ activities; instead they should be embedded within the system to accommodate their participation as partners in research and responses to tackle bullying and cyberbullying. This is a point taken up by Lundy ( 2018 ) although she acknowledges that a tokenistic approach to collective child participation might be a useful and necessary step on a journey towards more meaningful engagement with children. Either way some researchers in the field of bullying are now beginning to lead research and to develop initiatives that attempt to include a greater acknowledgement of the voice and agency of the child (Thornberg 2010 ; O’Brien 2019 ; White et al. 2019 ).

Not only will this approach be more effective, but it will also respect the rights of the child and go towards fulfilling our obligations and objectives under Article 12(1) of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (1989). However, as I have already suggested, such an approach to research and the development of related initiatives to tackle bullying in schools and online brings with it many challenges to the established order within the field of bullying studies. One such challenge is in the area of research ethics. Traditionally, adults have decided what is best for children, including what protects them from harm. Ethical standards are of course necessary to ensure that children and young people are not taken advantage of during the research process and that the researcher does not put his/her needs ahead of the needs of the child. However, when it comes to working ethically with children as respondents, co-researchers and commissioner of research, we must be careful not to allow traditional views of childhood to get in the way of allowing children their right to express themselves and to be heard by society on how they are affected by bullying and cyberbullying. Children and young people have a right to be heard and to be involved in anything that affects them; as such our assumptions and ethical frameworks must change to ensure that these rights are fulfilled. I suggest that university ethics committees need to involve children and young people in producing standards for ethical research and in evaluating research proposals that involve children and young people as respondents, co-researchers and/or commissioner of research.

In this lecture, I have explored traditional assumptions about childhood and the impact of these assumptions on research about childhood and specifically about bullying. I have argued that over almost 50 years, these assumptions led to a dominant discourse in bullying research and related initiatives that was characterised by a particular view of childhood. This view of childhood tended to focus on questions about the extent to which children had acquired the requisite knowledge and skills to become competent adult members of society. This socialisation perspective assumes that children are ‘incomplete’ adults rather than full members of society in their own right. Consequently, researchers have only had an interest in measuring and observing children in terms of their future capacity as adults. Until relatively recently, generally speaking, children’s voices have not been recognised as important either in research or in education and wider society. However, when we consider the perspective of children’s rights and apply a new sociology of childhood approach, our work with children moves beyond traditional assumptions and begins to be underpinned by a view of childhood that recognises that children have agency, are diverse and develop meaningful relationships, ultimately creating their own view of the world around them. Consequently, this changes our approach to research and the development of responses to bullying in school and online. It is clear that our work with children has to fundamentally change to recognise the experience of childhood as something that is valid and contains within it a set of rights that are fundamental to their general wellbeing and specifically to the future success of tackling bullying in schools and cyberspace.

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Preventing Bullying Through Science, Policy, and Practice (2016)

Chapter: 1 introduction, 1 introduction.

Bullying, long tolerated by many as a rite of passage into adulthood, is now recognized as a major and preventable public health problem, one that can have long-lasting consequences ( McDougall and Vaillancourt, 2015 ; Wolke and Lereya, 2015 ). Those consequences—for those who are bullied, for the perpetrators of bullying, and for witnesses who are present during a bullying event—include poor school performance, anxiety, depression, and future delinquent and aggressive behavior. Federal, state, and local governments have responded by adopting laws and implementing programs to prevent bullying and deal with its consequences. However, many of these responses have been undertaken with little attention to what is known about bullying and its effects. Even the definition of bullying varies among both researchers and lawmakers, though it generally includes physical and verbal behavior, behavior leading to social isolation, and behavior that uses digital communications technology (cyberbullying). This report adopts the term “bullying behavior,” which is frequently used in the research field, to cover all of these behaviors.

Bullying behavior is evident as early as preschool, although it peaks during the middle school years ( Currie et al., 2012 ; Vaillancourt et al., 2010 ). It can occur in diverse social settings, including classrooms, school gyms and cafeterias, on school buses, and online. Bullying behavior affects not only the children and youth who are bullied, who bully, and who are both bullied and bully others but also bystanders to bullying incidents. Given the myriad situations in which bullying can occur and the many people who may be involved, identifying effective prevention programs and policies is challenging, and it is unlikely that any one approach will be ap-

propriate in all situations. Commonly used bullying prevention approaches include policies regarding acceptable behavior in schools and behavioral interventions to promote positive cultural norms.

STUDY CHARGE

Recognizing that bullying behavior is a major public health problem that demands the concerted and coordinated time and attention of parents, educators and school administrators, health care providers, policy makers, families, and others concerned with the care of children, a group of federal agencies and private foundations asked the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine to undertake a study of what is known and what needs to be known to further the field of preventing bullying behavior. The Committee on the Biological and Psychosocial Effects of Peer Victimization:

Lessons for Bullying Prevention was created to carry out this task under the Academies’ Board on Children, Youth, and Families and the Committee on Law and Justice. The study received financial support from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), the Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development, the Health Resources and Services Administration, the Highmark Foundation, the National Institute of Justice, the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, Semi J. and Ruth W. Begun Foundation, and the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration. The full statement of task for the committee is presented in Box 1-1 .

Although the committee acknowledges the importance of this topic as it pertains to all children in the United States and in U.S. territories, this report focuses on the 50 states and the District of Columbia. Also, while the committee acknowledges that bullying behavior occurs in the school

environment for youth in foster care, in juvenile justice facilities, and in other residential treatment facilities, this report does not address bullying behavior in those environments because it is beyond the study charge.

CONTEXT FOR THE STUDY

This section of the report highlights relevant work in the field and, later in the chapter under “The Committee’s Approach,” presents the conceptual framework and corresponding definitions of terms that the committee has adopted.

Historical Context

Bullying behavior was first characterized in the scientific literature as part of the childhood experience more than 100 years ago in “Teasing and Bullying,” published in the Pedagogical Seminary ( Burk, 1897 ). The author described bullying behavior, attempted to delineate causes and cures for the tormenting of others, and called for additional research ( Koo, 2007 ). Nearly a century later, Dan Olweus, a Swedish research professor of psychology in Norway, conducted an intensive study on bullying ( Olweus, 1978 ). The efforts of Olweus brought awareness to the issue and motivated other professionals to conduct their own research, thereby expanding and contributing to knowledge of bullying behavior. Since Olweus’s early work, research on bullying has steadily increased (see Farrington and Ttofi, 2009 ; Hymel and Swearer, 2015 ).

Over the past few decades, venues where bullying behavior occurs have expanded with the advent of the Internet, chat rooms, instant messaging, social media, and other forms of digital electronic communication. These modes of communication have provided a new communal avenue for bullying. While the media reports linking bullying to suicide suggest a causal relationship, the available research suggests that there are often multiple factors that contribute to a youth’s suicide-related ideology and behavior. Several studies, however, have demonstrated an association between bullying involvement and suicide-related ideology and behavior (see, e.g., Holt et al., 2015 ; Kim and Leventhal, 2008 ; Sourander, 2010 ; van Geel et al., 2014 ).

In 2013, the Health Resources and Services Administration of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services requested that the Institute of Medicine 1 and the National Research Council convene an ad hoc planning committee to plan and conduct a 2-day public workshop to highlight relevant information and knowledge that could inform a multidisciplinary

___________________

1 Prior to 2015, the National Academy of Medicine was known as the Institute of Medicine.

road map on next steps for the field of bullying prevention. Content areas that were explored during the April 2014 workshop included the identification of conceptual models and interventions that have proven effective in decreasing bullying and the antecedents to bullying while increasing protective factors that mitigate the negative health impact of bullying. The discussions highlighted the need for a better understanding of the effectiveness of program interventions in realistic settings; the importance of understanding what works for whom and under what circumstances, as well as the influence of different mediators (i.e., what accounts for associations between variables) and moderators (i.e., what affects the direction or strength of associations between variables) in bullying prevention efforts; and the need for coordination among agencies to prevent and respond to bullying. The workshop summary ( Institute of Medicine and National Research Council, 2014c ) informs this committee’s work.

Federal Efforts to Address Bullying and Related Topics

Currently, there is no comprehensive federal statute that explicitly prohibits bullying among children and adolescents, including cyberbullying. However, in the wake of the growing concerns surrounding the implications of bullying, several federal initiatives do address bullying among children and adolescents, and although some of them do not primarily focus on bullying, they permit some funds to be used for bullying prevention purposes.

The earliest federal initiative was in 1999, when three agencies collaborated to establish the Safe Schools/Healthy Students initiative in response to a series of deadly school shootings in the late 1990s. The program is administered by the U.S. Departments of Education, Health and Human Services, and Justice to prevent youth violence and promote the healthy development of youth. It is jointly funded by the Department of Education and by the Department of Health and Human Services’ Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration. The program has provided grantees with both the opportunity to benefit from collaboration and the tools to sustain it through deliberate planning, more cost-effective service delivery, and a broader funding base ( Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration, 2015 ).

The next major effort was in 2010, when the Department of Education awarded $38.8 million in grants under the Safe and Supportive Schools (S3) Program to 11 states to support statewide measurement of conditions for learning and targeted programmatic interventions to improve conditions for learning, in order to help schools improve safety and reduce substance use. The S3 Program was administered by the Safe and Supportive Schools Group, which also administered the Safe and Drug-Free Schools and Communities Act State and Local Grants Program, authorized by the

1994 Elementary and Secondary Education Act. 2 It was one of several programs related to developing and maintaining safe, disciplined, and drug-free schools. In addition to the S3 grants program, the group administered a number of interagency agreements with a focus on (but not limited to) bullying, school recovery research, data collection, and drug and violence prevention activities ( U.S. Department of Education, 2015 ).

A collaborative effort among the U.S. Departments of Agriculture, Defense, Education, Health and Human Services, Interior, and Justice; the Federal Trade Commission; and the White House Initiative on Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders created the Federal Partners in Bullying Prevention (FPBP) Steering Committee. Led by the U.S. Department of Education, the FPBP works to coordinate policy, research, and communications on bullying topics. The FPBP Website provides extensive resources on bullying behavior, including information on what bullying is, its risk factors, its warning signs, and its effects. 3 The FPBP Steering Committee also plans to provide details on how to get help for those who have been bullied. It also was involved in creating the “Be More than a Bystander” Public Service Announcement campaign with the Ad Council to engage students in bullying prevention. To improve school climate and reduce rates of bullying nationwide, FPBP has sponsored four bullying prevention summits attended by education practitioners, policy makers, researchers, and federal officials.

In 2014, the National Institute of Justice—the scientific research arm of the U.S. Department of Justice—launched the Comprehensive School Safety Initiative with a congressional appropriation of $75 million. The funds are to be used for rigorous research to produce practical knowledge that can improve the safety of schools and students, including bullying prevention. The initiative is carried out through partnerships among researchers, educators, and other stakeholders, including law enforcement, behavioral and mental health professionals, courts, and other justice system professionals ( National Institute of Justice, 2015 ).

In 2015, the Every Student Succeeds Act was signed by President Obama, reauthorizing the 50-year-old Elementary and Secondary Education Act, which is committed to providing equal opportunities for all students. Although bullying is neither defined nor prohibited in this act, it is explicitly mentioned in regard to applicability of safe school funding, which it had not been in previous iterations of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act.

The above are examples of federal initiatives aimed at promoting the

2 The Safe and Drug-Free Schools and Communities Act was included as Title IV, Part A, of the 1994 Elementary and Secondary Education Act. See http://www.ojjdp.gov/pubs/gun_violence/sect08-i.html [October 2015].

3 For details, see http://www.stopbullying.gov/ [October 2015].

healthy development of youth, improving the safety of schools and students, and reducing rates of bullying behavior. There are several other federal initiatives that address student bullying directly or allow funds to be used for bullying prevention activities.

Definitional Context

The terms “bullying,” “harassment,” and “peer victimization” have been used in the scientific literature to refer to behavior that is aggressive, is carried out repeatedly and over time, and occurs in an interpersonal relationship where a power imbalance exists ( Eisenberg and Aalsma, 2005 ). Although some of these terms have been used interchangeably in the literature, peer victimization is targeted aggressive behavior of one child against another that causes physical, emotional, social, or psychological harm. While conflict and bullying among siblings are important in their own right ( Tanrikulu and Campbell, 2015 ), this area falls outside of the scope of the committee’s charge. Sibling conflict and aggression falls under the broader concept of interpersonal aggression, which includes dating violence, sexual assault, and sibling violence, in addition to bullying as defined for this report. Olweus (1993) noted that bullying, unlike other forms of peer victimization where the children involved are equally matched, involves a power imbalance between the perpetrator and the target, where the target has difficulty defending him or herself and feels helpless against the aggressor. This power imbalance is typically considered a defining feature of bullying, which distinguishes this particular form of aggression from other forms, and is typically repeated in multiple bullying incidents involving the same individuals over time ( Olweus, 1993 ).

Bullying and violence are subcategories of aggressive behavior that overlap ( Olweus, 1996 ). There are situations in which violence is used in the context of bullying. However, not all forms of bullying (e.g., rumor spreading) involve violent behavior. The committee also acknowledges that perspective about intentions can matter and that in many situations, there may be at least two plausible perceptions involved in the bullying behavior.

A number of factors may influence one’s perception of the term “bullying” ( Smith and Monks, 2008 ). Children and adolescents’ understanding of the term “bullying” may be subject to cultural interpretations or translations of the term ( Hopkins et al., 2013 ). Studies have also shown that influences on children’s understanding of bullying include the child’s experiences as he or she matures and whether the child witnesses the bullying behavior of others ( Hellström et al., 2015 ; Monks and Smith, 2006 ; Smith and Monks, 2008 ).

In 2010, the FPBP Steering Committee convened its first summit, which brought together more than 150 nonprofit and corporate leaders,

researchers, practitioners, parents, and youths to identify challenges in bullying prevention. Discussions at the summit revealed inconsistencies in the definition of bullying behavior and the need to create a uniform definition of bullying. Subsequently, a review of the 2011 CDC publication of assessment tools used to measure bullying among youth ( Hamburger et al., 2011 ) revealed inconsistent definitions of bullying and diverse measurement strategies. Those inconsistencies and diverse measurements make it difficult to compare the prevalence of bullying across studies ( Vivolo et al., 2011 ) and complicate the task of distinguishing bullying from other types of aggression between youths. A uniform definition can support the consistent tracking of bullying behavior over time, facilitate the comparison of bullying prevalence rates and associated risk and protective factors across different data collection systems, and enable the collection of comparable information on the performance of bullying intervention and prevention programs across contexts ( Gladden et al., 2014 ). The CDC and U.S. Department of Education collaborated on the creation of the following uniform definition of bullying (quoted in Gladden et al., 2014, p. 7 ):

Bullying is any unwanted aggressive behavior(s) by another youth or group of youths who are not siblings or current dating partners that involves an observed or perceived power imbalance and is repeated multiple times or is highly likely to be repeated. Bullying may inflict harm or distress on the targeted youth including physical, psychological, social, or educational harm.

This report noted that the definition includes school-age individuals ages 5-18 and explicitly excludes sibling violence and violence that occurs in the context of a dating or intimate relationship ( Gladden et al., 2014 ). This definition also highlighted that there are direct and indirect modes of bullying, as well as different types of bullying. Direct bullying involves “aggressive behavior(s) that occur in the presence of the targeted youth”; indirect bullying includes “aggressive behavior(s) that are not directly communicated to the targeted youth” ( Gladden et al., 2014, p. 7 ). The direct forms of violence (e.g., sibling violence, teen dating violence, intimate partner violence) can include aggression that is physical, sexual, or psychological, but the context and uniquely dynamic nature of the relationship between the target and the perpetrator in which these acts occur is different from that of peer bullying. Examples of direct bullying include pushing, hitting, verbal taunting, or direct written communication. A common form of indirect bullying is spreading rumors. Four different types of bullying are commonly identified—physical, verbal, relational, and damage to property. Some observational studies have shown that the different forms of bullying that youths commonly experience may overlap ( Bradshaw et al., 2015 ;

Godleski et al., 2015 ). The four types of bullying are defined as follows ( Gladden et al., 2014 ):

Physical bullying involves the use of physical force (e.g., shoving, hitting, spitting, pushing, and tripping).
Verbal bullying involves oral or written communication that causes harm (e.g., taunting, name calling, offensive notes or hand gestures, verbal threats).
Relational bullying is behavior “designed to harm the reputation and relationships of the targeted youth (e.g., social isolation, rumor spreading, posting derogatory comments or pictures online).”
Damage to property is “theft, alteration, or damaging of the target youth’s property by the perpetrator to cause harm.”

In recent years, a new form of aggression or bullying has emerged, labeled “cyberbullying,” in which the aggression occurs through modern technological devices, specifically mobile phones or the Internet ( Slonje and Smith, 2008 ). Cyberbullying may take the form of mean or nasty messages or comments, rumor spreading through posts or creation of groups, and exclusion by groups of peers online.

While the CDC definition identifies bullying that occurs using technology as electronic bullying and views that as a context or location where bullying occurs, one of the major challenges in the field is how to conceptualize and define cyberbullying ( Tokunaga, 2010 ). The extent to which the CDC definition can be applied to cyberbullying is unclear, particularly with respect to several key concepts within the CDC definition. First, whether determination of an interaction as “wanted” or “unwanted” or whether communication was intended to be harmful can be challenging to assess in the absence of important in-person socioemotional cues (e.g., vocal tone, facial expressions). Second, assessing “repetition” is challenging in that a single harmful act on the Internet has the potential to be shared or viewed multiple times ( Sticca and Perren, 2013 ). Third, cyberbullying can involve a less powerful peer using technological tools to bully a peer who is perceived to have more power. In this manner, technology may provide the tools that create a power imbalance, in contrast to traditional bullying, which typically involves an existing power imbalance.

A study that used focus groups with college students to discuss whether the CDC definition applied to cyberbullying found that students were wary of applying the definition due to their perception that cyberbullying often involves less emphasis on aggression, intention, and repetition than other forms of bullying ( Kota et al., 2014 ). Many researchers have responded to this lack of conceptual and definitional clarity by creating their own measures to assess cyberbullying. It is noteworthy that very few of these

definitions and measures include the components of traditional bullying—i.e., repetition, power imbalance, and intent ( Berne et al., 2013 ). A more recent study argues that the term “cyberbullying” should be reserved for incidents that involve key aspects of bullying such as repetition and differential power ( Ybarra et al., 2014 ).

Although the formulation of a uniform definition of bullying appears to be a step in the right direction for the field of bullying prevention, there are some limitations of the CDC definition. For example, some researchers find the focus on school-age youth as well as the repeated nature of bullying to be rather limiting; similarly the exclusion of bullying in the context of sibling relationships or dating relationships may preclude full appreciation of the range of aggressive behaviors that may co-occur with or constitute bullying behavior. As noted above, other researchers have raised concerns about whether cyberbullying should be considered a particular form or mode under the broader heading of bullying as suggested in the CDC definition, or whether a separate defintion is needed. Furthermore, the measurement of bullying prevalence using such a definiton of bullying is rather complex and does not lend itself well to large-scale survey research. The CDC definition was intended to inform public health surveillance efforts, rather than to serve as a definition for policy. However, increased alignment between bullying definitions used by policy makers and researchers would greatly advance the field. Much of the extant research on bullying has not applied a consistent definition or one that aligns with the CDC definition. As a result of these and other challenges to the CDC definition, thus far there has been inconsistent adoption of this particular definition by researchers, practitioners, or policy makers; however, as the definition was created in 2014, less than 2 years is not a sufficient amount of time to assess whether it has been successfully adopted or will be in the future.

THE COMMITTEE’S APPROACH

This report builds on the April 2014 workshop, summarized in Building Capacity to Reduce Bullying: Workshop Summary ( Institute of Medicine and National Research Council, 2014c ). The committee’s work was accomplished over an 18-month period that began in October 2014, after the workshop was held and the formal summary of it had been released. The study committee members represented expertise in communication technology, criminology, developmental and clinical psychology, education, mental health, neurobiological development, pediatrics, public health, school administration, school district policy, and state law and policy. (See Appendix E for biographical sketches of the committee members and staff.) The committee met three times in person and conducted other meetings by teleconferences and electronic communication.

Information Gathering

The committee conducted an extensive review of the literature pertaining to peer victimization and bullying. In some instances, the committee drew upon the broader literature on aggression and violence. The review began with an English-language literature search of online databases, including ERIC, Google Scholar, Lexis Law Reviews Database, Medline, PubMed, Scopus, PsycInfo, and Web of Science, and was expanded as literature and resources from other countries were identified by committee members and project staff as relevant. The committee drew upon the early childhood literature since there is substantial evidence indicating that bullying involvement happens as early as preschool (see Vlachou et al., 2011 ). The committee also drew on the literature on late adolescence and looked at related areas of research such as maltreatment for insights into this emerging field.

The committee used a variety of sources to supplement its review of the literature. The committee held two public information-gathering sessions, one with the study sponsors and the second with experts on the neurobiology of bullying; bullying as a group phenomenon and the role of bystanders; the role of media in bullying prevention; and the intersection of social science, the law, and bullying and peer victimization. See Appendix A for the agendas for these two sessions. To explore different facets of bullying and give perspectives from the field, a subgroup of the committee and study staff also conducted a site visit to a northeastern city, where they convened four stakeholder groups comprised, respectively, of local practitioners, school personnel, private foundation representatives, and young adults. The site visit provided the committee with an opportunity for place-based learning about bullying prevention programs and best practices. Each focus group was transcribed and summarized thematically in accordance with this report’s chapter considerations. Themes related to the chapters are displayed throughout the report in boxes titled “Perspectives from the Field”; these boxes reflect responses synthesized from all four focus groups. See Appendix B for the site visit’s agenda and for summaries of the focus groups.

The committee also benefited from earlier reports by the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine through its Division of Behavioral and Social Sciences and Education and the Institute of Medicine, most notably:

Reducing Risks for Mental Disorders: Frontiers for Preventive Intervention Research ( Institute of Medicine, 1994 )
Community Programs to Promote Youth Development ( National Research Council and Institute of Medicine, 2002 )
Deadly Lessons: Understanding Lethal School Violence ( National Research Council and Institute of Medicine, 2003 )
Preventing Mental, Emotional, and Behavioral Disorders Among Young People: Progress and Possibilities ( National Research Council and Institute of Medicine, 2009 )
The Science of Adolescent Risk-Taking: Workshop Report ( Institute of Medicine and National Research Council, 2011 )
Communications and Technology for Violence Prevention: Workshop Summary ( Institute of Medicine and National Research Council, 2012 )
Building Capacity to Reduce Bullying: Workshop Summary ( Institute of Medicine and National Research Council, 2014c )
The Evidence for Violence Prevention across the Lifespan and Around the World: Workshop Summary ( Institute of Medicine and National Research Council, 2014a )
Strategies for Scaling Effective Family-Focused Preventive Interventions to Promote Children’s Cognitive, Affective, and Behavioral Health: Workshop Summary ( Institute of Medicine and National Research Council, 2014b )
Investing in the Health and Well-Being of Young Adults ( Institute of Medicine and National Research Council, 2015 )

Although these past reports and workshop summaries address various forms of violence and victimization, this report is the first consensus study by the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine on the state of the science on the biological and psychosocial consequences of bullying and the risk and protective factors that either increase or decrease bullying behavior and its consequences.

Terminology

Given the variable use of the terms “bullying” and “peer victimization” in both the research-based and practice-based literature, the committee chose to use the current CDC definition quoted above ( Gladden et al., 2014, p. 7 ). While the committee determined that this was the best definition to use, it acknowledges that this definition is not necessarily the most user-friendly definition for students and has the potential to cause problems for students reporting bullying. Not only does this definition provide detail on the common elements of bullying behavior but it also was developed with input from a panel of researchers and practitioners. The committee also followed the CDC in focusing primarily on individuals between the ages of 5 and 18. The committee recognizes that children’s development occurs on a continuum, and so while it relied primarily on the CDC defini-

tion, its work and this report acknowledge the importance of addressing bullying in both early childhood and emerging adulthood. For purposes of this report, the committee used the terms “early childhood” to refer to ages 1-4, “middle childhood” for ages 5 to 10, “early adolescence” for ages 11-14, “middle adolescence” for ages 15-17, and “late adolescence” for ages 18-21. This terminology and the associated age ranges are consistent with the Bright Futures and American Academy of Pediatrics definition of the stages of development. 4

A given instance of bullying behavior involves at least two unequal roles: one or more individuals who perpetrate the behavior (the perpetrator in this instance) and at least one individual who is bullied (the target in this instance). To avoid labeling and potentially further stigmatizing individuals with the terms “bully” and “victim,” which are sometimes viewed as traits of persons rather than role descriptions in a particular instance of behavior, the committee decided to use “individual who is bullied” to refer to the target of a bullying instance or pattern and “individual who bullies” to refer to the perpetrator of a bullying instance or pattern. Thus, “individual who is bullied and bullies others” can refer to one who is either perpetrating a bullying behavior or a target of bullying behavior, depending on the incident. This terminology is consistent with the approach used by the FPBP (see above). Also, bullying is a dynamic social interaction ( Espelage and Swearer, 2003 ) where individuals can play different roles in bullying interactions based on both individual and contextual factors.

The committee used “cyberbullying” to refer to bullying that takes place using technology or digital electronic means. “Digital electronic forms of contact” comprise a broad category that may include e-mail, blogs, social networking Websites, online games, chat rooms, forums, instant messaging, Skype, text messaging, and mobile phone pictures. The committee uses the term “traditional bullying” to refer to bullying behavior that is not cyberbullying (to aid in comparisons), recognizing that the term has been used at times in slightly different senses in the literature.

Where accurate reporting of study findings requires use of the above terms but with senses different from those specified here, the committee has noted the sense in which the source used the term. Similarly, accurate reporting has at times required use of terms such as “victimization” or “victim” that the committee has chosen to avoid in its own statements.

4 For details on these stages of adolescence, see https://brightfutures.aap.org/Bright%20Futures%20Documents/3-Promoting_Child_Development.pdf [October 2015].

ORGANIZATION OF THE REPORT

This report is organized into seven chapters. After this introductory chapter, Chapter 2 provides a broad overview of the scope of the problem.

Chapter 3 focuses on the conceptual frameworks for the study and the developmental trajectory of the child who is bullied, the child who bullies, and the child who is bullied and also bullies. It explores processes that can explain heterogeneity in bullying outcomes by focusing on contextual processes that moderate the effect of individual characteristics on bullying behavior.

Chapter 4 discusses the cyclical nature of bullying and the consequences of bullying behavior. It summarizes what is known about the psychosocial, physical health, neurobiological, academic-performance, and population-level consequences of bullying.

Chapter 5 provides an overview of the landscape in bullying prevention programming. This chapter describes in detail the context for preventive interventions and the specific actions that various stakeholders can take to achieve a coordinated response to bullying behavior. The chapter uses the Institute of Medicine’s multi-tiered framework ( National Research Council and Institute of Medicine, 2009 ) to present the different levels of approaches to preventing bullying behavior.

Chapter 6 reviews what is known about federal, state, and local laws and policies and their impact on bullying.

After a critical review of the relevant research and practice-based literatures, Chapter 7 discusses the committee conclusions and recommendations and provides a path forward for bullying prevention.

The report includes a number of appendixes. Appendix A includes meeting agendas of the committee’s public information-gathering meetings. Appendix B includes the agenda and summaries of the site visit. Appendix C includes summaries of bullying prevalence data from the national surveys discussed in Chapter 2 . Appendix D provides a list of selected federal resources on bullying for parents and teachers. Appendix E provides biographical sketches of the committee members and project staff.

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Bullying has long been tolerated as a rite of passage among children and adolescents. There is an implication that individuals who are bullied must have "asked for" this type of treatment, or deserved it. Sometimes, even the child who is bullied begins to internalize this idea. For many years, there has been a general acceptance and collective shrug when it comes to a child or adolescent with greater social capital or power pushing around a child perceived as subordinate. But bullying is not developmentally appropriate; it should not be considered a normal part of the typical social grouping that occurs throughout a child's life.

Although bullying behavior endures through generations, the milieu is changing. Historically, bulling has occurred at school, the physical setting in which most of childhood is centered and the primary source for peer group formation. In recent years, however, the physical setting is not the only place bullying is occurring. Technology allows for an entirely new type of digital electronic aggression, cyberbullying, which takes place through chat rooms, instant messaging, social media, and other forms of digital electronic communication.

Composition of peer groups, shifting demographics, changing societal norms, and modern technology are contextual factors that must be considered to understand and effectively react to bullying in the United States. Youth are embedded in multiple contexts and each of these contexts interacts with individual characteristics of youth in ways that either exacerbate or attenuate the association between these individual characteristics and bullying perpetration or victimization. Recognizing that bullying behavior is a major public health problem that demands the concerted and coordinated time and attention of parents, educators and school administrators, health care providers, policy makers, families, and others concerned with the care of children, this report evaluates the state of the science on biological and psychosocial consequences of peer victimization and the risk and protective factors that either increase or decrease peer victimization behavior and consequences.

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129 Bullying Essay Topics

🏆 best essay topics on bullying, ✍️ bullying essay topics for college, 👍 good bullying research topics & essay examples, 🎓 most interesting bullying research titles, ❓ bullying research questions.

School Bullying: Causes and Effects
Bullying in Schools: Essay Example
Bullying in Schools: Anti-Bullying Programs
The Problem of Bullying in School
Chronicles of Bullying: An Editorial Article
Teenagers’ Contemporary Issues: Bullying at School
School Bullying and Student’s Development
Bullying at School and Impact on Mental Health Bullying victims experience an intolerable amount of distress, and thus, they are anxious and insecure and have high depression rates, negative self-image, and low self-esteem.
Bullying: A Serious Social Problem Bullying is undesirable behavior that society must deter at all costs. In schools, teachers, parents, and other stakeholders should have working knowledge on managing the vice.
Bullying Behavior and Its Negative Effects on Children Bullying behavior is a severe issue among school-age children. This essay addresses the negative effects of bullying on children and the ways of overcoming the problem.
Workplace Bullying and Its Implications on Organizations Discrimination is one of the major challenges that organizational leaders face within the workplace. Workplace bullying refers to any acts intended to intimidate a colleague.
Reducing Bullying in Schools by Involving Stakeholders Schools should raise awareness among educators, instructors, and community members about their roles and responsibilities in the battle against bullying.
The Cognitive Behavioural Therapy on Victims of Bullying This paper will be able to ascertain that Cognitive Behavioural Therapy is a very effective therapy that defies the ugly trend of bullying in schools.
Bullying From Religious Perspective I want to talk about the rising problem of bullying in the American educational system, how harmful these behaviors may be, and how to stop it in a way that pleases God.
Why Bullying Is Wrong and Methods of Resolving Disputes Without Violence Such methods of conflict resolution as mediation, communication, and listening may eliminate the harmful impact of such behavior without violence.
Bullying and Parenting Styles There are many positive and negative outcomes of parenting on children. This paper aims at investigating the connection between several types of parenting and bullying behaviors.
Bullying Through a Friend’s Facebook Page In contemporary society, cyberbullying through Facebook has become very common and serious because of the growth of the internet, particularly among students.
Online Bullying Takes Over the World In the context of a rapidly and highly digitized global environment, online bullying, otherwise known as cyberbullying, has become a prevalent issue.
School Bullying and Legal Responsibility The following paper will discuss and cover the rate of school bullies’ legally unregulated actions and the detriment that they constantly cause to other children who surround them.
Bullying and Sexual Harassment at Work Place According to Safety and Health Assessment and Research for Prevention, workplace bullying occurs when an individual direct irrational actions repeatedly towards their fellow worker.
Bullying at Pre-School and Preventive Measures This paper provides five tips for pre-school bullying prevention, the first of which is to give opportunities for children to show kindness and respect.
Bullying in Poverty and Child Development Context The aim of the present paper is to investigate how Bullying, as a factor associated with poverty, affects child development.
Bullying: A Guide for the Parents The first way for parents to assist the kid in coming up with bullies is to teach them a set of responses, which they can use in case someone is picking on them.
Nurse Bullying: Unprofessional Conduct Bullying can be exhibited in the form of physical and verbal threats, social seclusion, aggressive behaviors, and suppression of applicable care information.
Workplace Bullying and Its Impact on People’s Mental Health Workplace bullying turns out to be a serious theme for discussion because of a variety of reasons, and one of them is its impact on people’s mental health.
“Nurse Exposure to Physical and Nonphysical Violence, Bullying…” by Spector This paper is a critique of the article titled “Nurse Exposure to Physical and Nonphysical Violence, Bullying, and Sexual Harassment: A Quantitative Review”.
Causes of Bullying in Nursing The relationship between medical staff is an important aspect that determines the quality of work in a particular institution and the healthcare system as a whole.
Cyber-Bullying and Ways to Solve the Problem The primary goal of the given study is the investigation of cyber-bullying, which is nowadays one of the integral parts of social media and the Internet.
The Social Problem of Bullying and the School System The present paper focuses on the connection between the social problem of bullying and the school system, describing each of these concepts.
Bullying Among Adolescents Problem Studying the problem of bullying, its factors of influence, and the application of developmental theories are critical for finding ways to combat it effectively.
The Relation Between the Teen Suicide and Bullying During the teenage years, bullying and harassment represent cases of social animosity that make suicide an option.
The Dumfries and Galloway Council’s Policy Against Bullying This paper discusses the analysis of the bullying in general and its understanding in the works of Dumfries and Galloway Council.
The Meaning of Cyber Bullying The work reveals the meaning and purpose of cyberbullying, what signs characterize it and the solution to cyberbullying.
School Bullying and Problems in Adult Life Bullying is aggressive behavior that can be seen in different children, teenagers, and adults. In this paper, the causes of bullying and the effects of it will be presented and discussed.
Bullying in Schools and Intervention Methods Various methods and programs of gang deterrence demonstrate the ability to effectively confront the problem, one of which is mentoring.
Bullying in Schools: Addressing and Preventing Addressing bullying in schools requires the involvement of a wide range of stakeholders to effectively work with students.
Bullying in School: The Negative Effects Victims of bullying have unresolved self-esteem issues and experience difficulties in building relationships. Thus, bullying has a negative impact on personality formation.
High School Bullying: Psychological Aspects The study discusses the psychology behind bullying, the effects of bullying on all the involved parties, and emergent patterns.
The Workplace Bullying Prevention Policy The problem of bullying creates a severe issue for the atmosphere of the workplace environment, the mental health of workers, and their performance.
The Issue of High School Bullying Bullying cases among high school students have been on the rise in modern society. High school bullying is mainly caused by media exposure.
The Consequences of High School Bullying This annotated bibliography includes summaries of four academic studies that explore the effects of bullying on high school students.
Bullying of Learners with Disabilities The problem of bullying remains one of the predicaments learners with disabilities encounter in their learning environments.
Bullying and Methods of Solving This Problem The article is devoted to the causes of bullying which develops in almost any closed community among children and adolescents.
Harsher Laws for Cyber Bullying The number of people using social networks is growing but they do not see the danger in remote communication and are subjected to cyberbullying.
Bullying During Orientations in the Universities In order to address the issue related to bullying during orientations, only the most empathetic senior students should be allowed to participate in orientations.
Cyber Bullying Messages in Communication Networks Bullying can come in different forms, but it always causes injury or even worse. Bullying victims may carry the psychological wounds of their ordeal for the rest of their life.
Problem Scenario: Workplace Bullying in Teaching When the word “bullying” is used in the context of education, one often presumes the situation in which one student systematically mistreats another.
Bullying and Patient Safety in Clinical Settings Besides damaging the atmosphere in clinical settings and negatively affecting the personnel, bullying can lower the quality of healthcare services and harm patient safety.
Bullying and Work-Related Stress in the Irish Workplace One of the best analyses of relationships between workplace stress and bullying has been done in the research study called “Bullying and Work-Related Stress in the Irish Workplace.”
The Long-Term Consequences of Being Bullied or Bullying Others in Childhood This study attempts to discuss the main consequences on the mental and physical health of victims, bully-victims, and bullies themselves, and comment on the prevalent patterns.
Bullying as Managerial Issue in Nursing Sector Bullying is a significant nursing issue due to the negative impact caused on the performance level among the employees.
Problem of Bullying Overview and Analysis Bullying can have harmful impacts on everyone involved, including bullies, the bullied, and bystanders. It can be prevented through the use of selective preventive programs.
Bullying: A Concern for Modern Communities and Educational Establishments Parents can educate their children to create safe environment for healthy development, both physical and mental, guaranteeing the absence of abusive behavior or victimization.
Bullying and Its Impact on My Life In this essay, the author talks about the impact of bullying on his life and how he managed to cope with the problem.
Anti Bullying Prevention Program The standards for anti-bullying program aims to prevent not only the behavior of bullying but also behavior representing the full spectrum of inter-student cruelty.
Negative Bullying Outcomes: A Persuasive Speech Bullying has adverse effects on both victims and perpetrators. Bullying should be prevented, or should it occur, reported, and taken care of as soon as possible.
The Problem of Workplace Bullying: Literature Review The purpose of this paper is to provide a review of the relevant literature on the topic of workplace bullying.
Anti-bullying Practices in Criminal Prosecution Anti-bullying practices have proceeded past only encouraging an individual to avoid ill-treatment of their peers to the establishment of laws.
Workplace Bullying: Dealing With the Office Bully The psychological stress caused by bullying can be so severe that in the worst case, it can lead to depression and quitting.
Deterring Juvenile Crime. Bullying and Delinquency Delinquency can be defined as a crime committed by a minor; in the recent few years, cases of juvenile delinquency have been on the rise.
Bullying in the Modern Society: Review Bullying is one of the major concerns of modern society. Following the statistics, about 40% of all individuals have experienced being bullied at least once.
Bullying and School Drop Out Rate Relationship Analysis Bullying is rife in schools where physical and verbal abuse occurs among pupils/students. There is “a close relationship between bullying, school involvement, and literacy”.
Workplace Bullying in the Nursing Areas The paper is aimed to tell about the importance of overcoming workplace bullying in the example of a nursing collective.
Exploring Workplace Bullying in Nursing This paper critiques Etienne’s 2013 study of workplace bullying in nursing and highlights the strengths and weaknesses of the research.
Bullying Among Nursing Staff The bullying in health care is still present, and health practitioners’ mental health, motivation, and ability to uphold precision and self-composure are compromised.
Nurse Bullying and Legal Interventions Nurse bullying has to be addressed by healthcare establishments and national agencies to ensure proper work culture and adequate environment for patient care.
Horizontal Violence and Bullying in Nursing There is a direct correlation between horizontal violence and job satisfaction among nurses, which affects the efforts of individuals who choose this profession.
Bullying Effects on Health and Life Quality When children are subject to bullying by their peers, it affects their feelings and evokes negative emotions in the first place.
Fear Appeal in the Stop Bullying Public Campaign In the video “Stop bullying,” the subject matter is presented shockingly. The 47-second clip shows a high school girl receiving an aggressive text message from her peers.
The Issue of Cyber-Bullying in Education Field Bullying has been recognized as a pervasive and a severe problem as well as a significant concern, mostly in the educational field.
Parenting Style and Bullying Among Children The investigation of parenting styles is highly essential to understand how they affect the bullying behavior of children to prevent it.
Bullying and Laws in American Schools Researchers distinguish two major kinds of bullying that take place in the academic setting: direct and indirect.
Cyber-Bullying and Cyber-Stalking as Crimes Cyber-bullying and cyber-stalking are relatively close in meaning, but there is a slight difference in the definition of these terms.
Prevention of Bullying in Schools School bullying is a relevant and critical global issue, and while it affects all children, some groups may experience various disparities and increased exposure to bullying.
Bullying Problem in School Bullying is caused by genetic predisposition, relations with peers, and as a reaction to the situation in school or at home.
Organization Conflicts and Bullying Workplace bullying is a serious problem with huge costs attached to it in terms of loss of working days. The topic requires academic attention to ascertain the factors that induce such behavior.
Addressing Bullying in Elementary and Middle School Classrooms The study mainly focuses on teachers’ lack of knowledge on how to deal with the issue of bullying in the classroom in an effective manner.
School Bullying and Teacher Professional Development
Bullying and Its Effect on Our American Society
Physical, Emotional, and Social Bullying
The Government Should Put Laws in Place To Prevent Bullying
Childhood Bullying and Social Relationships
Bullying and Its Effects on Individual’s Education
The Emotional and Physical Aspects of Bullying
Bullying and Its Effects on the Person Who Is Being Hurt
Childhood Bullying and Its Effects on Children
Cyber Bullying Affects People‘s Lives More Than One Might Think
Managing Bullying and Harassment in the Workplace
Bullying Affects the Social Learning Theory
How Has Bullying Changed Our Modern World?
Bullying and the Workplace and Affect Morale
The Bible Belt and Its Beliefs on the Problem of Bullying
Cyber-bullying Through Anonymous Social Media
The Difference Between Bullying and Harassment
Racial Bullying and Its Effects on the Middle of the Twenty
Bullying Among Children With Autism Spectrum Disorder
Social Media Bullying and Cyberbullying
Bullying Prevention and School Safety
Physical and Verbal Bullying in Schools
What Are Schools and Parents Doing for Bullying Prevention?
What Are the Effects of Bullying in Public Schools?
What Strategies Might You Employ to Encourage Pupils to Prevent Bullying?
How to Talk to Your Children About Bullying?
What Are the Six Types of Bullying Parents Should Know About?
Which American State Has the Toughest Bullying Laws?
Who Started and Invented Anti-Bullying Day?
What Countries Have Anti-Bullying Laws?
Which American State Is the Only One to Not Have an Anti-Bullying Law?
What Is the Meaning of Anti-Bullying Law?
What Is the Number One Determinant of Bullying Will Occur?
When Was the First Anti-Bullying Law Passed?
Is Bullying a Social Determinant of Health?
What Should Be in an Anti-Bullying Policy?
Why Is the Anti-Bullying Policy Important?
Why Should We Be Aware of the Anti-Bullying Act of 2013?
What Is the Meaning of Emotional Bullying?
What Is the Punishment for Anti-Bullying Act?
Is Bullying a Social Phenomena?
Who Is the Father of Bullying Research?
What Is a Good Slogan for Stop Bullying?
Why Do the Bullying Programs not Work?
Why Students Engage in Bullying?
Why Are Workplace Bullying and Violence Important Issues for Organizations?
Why Should Bullying Not Be Harsh?
What Is the Most Important Strategy for Bullying Prevention?
Why Do We Need to Conduct a Study About Bullying?
Are Bullying Prevention Programs Effective?
Who Should Universities Have the Ability to Punish Students for Cyber Bullying?
Are Neoliberalist Behaviours Reflective of Bullying?

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ORIGINAL RESEARCH article

Understanding alternative bullying perspectives through research engagement with young people.

$\r\nNiamh O&#x;Brien*$

School of Education and Social Care, Faculty of Health, Education, Medicine and Social Care, Anglia Ruskin University, Chelmsford, United Kingdom

Bullying research has traditionally been dominated by largescale cohort studies focusing on the personality traits of bullies and victims. These studies focus on bullying prevalence, risk and protective factors, and negative outcomes. A limitation of this approach is that it does not explain why bullying happens. Qualitative research can help shed light on these factors. This paper discusses the findings from four mainly qualitative research projects including a systematic review and three empirical studies involving young people to various degrees within the research process as respondents, co-researchers and commissioners of research. Much quantitative research suggests that young people are a homogenous group and through the use of surveys and other large scale methods, generalizations can be drawn about how bullying is understood and how it can be dealt with. Findings from the studies presented in this paper, add to our understanding that young people appear particularly concerned about the role of wider contextual and relational factors in deciding if bullying has happened. These studies underscore the relational aspects of definitions of bullying and, how the dynamics of young people’s friendships can shift what is understood as bullying or not. Moreover, to appreciate the relational and social contexts underpinning bullying behaviors, adults and young people need to work together on bullying agendas and engage with multiple definitions, effects and forms of support. Qualitative methodologies, in particular participatory research opens up the complexities of young lives and enables these insights to come to the fore. Through this approach, effective supports can be designed based on what young people want and need rather than those interpreted as supportive through adult understanding.

Introduction

Research on school bullying has developed rapidly since the 1970s. Originating in social and psychological research in Norway, Sweden, and Finland, this body of research largely focusses on individualized personality traits of perpetrators and victims ( Olweus, 1995 ). Global interest in this phenomenon subsequently spread and bullying research began in the United Kingdom, Australia, and the United States ( Griffin and Gross, 2004 ). Usually quantitative in nature, many studies examine bullying prevalence, risk and protective factors, and negative outcomes ( Patton et al., 2017 ). Whilst quantitative research collates key demographic information to show variations in bullying behaviors and tendencies, this dominant bullying literature fails to explain why bullying happens. Nor does it attempt to understand the wider social contexts in which bullying occurs. Qualitative research on the other hand, in particular participatory research, can help shed light on these factors by highlighting the complexities of the contextual and relational aspects of bullying and the particular challenges associated with addressing it. Patton et al. (2017) in their systematic review of qualitative methods used in bullying research, found that the use of such methods can enhance academic and practitioner understanding of bullying.

In this paper, I draw on four bullying studies; one systematic review of both quantitative and qualitative research ( O’Brien, 2009 ) and three empirical qualitative studies ( O’Brien and Moules, 2010 ; O’Brien, 2016 , 2017 ) (see Table 1 below). I discuss how participatory research methodologies, to varying degrees, were used to facilitate bullying knowledge production among teams of young people and adults. Young people in these presented studies were consequently involved in the research process along a continuum of involvement ( Bragg and Fielding, 2005 ). To the far left of the continuum, young people involved in research are referred to as “active respondents” and their data informs teacher practice. To the middle of the continuum sit “students as co-researchers” who work with teachers to explore an issue which has been identified by that teacher. Finally to the right, sit “students as researchers” who conduct their own research with support from teachers. Moving from left to right of the continuum shows a shift in power dynamics between young people and adults where a partnership develops. Young people are therefore recognized as equal to adults in terms of what they can bring to the project from their own unique perspective, that of being a young person now.

Table 1. The studies.

In this paper, I advocate for the active involvement of young people in the research process in order to enhance bullying knowledge. Traditional quantitative studies have a tendency to homogenize young people by suggesting similarity in thinking about what constitutes bullying. However, qualitative studies have demonstrated that regardless of variables, young people understand bullying in different ways so there is a need for further research that starts from these perspectives and focusses on issues that young people deem important. Consequently, participatory research allows for the stories of the collective to emerge without losing the stories of the individual, a task not enabled through quantitative approaches.

What Is Bullying?

Researching school bullying has been problematic and is partly related to the difficulty in defining it ( Espelage, 2018 ). Broadly speaking, bullying is recognized as aggressive, repeated, intentional behavior involving an imbalance of power aimed toward an individual or group of individuals who cannot easily defend themselves ( Vaillancourt et al., 2008 ). In more recent times, “traditional” bullying behaviors have been extended to include cyber-bullying, involving the use of the internet and mobile-phones ( Espelage, 2018 ). Disagreements have been noted in the literature about how bullying is defined by researchers linked to subject discipline and culture. Some researchers for example, disagree about the inclusion or not of repetition in definitions ( Griffin and Gross, 2004 ) and these disagreements have had an impact on interpreting findings and prevalence rates. However, evidence further suggests that young people also view bullying in different ways ( Guerin and Hennessy, 2002 ; Cuadrado-Gordillo, 2012 ; Eriksen, 2018 ). Vaillancourt et al. (2008) explored differences between researchers and young people’s definitions of bullying, and found that children’s definitions were usually spontaneous, and did not always encompass the elements of repetition, power imbalance and intent. They concluded, that children need to be provided with a bullying definition so similarities and comparisons can be drawn. In contrast, Huang and Cornell (2015) found no evidence that the inclusion of a definition effected prevalence rates. Their findings, they suggest, indicate that young people use their own perceptions of bullying when answering self-report questionnaires and they are not influenced by an imposed definition.

Nevertheless, differences in children and young people’s bullying definitions are evident in the research literature and have been explained by recourse to age and stage of development ( Smith et al., 2002 ) and their assumed lack of understanding about what constitutes bullying ( Boulton and Flemington, 1996 ). Naylor et al. (2001) for example, found that younger children think similarly in their definitions of bullying, while Smith et al. (2002) found that 8 year olds did not distinguish as clearly between different forms of behavioral aggression as 14 year olds. Methodological limitations associated with understanding bullying have been identified by Forsberg et al. (2018) and Maunder and Crafter (2018) . These authors postulate that quantitative approaches, although providing crucial insights in understanding bullying, are reliant on pre-defined variables, which can shield some of the complexities that qualitative designs can unravel, as individual experiences of bullying are brought to the fore. Indeed, La Fontaine (1991) suggests that unlike standard self-report questionnaires and other quantitative methods used to collect bullying data, analyzing qualitative data such as those collected from a helpline, enables the voice of young people to be heard and consequently empowers adults to understand bullying on their terms rather than relying solely on interpretations and perceptions of adults. Moore and Maclean (2012) collected survey, as well as interview and focus group data, on victimization occurring on the journey to and from school. They found that what young people determined as victimization varied and was influenced by a multifaceted array of circumstances, some of which adults were unaware of. Context for example, played an important role where certain behaviors in one situation could be regarded as victimization while in another they were not. Specific behaviors including ignoring an individual was particularly hurtful and supporting a friend who was the subject of victimization could lead to their own victimization.

Lee (2006) suggests that some bullying research does not reflect individual experiences, and are thus difficult for participants to relate to. Canty et al. (2016) reiterates this and suggests that when researchers provide young people with bullying definitions in which to position their own experiences, this can mask some of the complexities that the research intends to uncover. Such approaches result in an oversight into the socially constructed and individual experiences of bullying ( Eriksen, 2018 ). Griffin and Gross (2004) further argue that when researchers use vague or ambiguous definitions an “overclassification of children as bullies or victims” (p. 381) ensues. Consequently, quantitative research does not consider children as reliable in interpreting their own lived experiences and therefore some of the interactions they consider as bullying, that do not fit within the conventional definitions, are concealed. This approach favors the adult definition of bullying regarding it as “more reliable” than the definitions of children and young people Canty et al. (2016) . The perceived “seriousness” of bullying has also been explored. Overall, young people and adults are more likely to consider direct bullying (face-to-face actions including hitting, threatening and calling names) as “more serious” than indirect bullying (rumor spreading, social exclusion, forcing others to do something they do not want to do) ( Maunder et al., 2010 ; Skrzypiec et al., 2011 ). This perception of “seriousness,” alongside ambiguous definitions of bullying, has further implications for reporting it. Despite the advice given to young people to report incidents of school bullying ( Moore and Maclean, 2012 ), the literature suggests that many are reluctant to do so ( deLara, 2012 ; Moore and Maclean, 2012 ).

Several factors have been highlighted as to why young people are reluctant to report bullying ( Black et al., 2010 ). deLara (2012) , found apprehension in reporting bullying to teachers due to the fear that they will either not do enough or too much and inadvertently make the situation worse, or fear that teachers will not believe young people. Research also shows that young people are reluctant to tell their parents about bullying due to perceived over-reaction and fear that the bullying will be reported to their school ( deLara, 2012 ; Moore and Maclean, 2012 ). Oliver and Candappa (2007) suggest that young people are more likely to confide in their friends than adults (see also Moore and Maclean, 2012 ; Allen, 2014 ). However, if young people believe they are being bullied, but are unable to recognize their experiences within a predefined definition of bullying, this is likely to impact on their ability to report it.

Research from psychology, sociology, education and other disciplines, utilizing both quantitative and qualitative approaches, have enabled the generation of bullying knowledge to date. However, in order to understand why bullying happens and how it is influenced by wider social constructs there is a need for further qualitative studies, which hear directly from children and young people themselves. The next section of this paper discusses the theoretical underpinnings of this paper, which recognizes that young people are active agents in generating new bullying knowledge alongside adults.

Theoretical Underpinnings – Hearing From Children and Young People

The sociology of childhood ( James, 2007 ; Tisdall and Punch, 2012 ) and children’s rights agenda more broadly ( United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child, 1989 ) have offered new understandings and methods for research which recognize children and young people as active agents and experts on their own lives. From this perspective, research is conducted with rather than on children and young people ( Kellett, 2010 ).

Participatory methodologies have proven particularly useful for involving young people in research as co-researchers (see for example O’Brien and Moules, 2007 ; Stoudt, 2009 ; Kellett, 2010 ; Spears et al., 2016 ). This process of enquiry actively involves those normally being studied in research activities. Previously, “traditional” researchers devalued the experiences of research participants arguing that due to their distance from them, they themselves are better equipped to interpret these experiences ( Beresford, 2006 ). However, Beresford (2006) suggests that the shorter the distance between direct experience and interpretation, the less distorted and inaccurate the resulting knowledge is likely to be. Jones (2004) further advocates that when young people’s voices are absent from research about them the research is incomplete. Certainly Spears et al. (2016) , adopted this approach in their study with the Young and Well Cooperative Research Centre (CRC) in Australia. Young people played an active role within a multidisciplinary team alongside researchers, practitioners and policymakers to co-create and co-evaluate the learning from four marketing campaigns for youth wellbeing through participatory research. Through this methodological approach, findings show that young people were able to reconceptualize mental health and wellbeing from their own perspectives as well as share their lived experiences with others ( Spears et al., 2016 ). Bland and Atweh (2007) , Ozer and Wright (2012) , highlight the benefits afforded to young people through this process, including participating in dialog with decision-makers and bringing aspects of teaching and learning to their attention.

Against this background, data presented for this paper represents findings from four studies underpinned by the ethos that bullying is socially constructed and is best understood by exploring the context to which it occurs ( Schott and Sondergaard, 2014 ; Eriksen, 2018 ). This socially constructed view focusses on the evolving positions within young people’s groups, and argues that within a bullying situation sometimes a young person is the bully, sometimes the victim and sometimes the bystander/witness, which contrasts the traditional view of bullying ( Schott and Sondergaard, 2014 ). The focus therefore is on group relationships and dynamics. For that reason, Horton (2011) proposes that if bullying is an extensive problem including many young people, then focusing entirely on personality traits will not generate new bullying knowledge and will be problematic in terms of interventions. It is important to acknowledge that this change in focus and view of bullying and how it is manifested in groups, does not negate the individual experiences of bullying rather the focus shifts to the process of being accepted, or not, by the group ( Schott and Sondergaard, 2014 ).

The Studies

This section provides a broad overview of the four included studies underpinned by participatory methodologies. Table 1 presents the details of each study. Young people were involved in the research process as respondents, co-researchers and commissioners of research, along a continuum as identified by Bragg and Fielding (2005) . This ranged from “active respondents” to the left of the continuum, “students as co-researchers” in the middle and “students as researchers” to the right of the continuum. Young people were therefore recognized as equal to adults in terms of what they can bring to the project from their own unique perspectives ( Bradbury-Jones et al., 2018 ).

A key finding from study one ( O’Brien, 2009 ) was the lack of voice afforded to young people through the research process and can be seen to reflect the far left of Bragg and Fielding (2005) continuum, as young people were not directly involved as “active respondents” but their views were included in secondary data analysis and informed the studies that followed. For example, the quantitative studies used an agreed academic definition of bullying which may or may not have influenced how young participants defined bullying within the studies. On the other hand, the qualitative study involved a group of students in deciding which questions to ask of the research participants and in interpreting the findings.

In contrast, study two ( O’Brien and Moules, 2010 ) was commissioned and led by a group of young people called PEAR (Public health, Education, Awareness, Researchers), who were established to advise on public health research in England. PEAR members were based in two large English cities and comprised 20 young people aged between 13 and 20 years. The premise of the study was that PEAR members wanted to commission research into cyber bullying and the effects this has on mental health from the perspectives of young people rather than adult perspectives. This project was innovative as young people commissioned the research and participated as researchers ( Davey, 2011 ) and can be seen to reflect the middle “students as co-researchers” as well as moving toward to right “students as researchers” of Bragg and Fielding (2005) continuum. Although the young people did not carry out the day-to-day work on the project, they were responsible for leading and shaping it. More importantly, the research topic and focus were decided with young people and adults together.

Study three ( O’Brien, 2016 ) involved five self-selecting students from an independent day and boarding school who worked with me to answer this question: What do young people in this independent day and boarding school view as the core issue of bullying in the school and how do they want to address this? These students called themselves R4U (Research for You) with the slogan researching for life without fear . Three cycles of Participatory Action Research (PAR) ensued, where decision making about direction of the research, including methods, analysis and dissemination of findings were made by the research team. As current students of the school, R4U had a unique “insider knowledge” that complemented my position as the “academic researcher.” By working together to generate understanding about bullying at the school, the findings thus reflected this diversity in knowledge. As the project evolved so too did the involvement of the young researchers and my knowledge as the “outsider” (see O’Brien et al., 2018a for further details). Similar to study two, this project is situated between the middle: “students as co-researchers” and the right: “students as researchers” of Bragg and Fielding (2005) continuum.

Study four ( O’Brien, 2017 ) was small-scale and involved interviewing four young people who were receiving support from a charity providing therapeutic and educational support to young people who self-exclude from school due to anxiety, as a result of bullying. Self-exclusion, for the purposes of this study, means that a young person has made a decision not to go to school. It is different from “being excluded” or “truanting” because these young people do not feel safe at school and are therefore too anxious to attend. Little is known about the experiences of young people who self-exclude due to bullying and this study helped to unravel some of these issues. This study reflects the left of Bragg and Fielding (2005) continuum where the young people were involved as “active respondents” in informing adult understanding of the issue.

A variety of research methods were used across the four studies including questionnaires, interviews and focus groups (see Table 1 for more details). In studies two and three, young researchers were fundamental in deciding the types of questions to be asked, where they were asked and who we asked. In study three the young researchers conducted their own peer-led interviews. The diversity of methods used across the studies are a strength for this paper. An over-reliance on one method is not portrayed and the methods used reflected the requirements of the individual studies.

Informed Consent

Voluntary positive agreement to participate in research is referred to as “consent” while “assent,” refers to a person’s compliance to participate ( Coyne, 2010 ). The difference in these terms are normally used to distinguish the “legal competency of children over and under 16 years in relation to research.” ( Coyne, 2010 , 228). In England, children have a legal right to consent so therefore assent is non-applicable ( Coyne, 2010 ). However, there are still tensions surrounding the ability of children and young people under the age of 18 years to consent in research which are related to their vulnerability, age and stage of development ( Lambert and Glacken, 2011 ). The research in the three empirical studies (two, three and four) started from the premise that all young participants were competent to consent to participate and took the approach of Coyne (2010) who argues that parental/carer consent is not always necessary in social research. University Research Ethics Committees (RECs) are nonetheless usually unfamiliar with the theoretical underpinnings that children are viewed as social actors and generally able to consent for themselves ( Lambert and Glacken, 2011 ; Fox, 2013 ; Parsons et al., 2015 ).

In order to ensure the young people in these reported studies were fully informed of the intentions of each project and to adhere to ethical principles, age appropriate participant information sheets were provided to all participants detailing each study’s requirements. Young people were then asked to provide their own consent by signing a consent form, any questions they had about the studies were discussed. Information sheets were made available to parents in studies three and four. In study two, the parents of young people participating in the focus groups were informed of the study through the organizations used to recruit the young people. My full contact details were provided on these sheets so parents/carers could address any queries they had about the project if they wished. When young people participated in the online questionnaire (study two) we did not know who they were so could not provide separate information to parents. Consequently, all participants were given the opportunity to participate in the research without the consent of their parents/carers unless they were deemed incompetent to consent. In this case the onus was on the adult (parent or carer for example) to prove incompetency ( Alderson, 2007 ). Favorable ethical approval, including approval for the above consent procedures, was granted by the Faculty Research Ethics Committee at Anglia Ruskin University.

In the next section I provide a synthesis of the findings across the four studies before discussing how participatory research with young people can offer new understandings of bullying and its impacts on young people.

Although each study was designed to answer specific bullying research questions, the following key themes cut across all four studies 1 :

• Bullying definitions

◦ Behaviors

• Impact of bullying on victim

• Reporting bullying

Bullying Definitions

Young people had various understandings about what they considered bullying to be. Overall, participants agreed that aggressive direct behaviors, mainly focusing on physical aggression, constituted bullying:

“…if someone is physically hurt then that is bullying straight away.” (Female, study 3).

“I think [cyber-bullying is] not as bad because with verbal or physical, you are more likely to come in contact with your attacker regularly, and that can be disturbing. However, with cyber-bullying it is virtual so you can find ways to avoid the person.” (Female, study 2).

Name-calling was an ambiguous concept, young people generally believed that in isolation name-calling might not be bullying behavior or it could be interpreted as “joking” or “banter”:

“I never really see any, a bit of name calling and taking the mick but nothing ever serious.” (Male, study 3).

The concept of “banter” or “joking” was explored in study three as a result of the participatory design. Young people suggested “banter” involves:

“…a personal joke or group banter has no intention to harm another, it is merely playful jokes.” (Female, study 3).

However, underpinning this understanding of “banter” was the importance of intentionality:

“Banter saying things bad as a joke and everyone knows it is a joke.” (Male, study 3).

“Banter” was thus contentious when perception and reception were ambiguous. In some cases, “banter” was considered “normal behavior”:

“…we’ve just been joking about, but it’s never been anything harsh it’s just been like having a joke…” (Male, study 3).

The same view was evident in relation to cyber-bullying. Some participants were rather dismissive of this approach suggesting that it did not exist:

“I don’t really think it exists. If you’re being cyber-“bullied” then there is something wrong with you- it is insanely easy to avoid, by blocking people and so on. Perhaps it consists of people insulting you online?” (Male, study 2).

When young people considered additional factors added to name calling such as the type of name-calling, or aspects of repetition or intention, then a different view was apparent.

“…but it has to be constant it can’t be a single time because that always happens.” (Male, study 3).

Likewise with words used on social media, young people considered intentionality in their consideration of whether particular behaviors were bullying, highlighting important nuances in how bullying is conceptualized:

“Some people they don’t want to sound cruel but because maybe if you don’t put a smiley face on it, it might seem cruel when sometimes you don’t mean it.” (Female, study 2).

Study one also found that young people were more likely to discuss sexist or racist bullying in interviews or focus groups but this information was scarce in the questionnaire data. This is possibly as a result of how the questions were framed and the researchers’ perspectives informing the questions.

Evident across the four studies was the understanding young people had about the effects of continuous name-calling on victims:

“…you can take one comment, you can just like almost brush it off, but if you keep on being bullied and bullied and bullied then you might kind of think, hang on a minute, they’ve taken it a step too far, like it’s actually become more personal, whereas just like a cheeky comment between friends it’s become something that’s more serious and more personal and more annoying or hurtful to someone.” (Female, study 3).

“Cyber-bullying is basically still verbal bullying and is definitely psychological bullying. Any bullying is psychological though, really. And any bullying is going to be harmful.” (Female, study 2).

Aspects of indirect bullying (social exclusion) were features of studies one and three. For the most part, the research reviewed in study one found that as young people got older they were less likely to consider characteristics of social exclusion in their definitions of bullying. In study three, when discussing the school’s anti-bullying policy, study participants raised questions about “ isolating a student from a friendship group .” Some contested this statement as a form of bullying:

“…. there is avoiding, as in, not actively playing a role in trying to be friends which I don’t really see as bullying I see this as just not getting someone to join your friendship group. Whereas if you were actually leaving him out and rejecting him if he tries to be friends then I think I would see that as malicious and bullying.” (Male, study 3).

“Isolating a student from a friendship group – I believe there are various reasons for which a student can be isolated from a group – including by choice.” (Female, study 3).

Cyber-bullying was explored in detail in study two but less so in the other three studies. Most study two participants considered that cyber-bullying was just as harmful, or in some cases worse than, ‘traditional’ bullying due to the use of similar forms of “harassment,” “antagonizing,” “tormenting,” and ‘threatening’ through online platforms. Some young people believed that the physical distance between the victim and the bully is an important aspect of cyber-bullying:

“I think it’s worse because people find it easier to abuse someone when not face to face.” (Male, study 2).

“I think it could be worse, because lots of other people can get involved, whereas when it’s physical bullying it’s normally just between one or two or a smaller group, things could escalate too because especially Facebook, they’ve got potential to escalate.” (Female, study 2).

Other participants in study two spoke about bullying at school which transfers to an online platform highlighting no “escape” for some. In addition, it was made clearer that some young people considered distancing in relation to bullying and how this influences perceptions of severity:

“…when there’s an argument it can continue when you’re not at school or whatever and they can continue it over Facebook and everyone can see it then other people get involved.” (Female, study 2).

“I was cyber-bullied on Facebook, because someone put several hurtful comments in response to my status updates and profile pictures. This actually was extended into school by the bully…” (Male, study 2).

Impact of Bullying on Victim

Although bullying behaviors were a primary consideration of young people’s understanding of bullying, many considered the consequences associated with bullying and in particular, the impact on mental health. In these examples, the specifics of the bullying event were irrelevant to young people and the focus was on how the behavior was received by the recipient.

In study two, young people divulged how cyber-bullying had adversely affected their ability to go to school and to socialize outside school. Indeed some young people reported the affects it had on their confidence and self-esteem:

“I developed anorexia nervosa. Although not the single cause of my illness, bullying greatly contributed to my low self-esteem which led to becoming ill.” (Female, study 2).

“It hurts people’s feelings and can even lead to committing suicide….” (Female, study 2).

Across the studies, young people who had been bullied themselves shared their individual experiences:

“….you feel insecure and it just builds up and builds up and then in the end you have no self-confidence.” (Female, study 2).

“…it was an everyday thing I just couldn’t take it and it was causing me a lot of anxiety.” (Male, study 4).

“I am different to everyone in my class …. I couldn’t take it no more I was upset all the time and it made me feel anxious and I wasn’t sleeping but spent all my time in bed being sad and unhappy.” (Male, study 4).

Young people who had not experienced bullying themselves agreed that the impact it had on a person was a large determiner of whether bullying had happened:

“When your self-confidence is severely affected and you become shy. Also when you start believing what the bullies are saying about you and start to doubt yourself.” (Female, study 3).

“…it makes the victim feel bad about themselves which mostly leads to depression and sadness.” (Male, study 2).

Further evidence around the impact of bullying was apparent in the data in terms of how relational aspects can affect perceived severity. In the case of cyber-bullying, young people suggested a sense of detachment because the bullying takes place online. Consequently, as the relational element is removed bullying becomes easier to execute:

“…because people don’t have to face them over a computer so it’s so much easier. It’s so much quicker as well cos on something like Facebook it’s not just you, you can get everyone on Facebook to help you bully that person.” (Female, study 2).

“Due to technology being cheaper, it is easier for young people to bully people in this way because they don’t believe they can be tracked.” (Male, study 2).

“The effects are the same and often the bullying can be worse as the perpetrator is unknown or can disguise their identity. Away from the eyes of teachers etc., more can be done without anyone knowing.” (Female, study 2).

Relational aspects of bullying were further highlighted with regards to how “banter” was understood, particularly with in-group bullying and how the same example can either be seen as “banter” or bullying depending on the nature of the relationship:

“…we’ve just been joking about, but it’s never been anything harsh it’s just been like having a joke. well, I haven’t done it but I’ve been in a crowd where people do it, so I don’t want to get involved just in case it started an argument.” (Female, study 3).

“But it also depends…who your groups with, for example, if I spoke to my friends from [School]… I wouldn’t like use taboo language with them because to them it may seem inappropriate and probably a bit shocked, but if I was with my friends outside of school we use taboo language, we’ll be ourselves and we’ll be comfortable with it, and if a stranger walked past and heard us obviously they’d be thinking that we’re being bullied ourselves.” (Female, study 3).

Furthermore, how individuals are perceived by others tended to influence whether they were believed or not. In study four for example, participants suggested that who the bullies were within the school might have impacted how complaints were acted upon by school officials:

“When I went to the school about it, the students said I had attacked them – all eight of them! I just realized that no one believes me….” (Female, study 4).

While in study three, a characteristic of bullying was the influence the aggressor has over the victim:

“When the victim starts to feel in danger or start to fear the other person. Consequently he or she tries to avoid the bad guy (or girl!)” (Male, study 3).

These relational and contextual issues also influenced a young person’s ability to report bullying.

Reporting Bullying

Young people were more likely to report bullying when they considered it was ‘serious’ enough. Just under half of participants in study two sought emotional/practical support if they worried about, or were affected by cyber-bullying, with most talking to their parents. In study three, young people were less likely to seek support but when they did, most went to their teachers. In study four, all participants reported bullying in school where they did not feel supported.

Fear of making the bullying worse was captured across the studies as a reason for not reporting it:

“I’m scared that if I tell then the bullying will still go on and they will do more.” (Female, study 3).

“The bully might bully you if he finds out.” (Male, study 3).

Being able to deal with the incident themselves was also a reason for non-reporting:

“…it’s embarrassing and not necessary, my friends help me through it, adults never seem to understand.” (Female, study 2).

“I don’t tend to talk to anyone about it, I just keep it to myself and obviously that’s the worst thing you should ever do, you should never keep it to yourself, because I regret keeping it to myself to be honest….” (Female, study 3).

“…but I think I’d deal with it myself ‘cos. I was quite insecure but now I’m quite secure with myself, so I’ll sort it out myself. I think it’s just over time I’ve just sort of hardened to it.” (Male, study 3).

Most young people seeking support for bullying said they spoke to an adult but the helpfulness of this support varied. This finding is important for understanding relationships between young people and adults. Those who felt supported by their teachers for example, suggested that they took the time to listen and understood what they were telling them. They also reassured young people who in turn believed that the adult they confided in would know what to do:

“So I think the best teacher to talk to is [Miss A] and even though people are scared of her I would recommend it, because she’s a good listener and she can sense when you don’t want to talk about something, whereas the other teachers force it out of you.” (Female, study 3).

“My school has had assemblies about cyber-bullying and ways you can stop it or you can report it anonymously…. you can write your name or you can’t, it’s all up to YOU.” (Male, study 2).

Others however had a negative experience of reporting bullying and a number of reasons were provided as to why. Firstly, young people stated that adults did not believe them which made the bullying worse on some level:

“I went to the teachers a couple of times but, no, I don’t think they could do anything. I did sort of go three times and it still kept on going, so I just had to sort of deal with it and I sort of took it on the cheek….” (Male, study 3).

Secondly, young people suggested that adults did not always listen to their concerns, or in some cases did not take their concerns seriously enough:

“…I had had a really bad day with the girls so I came out and I explained all this to my head of year and how it was affecting me but instead of supporting me he put me straight into isolation.” (Male, study 4).

“I could understand them thinking I maybe got the wrong end of the stick with one incident but this was 18 months of me constantly reporting different incidents.” (Female, study 4).

“If cyber-bullying is brought to our school’s attention, usually, they expect printed proof of the situation and will take it into their own hand depending on its seriousness. However this is usually a couple of detentions. And it’s just not enough.” (Female, study 2).

Finally, some young people suggested that teachers did not always know what to do when bullying concerns were raised and consequently punished those making the complaint:

“I think I would have offered support instead of punishment to someone who was suffering with anxiety. I wouldn’t have seen anxiety as bad behavior I think that’s quite ignorant but they saw it as bad behavior.” (Male, study 4).

It is worth reiterating, that the majority of young people across the studies did not report bullying to anybody , which further underscores the contextual issues underpinning bullying and its role in enabling or disabling bullying behaviors. Some considered it was “pointless” reporting the bullying and others feared the situation would be made worse if they did:

“My school hide and say that bullying doesn’t go on cos they don’t wanna look bad for Ofsted.” (Male, study 2).

“My school is oblivious to anything that happens, many things against school rules happen beneath their eyes but they either refuse to acknowledge it or are just not paying attention so we must suffer.” (Female, study 2).

“That’s why I find that when you get bullied you’re scared of telling because either, in most cases the teacher will – oh yeah, yeah, don’t worry, we’ll sort it out and then they don’t tend to, and then they get bullied more for it.” (Female, study 3).

Young people were concerned that reporting bullying would have a negative impact on their friendship groups. Some were anxious about disrupting the status quo within:

“I think everyone would talk about me behind my back and say I was mean and everyone would hate me.” (Female, study 3).

Others expressed concern about the potential vulnerability they were likely to experience if they raised concerns of bullying:

“I was worried it might affect my other friendships.”(Boy, study 2).

“I’m scared that if I tell, then the bullying will still go on and they will do more.” (Female, study 3).

“….because they might tell off the bullies and then the bullies will like get back at you.” (Female, study 3).

These findings underscore the importance of contextual and relational factors in understanding bullying from the perspectives of young people and how these factors influence a young person’s ability or willingness to report bullying.

Finally one young person who had self-excluded from school due to severe bullying suggested that schools:

“…need to be looking out for their students’ mental wellbeing – not only be there to teach them but to support and mentor them. Keep them safe really… I missed out on about three years of socializing outside of school because I just couldn’t do it. I think it’s important that students are encouraged to stand up for each other.” (Female, study 4).

The studies presented in this paper illustrate the multitude of perceptions underpinning young people’s understandings of what constitutes bullying, both in terms of the behavior and also the impact that this behavior has on an individual. In turn, the ambiguity of what constitutes bullying had an impact on a young person’s ability to seek support. Discrepancies in bullying perceptions within and between young people’s groups are shown, highlighting the fluid and changing roles that occur within a bullying situation. Findings from quantitative studies have demonstrated the differing perceptions of bullying by adults and young people (see for example Smith et al., 2002 ; Vaillancourt et al., 2008 ; Maunder et al., 2010 ; Cuadrado-Gordillo, 2012 ). However, by combining findings from participatory research, new understandings of the relational and contextual factors important to young people come to the fore.

Young people participating in these four studies had unique knowledge and experiences of bullying and the social interactions of other young people in their schools and wider friendship groups. The underpinning participatory design enabled me to work alongside young people to analyze and understand their unique perspectives of bullying in more detail. The research teams were therefore able to construct meaning together, based not entirely on our own assumptions and ideologies, but including the viewpoint of the wider research participant group ( Thomson and Gunter, 2008 ). Together, through the process of co-constructing bullying knowledge, we were able to build on what is already known in this field and contribute to the view that bullying is socially constructed through the experiences of young people and the groups they occupy ( Schott and Sondergaard, 2014 ).

With regards to understanding what bullying is, the findings from these studies corroborate those of the wider literature from both paradigms of inquiry (for example Naylor et al., 2001 ; Canty et al., 2016 ); that being the discrepancies in definitions between adults and young people and also between young people themselves. Yet, findings here suggest that young people’s bullying definitions are contextually and relationally contingent. With the exception of physical bullying, young people did not differentiate between direct or indirect behaviors, instead they tended to agree that other contextual and relational factors played a role in deciding if particular behaviors were bullying (or not). The participatory research design enabled reflection and further investigation of the ideas that were particularly important to young people such as repetition and intentionality. Repetition was generally seen as being indicative of bullying being “serious,” and therefore more likely to be reported, and without repetition, a level of normality was perceived. This finding contradicts some work on bullying definitions, Cuadrado-Gordillo (2012) for example found that regardless of the role played by young people in a bullying episode (victim, aggressor or witness), the criteria of ‘repetition’ was not important in how they defined bullying.

Relational factors underpinning young people’s perception of bullying and indeed it’s “seriousness” were further reflected in their willingness or otherwise to report it. Fear of disrupting the status quo of the wider friendship group, potentially leading to their own exclusion from the group, was raised as a concern by young people. Some were concerned their friends would not support them if they reported bullying, while others feared further retaliation as a result. Friendship groups have been identified as a source of support for those who have experienced bullying and as a protective factor against further bullying ( Allen, 2014 ). Although participants did not suggest their friendship groups are unsupportive it is possible that group dynamics underscore seeking (or not) support for bullying. Other literature has described such practices as evidence of a power imbalance ( Olweus, 1995 ; Cuadrado-Gordillo, 2012 ) but young people in these studies did not describe these unequal relationships in this way and instead focused on the outcomes and impacts of bullying. Indeed Cuadrado-Gordillo (2012) also found that young people in their quantitative study did not consider “power imbalance” in their understanding of bullying and were more likely to consider intention. This paper, however, underscores the relational aspects of definitions of bullying and, how the dynamics of young people’s friendships can shift what is understood as bullying or not. Without such nuances, some behaviors may be overlooked as bullying, whereas other more obvious behaviors draw further attention. This paper also shows that contextual issues such as support structures can shift how young people see bullying. Contextual factors were evident across the four studies through the recognition of bullying being enabled or disabled by institutional factors, including a school’s ability to respond appropriately to bullying concerns. Young people suggested that schools could be influenced by bullies, perceiving them as non-threatening and consequently not dealing appropriately with the situation. Indeed some young people reported that their schools placed the onus on them as victims to change, consequently placing the “blame” on victims instead. These findings raise questions about who young people feel able to confide in about bullying as well as issues around training and teacher preparedness to deal with bullying in schools. Evidenced in these four studies, is that young people feel somewhat disconnected from adults when they have bullying concerns. Those who did report bullying, identified particular individuals they trusted and knew would support them. Novick and Isaacs (2010) identified teachers who young people felt comfortable in approaching to report bullying and described them as “most active, engaged and responsive.” (p. 291). The bullying literature suggests that as young people get older they are more likely to confide in friends than adults ( Moore and Maclean, 2012 ; Allen, 2014 ). However, findings from this paper indicate that although fewer young people reported bullying, those who did confided in an adult. Young people have identified that a variety of supports are required to tackle bullying and that adults need to listen and work with them so nuanced bullying behaviors are not recognized as “normal” behaviors. Within the data presented in this paper, “banter” was portrayed as “normal” behavior. Young people did not specify what behaviors they regarded as “banter,” but suggested that when banter is repeated and intentional the lines are blurred about what is bullying and what is banter.

Exploring bullying nuances in this paper, was enhanced by the involvement of young people in the research process who had a unique “insider” perspective about what it is like to be a young person now and how bullying is currently affecting young people. In studies one and four, young people were “active respondents” ( Bragg and Fielding, 2005 ) and provided adults with their own unique perspectives on bullying. It could be argued that study one did not involve the participation of young people. However, this study informed the basis of the subsequent studies due to the discrepancies noted in the literature about how bullying is understood between adults and young people, as well as the lack of young people’s voice and opportunity to participate in the reviewed research. Accordingly, young people’s data as “active respondents” informed adult understanding and led to future work involving more active research engagement from other young people. Participation in study four provided an opportunity for young people to contribute to future participatory research based on lived experiences as well as informing policy makers of the effects bullying has on the lives of young people ( O’Brien, 2017 ). In studies two and three, young people were involved further along Bragg and Fielding (2005) continuum as “co-researchers” and “students as researchers” with these roles shifting and moving dependent on the context of the project at the time ( O’Brien et al., 2018a ). These young researchers brought unique knowledge to the projects ( Bradbury-Jones et al., 2018 ) that could not be accessed elsewhere. Perspectives offered by the young researchers supported adults in understanding more about traditional and cyber-bullying from their perspectives. Furthermore, this knowledge can be added to other, quantitative studies to further understand why bullying happens alongside bullying prevalence, risk and protective factors, and negative outcomes.

Findings from the four studies offer an alternative perspective to how bullying is understood by young people. Complexities in defining bullying have been further uncovered as understanding is informed by individual factors, as well as wider social and relational contexts ( Horton, 2011 ; Schott and Sondergaard, 2014 ). This has implications for the type of support young people require. This paper highlights how definitions of bullying shift in response to relational and contextual aspects deemed important to young people. Because of this, further nuances were uncovered through the research process itself as the respective studies showed discrepancies in bullying perceptions within and between young people’s groups.

These understandings can act as a starting point for young people and adults to collaborate in research which seeks to understand bullying and the context to which it occurs. Furthermore, such collaborations enable adults to theorize and understand the complexities associated with bullying from the perspective of those at the center. There is a need for additional participatory research projects involving such collaborations where adults and young people can learn from each other as well as combining findings from different methodologies to enable a more comprehensive picture of the issues for young people to emerge. Further research is needed to unravel the complexities of bullying among and between young people, specifically in relation to the contextual and relational factors underscoring perceptions of bullying.

Data Availability

The raw data supporting the conclusions of this manuscript will be made available by the authors, without undue reservation, to any qualified researcher.

Ethics Statement

Ethical approval was granted for all four studies from the Faculty of Health, Education, Medicine and Social Care at the Anglia Ruskin University. The research was conducted on the premise of Gillick competency meaning that young people (in these studies over the age of 12 years) could consent for themselves to participate. Parents/carers were aware the study was happening and received information sheets explaining the process.

Author Contributions

The author confirms being the sole contributor of this work and has approved it for publication.

These four studies were conducted at the Anglia Ruskin University. Study one was part of a wider masters degree funded by the Anglia Ruskin University, Study two was funded by a group of young people convened by the National Children’s Bureau with funding from the Wellcome Trust (United Kingdom). Study three was a wider Doctoral study funded by the Anglia Ruskin University and Study four was also funded by the Anglia Ruskin University.

Conflict of Interest Statement

The author declares that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest.

Acknowledgments

I would like to thank Dr. Grace Spencer, Ruskin Fellow at the Anglia Ruskin University for providing the critical read of this manuscript and offering constructive feedback. I would also like to thank the two independent reviewers for their feedback on the drafts of this manuscript.

^ These findings focus on perceptions and data from the young people in the four studies. For a full discussion on adult perceptions please refer to the individual studies.

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Skrzypiec, G., Slee, P., Murray-Harvey, R., and Pereira, B. (2011). School bullying by one or more ways: does it matter and how do students cope? Sch. Psychol. Int. 32, 288–311. doi: 10.1177/0143034311402308

Smith, P. K., Cowie, H., Olafsson, R. F., and Liefooghe, A. P. D. (2002). Definitions of bullying: a comparison of terms used, and age and gender differences, in a fourteen-country international comparison. Child Dev. 73, 1119–1133. doi: 10.1111/1467-8624.00461

Spears, B., Taddeo, C., Collin, P., Swist, T., Razzell, M., Borbone, V., et al. (2016). Safe and Well Online: Learnings from Four Social Marketing Campaigns for Youth Wellbeing. Available at: https://researchdirect.westernsydney.edu.au/islandora/object/uws:36405/datastream/PDF/view (accessed July 1, 2019).

Stoudt, B. G. (2009). The role of language & discourse in the investigation of privilege: using participatory action research to discuss theory. Dev. Methodol. Interrupt. Power Urban Rev. 41, 7–28.

Thomson, P., and Gunter, H. (2008). Researching Bullying with students: a lens on everyday life in an ‘innovative school’. Int. J. Inclusive Educ. 12, 185–200. doi: 10.1080/13603110600855713

Tisdall, E. K. M., and Punch, S. (2012). Not so ‘new’? Looking critically at childhood studies. Child. Geogr. 10, 249–264. doi: 10.1080/14733285.2012.693376

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Vaillancourt, T., McDougall, P., Hymel, S., Krygsman, A., Miller, J., Stiver, K., et al. (2008). Bullying: are researchers and children/youth talking about the same thing? Int. J. Behav. Dev. 32, 486–495. doi: 10.1177/0165025408095553

Keywords : bullying, young people, participatory research, social constructionism, young people as researchers, collaboration, bullying supports

Citation: O’Brien N (2019) Understanding Alternative Bullying Perspectives Through Research Engagement With Young People. Front. Psychol. 10:1984. doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2019.01984

Received: 28 February 2019; Accepted: 13 August 2019; Published: 28 August 2019.

Reviewed by:

Copyright © 2019 O’Brien. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY) . The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) and the copyright owner(s) are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

*Correspondence: Niamh O’Brien, [email protected]

Disclaimer: All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article or claim that may be made by its manufacturer is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.

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116 Bullying Essay Topic Ideas & Examples

Inside This Article

Bullying is a prevalent issue that affects children, teenagers, and even adults worldwide. It is a form of aggressive behavior that can have long-lasting psychological and emotional effects on the victims. Writing an essay on bullying can help raise awareness about the issue and promote discussions on how to prevent and address it. To assist you in your essay writing process, here are 116 bullying essay topic ideas and examples:

The impact of bullying on mental health.
Different types of bullying: physical, verbal, and cyberbullying.
The role of schools in preventing and addressing bullying.
How bullying affects academic performance.
The consequences of ignoring bullying.
How can parents identify if their child is being bullied?
The importance of bystander intervention in stopping bullying.
The correlation between bullying and self-esteem issues.
The long-term effects of bullying on victims.
The role of social media in spreading and perpetuating bullying.
The connection between bullying and suicidal tendencies.
The effectiveness of anti-bullying campaigns in schools.
The role of teachers in preventing bullying.
Bullying within the workplace: causes and solutions.
The impact of bullying on LGBTQ+ youth.
Strategies to support and empower bullying victims.
The role of law enforcement in tackling cyberbullying.
Bullying and its influence on body image.
The connection between bullying and substance abuse.
The role of parents in teaching empathy to prevent bullying.
The psychological profile of a bully.
The impact of bullying on the academic achievement of students.
The role of school counselors in addressing bullying.
How to create a safe and inclusive school environment.
The role of peer pressure in bullying behavior.
The impact of bullying on a victim's social life.
The connection between bullying and eating disorders.
The role of technology in enabling cyberbullying.
The impact of bullying on the mental health of teenagers.
The relationship between bullying and depression.
How to promote kindness and empathy in schools to prevent bullying.
The role of community organizations in combating bullying.
The legal consequences of bullying.
The correlation between bullying and academic dropout rates.
The impact of bullying on minority groups.
The role of the media in addressing bullying.
How to create a zero-tolerance policy for bullying in schools.
The connection between bullying and aggression in adulthood.
The role of parents in educating their children about bullying.
The impact of bullying on a victim's self-worth.
The role of social support in helping bullying victims.
The connection between bullying and anxiety disorders.
The effectiveness of restorative justice practices in addressing bullying.
The impact of bullying on a victim's future relationships.
The role of school administrators in preventing bullying.
The role of peer groups in promoting or preventing bullying.
The connection between bullying and sleep disorders.
How to foster empathy and compassion in children to prevent bullying.
The impact of bullying on academic motivation.
The role of technology companies in combating cyberbullying.
The relationship between bullying and self-harm.
The impact of bullying on the mental health of college students.
The role of the government in implementing anti-bullying policies.
The connection between bullying and criminal behavior.
How to create a supportive classroom environment to prevent bullying.
The impact of bullying on a victim's trust in others.
The role of peer mentoring programs in preventing bullying.
The connection between bullying and post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD).
The impact of bullying on a victim's physical health.
The role of technology in promoting positive online interactions and reducing bullying.
The connection between bullying and substance use disorders.
How to promote empathy and tolerance in society to prevent bullying.
The impact of bullying on a victim's academic aspirations.
The role of community leaders in raising awareness about bullying.
The connection between bullying and eating disorders in males.
The impact of bullying on a victim's ability to form healthy relationships.
The role of peer mediation programs in resolving bullying incidents.
The connection between bullying and trauma.
The impact of bullying on a victim's sense of belonging.
The role of school policies in preventing and addressing bullying.
The connection between bullying and body dysmorphic disorder.
How to create a culture of respect and inclusivity to prevent bullying.
The impact of bullying on a victim's social skills.
The role of school-based mental health services in supporting bullying victims.
The connection between bullying and personality disorders.
The impact of bullying on a victim's academic engagement.
The role of social-emotional learning programs in preventing bullying.
The connection between bullying and sleep disturbances.
The impact of bullying on a victim's ability to trust authority figures.
The role of school climate in preventing and addressing bullying.
The connection between bullying and obsessive-compulsive disorder.
How to promote digital citizenship to prevent cyberbullying.
The impact of bullying on a victim's emotional well-being.
The role of school-based peer support groups in helping bullying victims.
The connection between bullying and bipolar disorder.
The impact of bullying on a victim's resilience.
The role of teacher training in identifying and addressing bullying.
The connection between bullying and social anxiety disorder.
How to promote empathy and kindness in online communities to prevent cyberbullying.
The impact of bullying on a victim's sense of identity.
The role of school-wide positive behavior interventions in preventing bullying.
The connection between bullying and attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD).
The impact of bullying on a victim's sense of safety.
The role of peer-led initiatives in preventing and addressing bullying.
The connection between bullying and autism spectrum disorder.
How to promote responsible online behavior to prevent cyberbullying.
The impact of bullying on a victim's ability to concentrate in school.
The role of community-based organizations in providing support to bullying victims.
The connection between bullying and borderline personality disorder.
The impact of bullying on a victim's academic self-efficacy.
The role of school-based counseling services in addressing bullying.
The connection between bullying and schizophrenia.
How to promote empathy and understanding in online gaming communities to prevent cyberbullying.
The impact of bullying on a victim's social status.
The role of school discipline policies in preventing and addressing bullying.
The connection between bullying and oppositional defiant disorder.
The impact of bullying on a victim's sense of belonging in the community.
The role of peer mediation programs in reducing bullying incidents.
The connection between bullying and conduct disorder.
How to promote digital literacy to prevent cyberbullying.
The impact of bullying on a victim's body image.
The role of school-based mentorship programs in supporting bullying victims.
The connection between bullying and substance-induced disorders.
The impact of bullying on a victim's ability to form social connections.
The role of school-wide positive reinforcement strategies in preventing bullying.
The connection between bullying and antisocial personality disorder.

These 116 bullying essay topic ideas and examples can serve as a starting point for your essay. Choose a topic that resonates with you, conduct thorough research, and present compelling arguments to shed light on this critical societal issue. By writing about bullying, you contribute to the ongoing conversation about prevention and support for victims.

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Bullying is a form of aggressive behavior in which someone intentionally and repeatedly causes another person injury or discomfort. Bullying can take the form of physical contact, words, or more subtle actions.

The bullied individual typically has trouble defending him or herself and does nothing to “cause” the bullying.

Cyberbullying is verbally threatening or harassing behavior conducted through such electronic technology as cell phones, email, social media, or text messaging.

Adapted from APA Dictionary of Psychology

Resources from APA

Cyberbullying: What is it and how can you stop it?

Explore the latest psychological science about the impact of cyberbullying and what to do if you or your child is a victim

Spotlight: Can school-wide social and emotional learning reduce cyberbullying among adolescents?

In a large-scale survey study, Chunyan Yang and colleagues used multilevel modeling to examine how components of school-wide social and emotional learning influenced adolescents’ cyberbullying experience.

Students experiencing bullying

Teachers are critical contributors to promoting safe school interactions and promoting positive relationships.

Students Exploring Gender Identity

Teachers are critical in establishing welcoming and safe environments, setting expectations for student interactions, and modeling inclusive language, which continues to evolve over time.

More resources about bullying

Magination Press children’s books

Did You Hear?

Mookey the Monkey Gets Over Being Teased

Big Red and the Little Bitty Wolf

The Hero Handbook

Big Brave Bold Sergio

Research With High-Risk Populations

APA Handbook of Giftedness and Talent

Bullying Prevention

Supporting Gender Identity and Sexual Orientation Diversity in K-12 Schools

Journal special issues

Adolescents and Violence

Preventing Interpersonal Stressors at Work

Groups in Educational Settings

Prevention Groups

Technology and Violence

78 Cyber Bullying Essay Topic Ideas & Examples

🏆 best cyber bullying topic ideas & essay examples, 💡 interesting topics to write about cyber bullying, 👍 good essay topics on cyber bullying, ❓ questions about cyberbullying research.

Cyber Bullying Issue Therefore, the goal of this paper is to analyse who the victims of cyber bullying are and the influence it has on them.
The Effects of Cyber-Bullying and Cyber-Stalking on the Society In particular, one should focus on such issues as the disrespect for a person’s autonomy, the growing intensity of domestic violence and deteriorating mental health in the country.
Cyber Bullying and Positivist Theory of Crime Learning theory approaches to the explanation of criminal behavior have been associated with one of the major sociological theories of crime, the differential association theory.
Cyber Bullying Reduction Program Table of Activities Activity Significance Assembling parents/guardians, students and teachers to announce and explain the program in the institution To enlighten parents/guardians, students and teachers about the rules and regulation enacted due to the threat […]
Cyber Bullying Prevention in Learning Institutions: Systematic Approach To start with, the students are provided with ways of reporting their concern to the educational institution, and when the staff members of the institution receive the report, they evaluate the information together with the […]
Discouraging and Eliminating Cyber Bullying Resources Role of the resource/input Statement forms To facilitate information transfer to the staff Counseling Personnel To arm students against the problem Bullying report system To create efficient internet enhance report system Regulation implementation documents […]
Cyber Bullying and Its Forms The difference between the conventional way of bullying and cyber bullying is that in conventional bullying, there is contact between the bully and the victim.
Ethics in Technology: Cyber Crimes Furthermore, the defendant altered the data, which compromised the integrity of the information to the detriment of the organizations involved. In this litigation, Aleksey Vladimirovich Ivanov was the defendant while the American government was the […]
Cyber Bullying as a Virtual Menace The use of information and communication technologies to support a deliberate and most of the time repeated hostile behavior by an individual or groups of people with the sole intention of harming others, one is […]
Ethical Case: Facebook Gossip or Cyberbullying? The best option to Paige is to apologize publicly and withdraw her comments. The final stage is to act and reflect the outcome of the choice made.
Freedom Of Speech In The Era Of Cyber Bullying
The Negative Impacts of Technology on Social Skills: Anxiety, Awkward Conversations, Cyber Bullying, and Lack of Awareness
Different Consequences of Cyber Bullying in School
The Study Of Cyber Bullying Victimization On Children Who Are Addicted To The Internet
The Causes and Harmful Effects of Cyber Bullying
Why Do Cyber Bullying Laws Need to Be Enforced
Unsecured Privacy Settings, Cyber Bullying, And Facebook Crime
Bullying Carried too Far: Cyber Bullying and Violent Bullying
Cyber Bullying: Misuse of Information and Communications Technology
Cyber Bullying and Why Parents Need to Monitor Their Children’s Activity
The Detrimental Effects of Cyber Bullying
Cyber Bullying, Its Forms, Impact, and Relationship to Juvenile Delinquency
How Cyber Bullying Affects Our Lives Negatively
The Effects Of Cyber Bullying On Substance Use And Mental Health
Cyberbullying : Causes And Dangers Of Cyber Bullying
The Effects Of Cyber Bullying On The Mental Health Of Middle School Aged Youth
Is Cyber Bullying Morally Justifiable
Cyber Bullying And Its Effect On Our Youth
An Analysis of Cyber Bullying in Today’s World
Cyber Bullying And Its Effect On The Lives Of The American
Bullying And The Potential Motives Behind Cyber Bullying
Cyber Bullying And Its Various Forms
Bullying In The Digital Age: Electronic Or Cyber Bullying
Information Technology – Role of Social Networking Cites in Cyber Bullying
Cyber Bullying : A Consistent Problem For Young People
Cause And Effect Of Cyber Bullying
Cyber Bullying, Creating a Culture of Respect
Cyber Bullying And Its Effect On Adolescents
Prevention And Intervention Of Cyber Bullying
Investigating Cyber Bullying Using Social Media
Cyber Bullying Affects People ‘s Lives More Than One Might Think
The Cyber Crime and the Cyber Bullying
The Cause of Cyber Bullying and the Effect of the Mental Development of Teenagers
Cyber Bullying: An Uncontrollable Epidemic
The Psychological Impact of Cyber Bullying
The Eternal Effects Of Cyber Bullying
Cyber Bullying : Bullying Through Technology
Why Does Online Anonymity Increase Cyberbullying Among Teenagers?
Are Laws Effective Strategy Address Issue Cyberbullying?
Are Schools Doing Enough About Cyberbullying?
What Are the Causes of Cyberbullying?
What Is the Prevention of Cyberbullying?
Is Cyberbullying Related to a Lack of Empathy and Social-Emotional Problems?
How Often Do Celebrities Suffer From Cyberbullying?
What Are the Characteristics of Cyberbullying Among Students?
How Does Social Integration of Children Help to Combat Cyberbullying?
What Is the Correlation Between Suicide Rates and Cyberbullying?
How Does Cyberbullying Affect Society?
What Is the Correlation Between Depression, Bullying and Cyberbullying?
Are There Gender Differences in Cyberbullying?
What Is the Criminal Penalty for Cyberbullying?
What International Associations Prevent Cyberbullying?
What Is the Role of Affective and Cognitive Empathy in Cyberbullying?
What Are the Solutions to Cyberbullying?
Can Cyberbullying Be Called Cyber Crime?
What Is the Role of Teachers in Preventing Cyberbullying?
Can Internet Privacy Be Enough to Prevent Cyberbullying?
How Does Cyberbullying Affect Children?
How Many American Teenagers Are Cyberbullied?
How Does Cyberbullying Affect Mental Health?
How Is Cyberbullying Different From Physical Bullying?
Is Cyberbullying an Example of Psychological Abuse?
Can School Policies Reduce Cyberbullying?
How Does Cyberbullying Affect Teenagers’ Self-Esteem?
What Are the Consequences of Cyberbullying?
Has the Proliferation of Social Media Led to an Increase in Cyberbullying?
Is Cyberbullying Less Criminal Than Traditional Bullying?
Cyber Security Topics
Cyberspace Topics
Crime Ideas
Mental Health Essay Ideas
Fake News Research Ideas
Internet Research Ideas
Freedom of Speech Ideas
Online Community Essay Topics
Chicago (A-D)
Chicago (N-B)

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80 Bullying Essay Topics

Table of Contents

Bullying Essay Guide: Topics, Selection, and Writing Tips

Bullying is a topic that has attracted significant attention over the years due to its widespread prevalence and detrimental effects on victims. Primarily observed among school children, bullying often stems from social differences, physical appearances, or an individual’s vulnerability. This article aims to guide you through the process of selecting the best bullying essay topic and offers a plethora of topics to inspire your writing.

How to Choose the Best Bullying Essay Topic?

1. Consider Your Audience: Choose a topic that resonates with your readers. Given the prevalence of bullying, many can relate, including perhaps your teachers.

2. Brainstorm and Collaborate: Discuss potential topics with peers to gauge their depth and relevance.

3. Hook Your Readers: Start with an engaging title and opening line to captivate your audience immediately.

4. Rely on Facts: Ensure you incorporate accurate statistics and facts to build a credible argument.

5. Proofread: Review your essay, refine it, and seek feedback. Ensure all aspects of your chosen topic are addressed. For comprehensive proofreading and topic selection, consider using professional services like writeondeadline.com .

Bullying Essay Topics

General topics:.

Effects of bullying on victims’ wellbeing.
Strategies to combat bullying in schools.
The role of parents in addressing bullying.
Personal experiences with bullying – as a bystander or victim.
Legal implications and interventions against bullying.
Motivations behind bullying behaviors.
The societal view on bullying: Is it normalized?
Differentiating between various forms of bullying.
The impact of teachers’ interventions in bullying scenarios.
Raising awareness about bullying in educational institutions.

Cyberbullying Topics:

Factors leading to cyberbullying.
Overcoming the trauma of online harassment.
Investigative methods to trace cyberbullies.
The psychology of individuals who cyber bully.
Comparing the psychological impacts: Cyberbullying vs. traditional bullying.
How social media platforms can be breeding grounds for cyberbullying.
Prevention strategies against online harassment.

Anti-Bullying Topics:

Effective measures to eradicate bullying.
The repercussions of bullying on individuals.
Role of parents and educators in supporting bullying victims.
Social dynamics contributing to bullying.
Governmental initiatives against bullying in schools.
Techniques to confront and neutralize bullies.

General Bullying Topics:

The psychological aftermath of being bullied.
The global statistics on bullying: How does it vary?
The role of school leadership in bullying interventions.
Bullying and its connection to the rise in youth mental health issues.
Can bullying be linked to familial structures and parenting styles?
Bullying in adult workplaces: Is it an extension of school behavior?
How pop culture and media representation influence bullying trends.
The economic implications of bullying on society.
Effects of bullying on academic achievements.
The role of peer pressure in bullying incidents.

Cyberbullying Themes:

Anonymity and its role in escalating cyberbullying.
The dark side of social networking sites: A hub for bullies.
Laws and regulations against cyberbullying worldwide.
The role of tech companies in preventing online harassment.
Digital footprints: How they contribute to cyberbullying.
The evolution of cyberbullying: Past, present, and future.
Parental monitoring: A solution to teen cyberbullying?
The contrast between online and offline bullying personas.
How educators can equip students against online threats.
The long-term effects of cyberbullying on mental health.

Anti-Bullying Initiatives:

School programs that effectively reduce bullying.
The power of storytelling and personal narratives in bullying prevention.
Community-driven initiatives against bullying.
The role of celebrities and influencers in anti-bullying campaigns.
Collaborative strategies between parents and schools to counteract bullying.
Importance of counseling services in schools for bullied students.
Anti-bullying laws and their effectiveness.
The positive impact of peer-support groups.
Role models and mentors: Their influence on reducing bullying.
International anti-bullying initiatives and their success stories.

Bullying Research and Case Studies:

Detailed analysis of high-profile bullying incidents.
Cultural influences on bullying behaviors.
Ethnographic studies on bullying patterns.
The connection between substance abuse and bullying.
How do marginalized groups (LGBTQ+, ethnic minorities) experience bullying differently?
The link between childhood trauma and becoming a bully.
Comparative studies: Bullying in urban vs. rural schools.
Evaluating the success of helplines for bullied individuals.
The role of the internet in both escalating and combating bullying.
Assessing the impact of anti-bullying mobile apps and digital tools.

Societal and Psychological Perspectives:

Bullying from a sociological viewpoint: What does it reveal about society?
The psychological profile of a typical bully.
Do societal standards and ideals indirectly promote bullying?
How bullying affects the family dynamics of the victim.
The cycle of bullying: Can a victim become a bully?

Argumentative Essay Ideas on Bullying:

Defining a bully: Are they criminals?
Examining bullying trends across different age groups.
Gender dynamics in bullying: Do boys bully more than girls?
Assessing the correlation between bullying and academic performance.
The link between bullying and suicidal thoughts.

For those who might feel overwhelmed by the wide array of topics, our dedicated team at writeondeadline.com is here to assist. Whether you need help in choosing a topic, writing, or proofreading your essay, our experts are just a click away.

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Bullying is now regarded as a health problem and not just a disciplinary problem. Increasing evidence shows both traditional bullying (e.g. hitting, teasing) and cyberbullying have lasting effects on young people (both those who bully and those who are bullied), including damage to self-esteem, academic results and mental health.

What is bullying?

Bullying occurs when an individual (or a group of people) repeatedly and intentionally cause harm to another person (or group of people), who is unable to avoid being targeted.

Bullying can include:

Physical bullying (hitting, tripping, damaging property)
Verbal bullying (insults, teasing, intimidation)
Social bullying (lying, spreading rumours, excluding, damaging someone's social reputation)
Cyberbullying (hurtful texts, posts, images or videos, imitating others online).

Social bullying and cyberbullying can be considered ‘invisible’ or covert forms of bullying, as they are particularly difficult for teachers and parents to detect and address. As students get older, they are increasingly likely to bully others using these covert behaviours.

The risk of being cyberbullied increases with age and is most likely to occur in high school. Cyberbullying is particularly upsetting for young people, because it can occur in any time or place, be witnessed by a wide audience, and the perpetrator can hide their identity.

All forms of bullying can have serious consequences for the person targeted, for the person who learns to bully others to achieve their goals, and for those who witness the bullying. Bullying involvement is associated with feelings of being unsafe, poor relationships and social support, poor academic outcomes, and an increased risk of depression and other mental health issues.

Friends (64%) followed by parents or guardians (57%) and then teachers and other staff members (46%) are the people students most commonly turn to for help if they are bullied. Boys (33%) are more likely than girls (23%) to not ask anyone for help.

Telltale signs of being bullied can include:

Changes in sleeping and eating patterns,
Frequent tears or anger
Feeling ill in the morning and not wanting to go to school
Changing friendship groups and
Unexplained bruises, cuts and scratches.

How common is bullying in Australia?

Despite attention to the problem by schools, communities and researchers, bullying continues to be highly prevalent in Australian schools.

Approximately 1 in 4 students in Years 4-9 is bullied every few weeks or more often, and frequent school bullying is highest among students in Year 5 and Year 8.

What can parents do?

It is important for parents to monitor their children’s online and offline activities and social interactions, and encourage their child to talk about any troubling experiences. If bullying has occurred, parents must be careful not to react with anger or take action without consulting their child. Young people often hide bullying from parents because they fear the parent will make things worse.

It is helpful for parents to use the LATE strategy:

Acknowledge it hurts
Talk about options
End with encouragement.

Schools and parents should also encourage students to be positive bystanders in online and offline settings. Those who witness bullying can help the person being targeted by standing up for them, telling a teacher or other adult, or by comforting them later. Students should be aware that they are contributing to bullying behaviour if they encourage the perpetrator or watch without taking action.

Our research impact

The Friendly Schools body of research since 1999 has contributed to societal impacts related to improvements in the health and wellbeing and other developmental outcomes for Australian children and adolescents.

FS research has been refined and empirically tested in Australia over the past 20 years (since 1999) through 15 major research projects (including 7 randomised control trials) involving over 30,000 students, their teachers, parents and school leaders in 255 schools. This program has been evaluated more rigorously and over a longer duration than any other bullying prevention program in Australia.

Over 3000 Australian schools have been recorded by the publishers to have implemented Friendly Schools resources since 2005. It is also being used in schools in the USA, Canada, UK, Singapore, South Africa and NZ

Over 70 peer review publications have been published from FS research data detailing findings including the effectiveness of FS in consistently reducing student bullying behaviours.

Friendly Schools research has significantly influenced national and state policy in WA, QLD, SA, VIC and NSW and national and international policy.

Find out more about friendly schools

Bullying: A researcher's perspective

Professor Donna Cross: Head, Health Promotion and Education Research; Director, CoLab.

The Friendly Schools research is as important now as it was when we began it 20 years ago – if not more so.

With the emergence and increasingly visibility of cyberbullying, schools and communities are realising that bullying is not just a normal part of childhood, but can result in significant long-term damage. New fields of research suggest that severe social stress can even affect gene expression, leading to long-term chronic physical and mental health problems.

If we can help students negotiate stressful social circumstances and prevent bullying from occurring to themselves and to others, we can have a significant positive impact on their future.

I'm also passionate about the research because there is such a need for it – I regularly receive requests for advice from worried parents and schools struggling to address bullying with limited support and resources.

A key focus of FS is to provide training and strategies to parents, students and school staff, so they can feel empowered to help children prevent and cope with social difficulties.

Finally, I feel strongly that young people have the right to contribute to research efforts that involve them, and I have found it very rewarding to work with students to co-develop strategies to prevent bullying. They understand online environments better than most adults, and frequently come up with insightful suggestions and creative ideas to help other young people, and adults.

Bullying teams

The Human Development and Community Wellbeing Team conducts research across the lifespan from conception, childhood, and youth to adulthood and the social determinants that impact and influence outcomes. The team’s focus is on the broader life course of individuals and communities within the family, school, and online environments, and includes economic evaluation of programs and outcomes.

73 School Bullying Research Topics & Essay Examples

📝 school bullying research papers examples, 🏆 best school bullying essay titles, ❓ school bullying research questions.

Bullying in School and How to Minimize It The paper studies the phenomena of bullying in the school, its types and gives recommendations on how to minimize bullying.
Physical Injury Bullying in High School The research study provides a framework for understanding the various aspects of bullying such as causes, effects, and how it can be prevented.
School Bullying and Its Causes Bullying in schools has become a worldwide problem, and in some cases, its effects may have lasting implications on the victims.
Students’ Willingness to Report Threats of Violence in Campus Communities The study was undertaken by Michael Sulkowski from the University of Florida with the objective of extending prior work conducted on college-age populations on the same issue.
Bullying in School: Understanding and Dealing With It The purpose of this article is to understand the problem of bullying in schools, as well as possible methods of dealing with it.
Impact of Rising Cyberbullying on High School Performance This literature review of five articles seeks to clarify how an increase in cyberbullying affects high school academic performance.
How Teachers Deal With Bullying in the Classes The problem is that the teachers may take a lot of time addressing these acts of violence at the expense of instructional time in the classes.
Journal Article Review: Correlates of Physical Violence at School: A Multilevel Analysis of Australian High School Students The school's student interaction policy plays an important role in determining whether students will be violent or not.
School Violence Measures in the United States School violence is an urgent problem for most educational facilities in the United States. This discussion post will consider measures that can make schools safer.
Preventing Violence in the Education System The issue of preventing situations of violence in the education system is very relevant nowadays. Violence in school is exposed to every tenth student in the world.
Decision-Making and Bullying Problems Inside Our Schools Bullying is a serious problem that many schools are trying to battle. It can affect victims emotionally, socially, and academically.
Bullying in the School Environment Bullying has a negative impact on the academic performance of the victims since it limits their participation in the school environment.
A Strategy to Prevent Bias and Discrimination in School Practice In his school practice, as a strategy to prevent bias and discrimination, the author prefers to resort to the theory of contact.
How to Combat Bullying: An Action Plan This plan includes two strategies – sensitization and fostering a safe environment for students with disabilities.
Discrimination Against Children in Schools Most of a person's psychological problems arise in childhood and adolescence when parents and school are the main spheres of influence on the child.
Bullying of Disabled Children in School The purpose of this study is to evaluate the level of bullying of students with disabilities and special education needs.
Educational Anti-Bullying Programs This anti-bullying work includes an overview of harassment, as well as suggestions for developing a healthy school atmosphere and robust anti initiatives.
Bullying and Its Effects on Adolescents Bullying has vast societal implications for a large adolescent population, resulting in more abuse and consequential mental illnesses.
Peer Relations, Violence, and School Attendance: Analyses of Bullying in Senior High Schools in Ghana
Bullying and Its Effects on Learning and Development in Australian Primary School
Bullying, Identity, and School Performance: Evidence From Chile
Anti Bullying Policy, the Matt Epling Safe School Law
Bullying and Its Effects on School Across the United States
School Bullying and Teacher Professional Development
The Residential School System State-Sponsored Bullying
Bullying and Columbine High School
Effects Concerning School-age Bullying: A Retrospective
School Violence: The Financial Costs of Bullying, Vandalism, and Violence
Cyberbullying: Abuse and Old-school Bullying
Bullying and Its Effect on School Communities
Children and Adolescents Are Victims of School Bullying
Bullying and Its Effects on School
Correlation Among Depression, Bullying, Experience of Victimization, and Suicide in High School Students
Bullying: America’s Worst School
Middle School Advisory Programs: An Effective Anti Bullying
Cyber Harassment and Bullying at Madera High School
Bullying and School Attendance: A Case Study of Senior High School
The Problem With Name-Calling and Bullying in School
Bullying and High School Dropout Rates
Bullying Children and School Personnel Challenges
School Uniforms Should Stop Bullying With Anti Bullying
Bullying Prevention and School Safety
School Bullying and the Need for Policy Change
Physical and Verbal Bullying at School
Preventing School Bullying Through a Supervisory System
School Students Bullying and Harassment
Bullying and Emotional Abuse Among School Children
School Bullying and Post-traumatic Stress Disorder Symptoms: The Role of Parental Bonding
Effects of Bullying and Victimization in Schools and the Victims
Dealing With a Bullying Target and How We Should Behave Around Them
Bullying and Problems of the Younger Generation
Bullying Is Not Just Anger and Meanness
Bullying and Lack of Contact With Peers
How Can Parents Prevent Bullying at School?
What Is the Nature and Consequences of School Bullying?
Does Bullying Affect High School-Aged Students?
What Is the School’s Involvement in Cyberbullying?
Are School-Based Anti Bullying Programs Decreasing the Rate of Victimization?
What Is the Relationship Between Bullying and Mass Shootings in Schools?
What Is the Relationship Between School Violence and Psychological Bullying?
How School Bullying Affects Bullies and Victims?
What Is the Connection Between the LGBT Community and School Bullying?
What Are the Causes and Effects of Bullying in School?
Can High School Dress Codes Stop Bullying?
How the Bystander Intervention and the Drowning Child Analogy Can Be Used in the School Bullying Cases?
Does Maternal Spanking Lead To Bullying Behavior at School?
Should There Be School Intervention Programs for Bullying Prevention?
What Is the Relationship Between School Bullying and Robbery and How It Affects People’s Lives?
What Are the Problems of Bullying and Victims in High School?
How Has Bullying Affected the Entire Student Population or the School Climate?
School Bullying: What Should Parents Do?
What Is Known About Bullying Between Schoolchildren?
What Is School Bullying From the Point of View of a Teacher?

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88 Bullying Research Topics & Essay Examples

📝 bullying research papers examples, 🏆 best bullying essay titles, 🎓 simple research topics about bullying, ❓ bullying research questions.

Family Violence: Adult-Child Sexual Abuse Psychology essay sample: This paper explores the risk and protection factors for child abuse in the light of Macro-system, microsystem, mesosystems; and programs that target the prevention of child abuse.
Bullying and Suicide Relationship: Data Analysis Psychology essay sample: Bullying is one of the main reasons why teenagers commit suicide. Parents should watch over their children in order to identify and help them fight the effects of bullying.
The Problem of Bullying in Colleges Psychology essay sample: This research study shows that college-going students are just as likely to be victims or perpetrators or even belong to the victim-perpetrator group of bullying.
Anti-bullying Program for the School Psychology essay sample: Bullying is a serious problem that must be dealt with immediately. Usually, children develop the idea that bullying is acceptable in pre-school.
Stuttering Among Schoolchildren: Teaching Interventions Psychology essay sample: Communication speech impairments affect children, adolescents. People with stuttering experience bullying and difficulties in forming relationships from a very young age.
Bullying Children: The Analysis of Various Examples Psychology essay sample: This discussion provides a detailed analysis of various examples of bullying and some of the evidence-based strategies to prevent the malpractice.
Bullying and Suicide: Outcomes and Implications Psychology essay sample: Bullying may occur in any society or time. Bulling is part of a wide-ranging pattern of antisocial behavior, with long-term consequences for society.
Bullying as a Group Process in Childhood Psychology essay sample: The primary purpose of the article is to explore bullying as a network relation founded on the exact nominations for bullying.
Middle Childhood Through the Prism of Psychological Disorders Psychology essay sample: The paper states that various disorders such as ADHD and ASD in middle childhood can affect an individual's ability to reach success and overcome obstacles.
Suicide is a Crucial Health Risk among Adolescents Psychology essay sample: Nowadays, suicide is the second most prevalent cause of death among adolescents in the US and worldwide, accounting for about 800,000 lives globally.
Deviant Behavior: Workplace Bullying Psychology essay sample: This paper aims to explore workplace bullying in terms of conflict and labeling theories to better understand its causes and nature.
Aggression in Psychology Psychology essay sample: This emotion is difficult to define, and psychologists, judges, and lawyers have been trying to determine what actions should and should not be considered aggressive for a long time.
Bullying in Adolescents and Social Work Interventions Psychology essay sample: Bullying provokes a number of negative emotions and situations when students need additional help and treatment.
Moral Development Theory and Bullying Issues Psychology essay sample: The impact of bullying is not easy to predict. Moral development is used to identify the principles and moral values according to which adolescents should treat each other.
Parenting Styles in Different Cultures Psychology essay sample: To understand the specificities of parents’ behavior that influence their children, it is vital to consider them in the context of selected countries and regions.
Depression Management in Adolescent Psychology essay sample: Adolescents are men and women in their transitional age from childhood to youth. Their age bracket is from ten to twenty-two.
Cell Phones and Mental Health Psychology essay sample: Limited use of smartphones, current human companions, makes life easier and enjoyable, while excessive screen time may bring severe mental health consequences.
Developmental Psychology and a Movie Character Psychology essay sample: This work aims to assess adolescents' psychology by applying relevant concepts and considering some issues with specific examples.
Bullying Behavior in Children Psychology essay sample: The paper states that contributing factors to bullying behavior are family violence and media content that encourages victimization.
Cyberbullying in Social Psychology Psychology essay sample: The study aims to determine the prevalence and effects of cyberbullying among teenagers and young adults, as well as explore the most suitable coping strategies.
Interpersonal Conflicts at Workplace: Types and Resolution Strategies Psychology essay sample: This paper aims to discuss the types of interpersonal conflicts and recommended strategies for effective conflict resolution.
Narrative Therapy: Patient Case Psychology essay sample: The narrative approach would be the most useful for the described case conceptualization, as it allows the person to separate the context and see these stories as situational.
Bullying: Collaborating with Parents to Increase Proactive Bystander Message Psychology essay sample: Bullying could potentially lead to anxiety, depression, and post-traumatic stress. These symptoms could be typical also to the bystanders.
Childhood Trauma: Causes, Effects, and Preventive Measures Psychology essay sample: It is salient to understand the causative factors and the effects of childhood trauma while also highlighting applicable preventive measures.
The Best Solution to Predict Depression Because of Bullying Psychology essay sample: This paper examines interventions to prove that the Olweus Bullying Prevention Program is the most effective solution for predicting depression provoked by bullying.
The Long-Term Effects of Bullying: Understanding the Impact on Mental Health
Bullying in the Digital Age: Problem Statement
Empowering Students to Speak Up: Strategies for Reporting Bullying Incidents
Bullying in the Workplace: Recognizing and Addressing Adult Bullying
The Role of Bystanders in Bullying Situations: How to Be an Active Ally
Bullying and Self-Esteem: Rebuilding Confidence After Being Bullied
Exploring the Link Between Bullying and Substance Abuse in Adolescents
Debunking Myths About Bullying: Separating Fact from Fiction
Nurse Bullying Study: Ethical Perspectives The research question is: how does the medical community address the psychological effects of nurse bullying in the workplace in the context of ethical obstacles?
Bullying Prevention Programs That Work: Case Studies and Success Stories
Understanding the Psychology of a Bully: What Drives the Behavior?
Bullying and Academic Performance: Impact
The Legal Ramifications of Bullying: Navigating Anti-Bullying Legislation
Parental Involvement in Bullying Prevention
Bullying in the LGBTQ+ Community: Addressing Unique Challenges and Solutions
Healing from Bullying Trauma: Coping Strategies and Resources for Recovery
Understanding the Impact of Workplace Bullying on Mental Health
From Victim to Victor: Inspirational Stories of Overcoming Bullying
Spotting the Signs of Workplace Bullying: What to Look Out For
Cyberbullying and LGBTQ+ Youth: Navigating the Unique Challenges and Solutions
Addressing Friend Bullying: Tips for Parents and Caregivers
How to Address Workplace Bullying: A Step-by-Step Guide for Employees
Exploring the Legal Aspects of Workplace Bullying: Know Your Rights
The Impact of Cyberbullying on Mental Health: Understanding the Long-Term Effects
The Role of HR in Preventing and Addressing Workplace Bullying
Empathy in the Digital Age: Fostering Compassion to Combat Cyberbullying
The Impact of Workplace Violence on Nurses: Nurse Bullying Statistics Wondering about the impact of workplace violence on nurses? Read this essay to learn about economic and psychological effects of workplace bullying.
Real Stories: Overcoming Workplace Bullying and Restoring Confidence
Understanding the Impact of Friend Bullying on Mental Health
The Long-Term Effects of Workplace Bullying on Employee Productivity
The Impact of Bullying on Mental Health: Understanding the Long-Term Effects
The Long-Term Effects of Friend Bullying on Self-Esteem
How to Combat Bullying: An Action Plan
Confronting the Bully: Tips for Standing Up to Workplace Aggression
Building a Culture of Respect: Preventing Workplace Bullying Through Leadership
Spotlight on Cyberbullying Laws: A State-by-State Comparison
Breaking the Silence: Encouraging Open Communication About Workplace Bullying
Healing from Workplace Bullying: Strategies for Moving Forward and Thriving in Your Career
Exploring the Role of Social Media in Friend Bullying
The Importance of Open Communication in Combating Friend Bullying
Understanding the Dynamics of Family Bullying: What It Looks Like and Why It Happens
The Long-Term Effects of Sibling Bullying on Mental Health
When Bullying Goes Unnoticed: Signs That a Child Is Being Bullied by a Family Member
How Social Media Exacerbates the Problem of Bullying?
How Bullying Affects Student Achievement?
How to Support Your Child if He Is Bullied?
What Drives Psychology of Cyberbullies?
How to Address and Prevent Cyberbullying in the Workplace?
How to Recognize and Address Parental Bullying Within the Family?
How to Protect Yourself from Bullying Within Your Own Family?
How Teaching Kids to Address Bullying Within the Family?
What The Impact of Social Bullying on Mental Health?
What Is Mean Debunking Myths About Social Bullying?
What The Legal Implications of Social Bullying?
What The Role of Educators in Combating Social Bullying?
How Social Bullying Differs from Other Forms of Harassment and Abuse?
How Understand Navigating the Complexities of Cyberbullying Laws?
Is It Possible to Avoid Bullying?
How to Recognize if Your Child is Being Bullied?
What Drives Perpetrators to Target Others on Online Bullying?
How Witnesses Can Help Combat Online Bullying?
How Verbal Abuse in Relationships Can Leave a Lasting Impact?
How Community Efforts to Combat Online Bullying?

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Bullying Research Paper

This sample bullying research paper features: 4600 words (approx. 15 pages), an outline, and a bibliography with 28 sources. Browse other research paper examples for more inspiration. If you need a thorough research paper written according to all the academic standards, you can always turn to our experienced writers for help. This is how your paper can get an A! Feel free to contact our writing service for professional assistance. We offer high-quality assignments for reasonable rates.

Introduction

Bullying defined.

National Variation
The Importance of Age

Stability of Bullying Roles

Gender Differences

The Bully-Victim

The peer group, parenting and home environment, sibling relationships, school factors, internalizing problems, academic performance, delinquency and criminality, impact beyond victims.

Interventions

Future Directions and Conclusion

Bibliography

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Bullying Prevention Research Paper
Bullying and Crime Research Paper
Bullying in School Research Paper

Bullying has received worldwide attention in the last 30 years as a form of aggressive behavior that can have a significant negative impact on the physical, emotional, and academic development of victims. The first major contribution to the academic study of bullying was made by Dan Olweus, who wrote the first scholarly book in English to deal with bullying. The book was written in response to the suicide of three bullied boys in Norway and reported a high prevalence of school bullying (20 % of Norwegian children reported having some involvement) as well as discussed the success of the world’s first bullying prevention program (Olweus 1993). Olweus’ work opened the way for an explosion of research on bullying, which expanded from an initial interest in schools to include broader contexts such as the workplace, prisons, and sibling relationships. While much of this work is of interest, showing that bullying has the potential to affect a significant proportion of the population, this review focuses on school bullying, as this is the area that has attracted the most research interest to date.

The international literature is repleted with definitions of school bullying, most of which seem to accept that bullying is any type of negative action intended to cause distress or harm that is repeated and targeted against individuals who cannot defend themselves. When research on bullying started in the 1980s, bullying was perceived to comprise only episodes of physical or verbal aggression where the victim was physically attacked or called names. In recent years, the definition of bullying has broadened to include other forms of aggression that are relational in nature and aim to damage the victim’s peer relationships and their social status such as spreading of malicious gossip and social exclusion. Fighting between people of approximately equal strength, a one-time attack, or a good-natured teasing and play fighting are not counted as bullying.

The advent and widespread use of electronic means of communication such as mobile phones and the Internet has made it easier to bully anonymously, through the use of pseudonyms and temporary accounts, at any time and in any place involving a wide audience. This development has meant that the definition of bullying has had to be expanded to account for what the literature refers to as “cyber-bullying” or “electronic bullying.” A nationally representative survey of 7,508 adolescents in the United States in 2005 found that 8.3 % had bullied others and 9.8 % had been bullied electronically at least once in the last 2 months (Wang et al. 2009). In the same year in England and Wales, a survey of pupils aged 11–16 found that 22 % had been cyber-bullied at least once or twice in the last couple months (Smith et al. 2008). The most common form of cyber-bullying internationally is sending threatening and/or nasty text messages.

Bullying Prevalence and Continuity

National variation in bullying.

There are large variations across countries in the prevalence of bullying perpetration and victimization. In an international survey of health-related symptoms among school-aged children, the percentage of students who reported being frequently bullied during the current term ranged from a low of 5 % to 10 % in some countries to a high of 40 % in others (Due et al. 2005). The prevalence of bullies in primary school ranges, in most countries, between 7 % and 12 % and remains at those levels in secondary school (around 10 %). It is unclear whether these differences in prevalence reflect genuinely different levels of engagement in bullying among countries or, at least partly, result from different meanings of the term “bullying” in different countries and differences in methodologies and samples used.

An example of why valid comparisons between countries are not possible is Portugal where the bullying rate is high compared to other countries. Berger (2007) in her analysis found that one detail of educational policy in Portugal may account, among other things, for this higher rate of bullying. In Portuguese schools, children are asked to repeat sixth grade unless they pass a rigorous test. This practice results in at least 10 % of all sixth graders (more often boys) to be held back 2 years or more, and these older, bigger children are almost twice as likely to bully compared to the class average. This suggests that the difference in prevalence rates between countries may be, at least partly, accounted for by external factors including national differences in school policies and environments but also differences in the methodologies used (self-reports vs. peer and/or teacher reports), students’ differing levels of cognitive ability, cultural differences in reporting, and different meanings of the term “bullying” in different countries.

The Importance of Age in Bullying

Despite variations in prevalence, it is a universal finding that bullying victimization is more frequent among younger children and steadily declines with age. A range of explanations have been put forward to explain these age differences (Smith et al. 1999a, b). Compared to older children, younger children are less likely to have developed the appropriate skills and coping strategies to deal effectively with bullies and avert further victimization. Younger children are also less likely to refrain from bullying others due to socialization pressure. Finally, there is evidence that younger students adopt a more inclusive definition of bullying when responding to prevalence surveys, and this may, at least partly, account for the higher reported frequency of bullying victimization in primary school. For example, younger pupils might find it more difficult to distinguish between bullying and fighting, broadening the use of the term bullying to include aggressive behaviors that involve no imbalance of power. Within the general trend of decreasing bullying victimization over time, researchers have observed an abrupt increase in bullying during the transition from primary to secondary school which may reflect some students’ attempts to establish dominance hierarchies in the new school environment. Relational forms of bullying take precedence over physical modes of attack as children grow older and their social skills improve.

There is some controversy in the literature as to the stability of bullying victimization in primary school. Some studies have reported that bullying victimization is relatively stable over a period of up to 4 years in primary school and often continues in secondary school. Other studies have found that only a relatively small proportion of children (around 4–5 %) are victimized repeatedly over time in primary school.

In secondary school, the stability of both bully and victim roles is considerably higher than in primary school according to teacher, peer, and self-reports. It is estimated that two out of three male bullies remain in their role over a 1-year period. Despite the moderate to high stability of the victim and bully roles in secondary school, prevalence rates are lower than in primary school. This suggests that a small number of victims are targeted consistently and systematically in secondary school.

Stability in bullying victimization has been explained in two ways. Firstly, it has been observed that victims select social environments that reinforce the risk of victimization, for example, they are more likely to have friends who are less accepted by the peer group and often victimized themselves. Secondly, victims often lack the social skills to break through in new environments, and this increases the risk that they are labeled as victims and locked in that role over a long period of time. It is important, therefore, to acknowledge that although for some children bullying victimization will be situational, for others it will develop into a trait.

Gender Differences in Bullying

The view that males are more likely to bully and be bullied than females has been dismissed in recent years following a better understanding about the different forms aggressive behavior such as bullying can take. Although males are more likely to engage in physical forms of bullying such as pushing and hitting, females are, according to some studies, more adept at employing relational forms of aggression (e.g., social exclusion, spreading of nasty rumors) against their victims especially during adolescence. No consistent gender differences have been identified in the use of verbal bullying (e.g., calling names, nasty teasing). This suggests that overall gender differences are not as pronounced as originally thought and that bullying is not a male problem.

Characteristics of Children and Adolescents Involved in Bullying

There is some controversy in the literature about the profile of bullies. Initially, studies described children who bullied others as insecure, anxious individuals who have low self-esteem, are unpopular among their classmates, and use aggressive strategies to resolve conflicts. This stereotype was later disputed by research that suggested bullies are socially competent and have superior theory of mind skills (i.e., awareness of others’ mental functions and states) and good levels of social intelligence, knowing how to attain goals without damaging their reputation. Linked to this, there is also debate concerning whether bullies lack empathic skills. Some research suggests that bullies understand the emotions of others but do not share them. The inconsistencies across studies may be, at least partly, due to different definitions of bully status and different methodologies employed. Studies which have distinguished between “pure” bullies and bully/victims have revealed that “pure” bullies have few conduct problems, perform well at school, are popular among their classmates, and do not suffer from physical and psychosomatic health problems.

There is more consensus on the profile of “pure” victims. Research has identified that “pure” victims exhibit elevated levels of depression and anxiety, low self-esteem, and poor social skills. Hawker and Boulton’s (2000) meta-analysis found that peer victimization is more strongly concurrently associated with depression than with anxiety, loneliness, or self-esteem. Another meta-analysis by Card (2003) found that the strongest correlates of the victimization experience are low self-concept, low physical strength, low school enjoyment, poor social skills, and high internalizing and externalizing problems. It was unclear from these reviews of cross-sectional studies, however, whether internalizing problems lead to victimization or vice versa.

The recent body of longitudinal research on bullying and peer victimization more widely suggests that the relationship between internalizing problems such as depression, anxiety and loneliness, and victimization is more likely to be reciprocal, that is, internalizing problems contribute to victimization and vice versa. A metaanalysis of 18 longitudinal studies examining associations between peer victimization and internalizing problems in children and adolescents concluded that internalizing problems both precede and follow peer victimization experiences (Reijntjes et al. 2011). It is worth noting, however, that the path from psychological maladjustment to victimization has not been replicated in all studies. For instance, Bond et al. (2001) found no support for the hypothesis that emotional maladjustment invites victimization.

Recent work suggests that bullying might arise out of early cognitive deficits, including language problems, imperfect causal understanding, and poor inhibitory control that lead to decreased competence with peers, which over time develops into bullying. Research does not support the assertion that physical appearance (e.g., wearing glasses) is a risk factor for being bullied at school. The only physical characteristic that has been associated with an increased risk of victimization is low physical size and strength. There is less evidence on how equality characteristics influence victimization. There is no consistently robust evidence to suggest that ethnic minority children are more at risk of being bullied at school. Sexual orientation has rarely been investigated in longitudinal studies as a possible risk factor of bullying victimization, but there is some, mainly qualitative, evidence of sexual minorities being targeted in secondary schools. There is stronger evidence that children with disabilities are particularly vulnerable to victimization in mainstream settings, although it might be other characteristics of disabled children that make them more vulnerable to victimization such as lack of friends rather than the disability per se.

Olweus (1993) was the first researcher to identify a small proportion of victims of bullying that he called “provocative victims” or “bully-victims,” who bully other children as well as being bullied by them. Research has identified that bully-victims are the most troubled group among children and adolescents involved in bullying incidents. This group displays the highest levels of internalizing problems, including depression, anxiety, low selfesteem, and loneliness. At the same time, they score high on externalizing problems such as aggression, impulsivity, hyperactivity, and conduct problems. Other research has shown that bully-victims display higher levels of neuroticism and psychoticism than either bullies or victims. Bully-victims use aggressive strategies to cope with stressors at school that increase the risk of further victimization and rejection from peers.

Besides the traditional roles of bully, victim, and bully-victim, research has identified that all students take on a role when bullying episodes emerge. Salmivalli et al. (1996) distinguished between six different roles children can take in bullying situations: the bully (leader), the reinforcer (encourages and provides audience), the assistant (follower/helper, e.g., holds the child down), the defender (helps the victim and/or tells bullies to stop), the outsider (stays away from bullying situations), and the victim. Subsequent research established that the three roles of bully, reinforcer, and assistant are closely correlated with each other and, therefore, cannot usefully discriminate between children. In kindergarten, the three most commonly held roles are those of the bully, the victim, and the defender. Fewer students are defenders by middle school, and the majority becomes witnesses or bystanders when bullying takes place. Such passive behavior, although not directly encouraging of bullying, provides a permissive context for bullies that allows them to continue harassing their victims.

Environmental Influences on Bullying

There is clear evidence that parenting styles are related to bullying behavior. Studies indicate that bullies are more likely to have parents who are authoritarian and punitive, disagree more often, and are less supportive. The parents of bullies are more likely to have been bullies themselves when they were young. Victims, on the other hand, are more likely to have been reared in an overprotective family environment. Bully-victims tend to come from family backgrounds that are exposed to abuse and violence and favor the use of harsh, punitive, and restrictive discipline practices. This group reports little positive warmth in their families and more difficulties in communicating with parents.

Family characteristics are related to bullying victimization in different ways for boys and girls. Boys are more prone to victimization when the father is highly critical or absent in his relationship with his son, thus failing to provide a satisfactory role model. Victimization in boys is also associated with maternal overprotectiveness which may hinder boys’ search for autonomy and independence, whereas victimization in girls is more strongly related to maternal hostility which may lead to anxiety and decreased sense of connectedness in relationships.

Very little research has examined longitudinal associations between early home environment and subsequent bullying behavior. The few studies that exist suggest a link between low emotional support and subsequent bullying behavior at school. Parents who are disagreeable, hostile, cold, or rejecting tend to have children who are at risk of becoming aggressive in the future. In a small longitudinal study, Schwartz et al. (1997) found that bully-victims at 10 years were significantly more likely than the other groups to have had experiences with harsh, disorganized, and potentially abusive home environments 5 years earlier. Mother-child interactions at 5 years were characterized by hostile, restrictive, or overly punitive parenting. They were significantly exposed to higher levels of marital conflicts and more likely to come from marginally lower socioeconomic backgrounds. Bullies were found to be exposed to adult aggression and conflicts, but not victimization by adults, and were from lower socioeconomic backgrounds. These findings need to be replicated in larger samples before any safe conclusions can be drawn.

More recently, there has been interest in how sibling relationships affect the development of bullying behavior. There is international evidence that children who are victimized at school are more likely, compared to other groups, to be victimized by their siblings at home. Wolke and Samara (2004) found that more than half of victims of bullying by siblings (50.7 %) were also involved in bullying behavior at school compared to only 12.4 % of those not victimized by siblings, indicating a strong link between intrafamilial and extrafamilial peer relationships. Those who were both victimized at home and at school had the highest behavior problems and were the least prosocial. Similar evidence exists in relation to bullying perpetration, suggesting that those who bully at school tend to exhibit similar behaviors towards their siblings at home.

A number of school factors have also been implicated as correlates of bullying behavior. One of the most consistent findings in the international literature is that the number and quality of friends at school is one of the strongest, if not the strongest, protective factor against bullying victimization. Having friends is not sufficient in itself to protect against victimization. For instance, when at-risk children have friends with internalizing problems, who are physically weak or who themselves are victimized, the relation of children’s behavioral risk to victimization is exacerbated.

More recent work on the role of class structure and climate on bullying has shown that variations in peer structure and dominance hierarchies influence the stability of bullying victimization. For example, victims in primary school classes with a more pronounced hierarchical structure are less likely to escape their victim role compared to those in classes with less clearly marked hierarchies (Sch€afer et al. 2005).

Consequences of Bullying

There has been a growing interest in recent years to investigate the long-term effects of bullying involvement on children’s and adolescents’ social, emotional, behavioral, and academic development using longitudinal samples. The results of these studies suggest that victims and bully-victims manifest more adjustment problems than bullies. Victims and, especially, bully-victims are more likely to show elevated levels of depression, anxiety, and loneliness; perform less well academically; and display conduct problems. The only negative long-term outcome that has consistently been reported in the literature for bullies is their involvement in later offending. There is also some initial evidence that bullying perpetration is a significant risk factor of poor academic performance.

Several cross-sectional studies have demonstrated negative associations between peer victimization and a range of internalizing problems, including loneliness and low self-esteem. A meta-analysis of 23 cross-sectional studies of the association between peer victimization and psychological maladjustment found that peer victimization was more strongly concurrently associated with depression than with anxiety, loneliness, or self-esteem (Hawker and Boulton 2000).

Over the last decade, research on bullying is increasingly reliant on longitudinal methodologies to disentangle whether victimization contributes to internalizing problems or vice versa. It has been argued, for example, that children who display internalizing behaviors (e.g., anxiety or shyness) are more at risk of being targeted by peers due to their inability to cope effectively with provocation. The majority of longitudinal studies investigating associations between peer victimization and psychological maladjustment have found evidence for both directions.

There is some longitudinal evidence that bullying involvement has a negative impact on academic performance, although more studies are needed to reach a definitive conclusion. A US longitudinal study that began in 2002 with a sample of about 1,700 adolescents found that being a bully had a stronger negative effect on self-perceived academic competence over time than being a victim after controlling for demographic background variables and baseline academic competence (Ma et al. 2009). Furthermore, only bully status predicted lower self-reported grades.

Despite showing fewer adjustment problems than victims and bully-victims, bullies are at an increased risk of later delinquency and criminal offending. A recent meta-analysis of studies measuring school bullying and later offending found that school bullies were 2.5 times more likely than noninvolved students to engage in offending over an 11-year follow-up period (Ttofi et al. 2011). The risk was lower when major childhood risk factors were controlled for, but remained statistically significant. The effect of bullying on later offending was especially pronounced when bullying was assessed in older children. The longitudinal association between bullying perpetration and later offending has been replicated in many countries, including Australia, Canada, and Europe.

Finally, there is evidence that bullying and victimization have a negative impact not only on the individual children involved but also on bystanders. Children who witness bullying incidents report increased anxiety, less satisfaction with school, and lower academic achievement. There is also evidence that in school classes where a lot of victimization is taking place, school satisfaction among students is low.

Bullying Interventions

Following the development of the first anti-bullying program by Dan Olweus in Norway in the 1980s, a considerable number of anti-bullying interventions have flourished around the world to reduce bullying behaviors and protect victims. These fall under four broad categories: curriculum interventions generally designed to promote an anti-bullying attitude within the classroom; whole-school programs that intervene on the school, class, and individual level and address bullying as a systemic problem; social and behavioral skills training; and peer support programs including befriending and peer mediation. A systematic review conducted in 2004 evaluated the strength of scientific evidence in support of anti-bullying programs (Vreeman and Carroll 2007). The review concluded that only a small number of anti-bullying programs have been evaluated rigorously enough to permit strong conclusions about their effectiveness.

Whole-school interventions were found to be more effective in reducing victimization and bullying than interventions that focused only on curriculum changes or social and behavioral skills training. Targeting the whole school involves actions to improve the supervision of the playground, having regular meetings between parents and teachers, setting clear guidelines for dealing with bullying, and using role-playing and other techniques to teach students about bullying. The success of whole-school interventions, relative to other stand-alone approaches, supports the view that bullying is a systemic, sociocultural phenomenon derived from factors operating at the individual, class, school, family, and community level. Hence, interventions that target only one level are unlikely to have a significant impact.

A more recent systematic review of school-based anti-bullying programs found that, overall, these programs are effective in reducing bullying perpetration and victimization by an average of 20–23 % and 17–20 %, respectively (Farrington and Ttofi 2009). The interventions that were found to be most effective were those that incorporated parent training/meetings, disciplinary methods, and videos; targeted older children; and were delivered intensively and for longer. There is less robust evidence on the effectiveness of peer support programs that include activities such as befriending, peer counseling, conflict resolution, or mediation, and a systematic review suggested their use may lead to increases in bullying victimization.

More recently, there has been a growing interest in the use of virtual learning environments to reduce bullying at schools. The basic feature of these programs is a computer-based environment that creates a highly believable learning experience for children who find themselves “present” in the situation that causes emotional distress and, as a result, learn experientially how to deal with school problems. An example of such a program is “FearNot,” an intervention that was developed to help victims of bullying explore the success or otherwise of different coping strategies to dealing with bullying victimization through interactions with “virtual” victims of school bullying. The evaluation of this intervention found that the victims that received the intervention were more likely to escape victimization in the short term than victims in control schools who did not interact with the software (Sapouna et al. 2010). These results suggest that the use of virtual environments might be an engaging and useful component of whole-school anti-bullying policies that merits further testing. A key finding that emerged from this research is that interventions are more likely to be successful if they have the support of teachers and other school personnel and there is a strong commitment to reduce bullying in the school community. This is considered to be one of the reasons behind the huge success of the Olweus’ prevention program that has not been replicated to date.

Although an abundance of knowledge has emerged in recent years regarding the correlates of bullying behavior, there is still relatively little known about the causal processes and mechanisms associated with the bully and victim status. Longitudinal studies, which track bullies and victims over time, offer one of the best chances of disentangling the antecedents of bullying perpetration and victimization from its consequences, and these should form a key part of future research in this field. Another approach which shows much promise is the cutting-edge attempt to unravel the causes of bullying behavior made by researchers investigating biological and environmental influences and the way these influences interact.

One of these studies, involving 1,116 families with 10-year-old twins, found that the tendency for children to be bullied was largely explained by genetics (73 % of variance) and less so by environmental factors that were unique to each child (Ball et al. 2008). Another study of 506 six-year-old twins found that variance in victimization was accounted for only by shared and non-shared environmental influences (29 % and 71 %, respectively) and was not related to the child’s genetic predisposition (Brendgen et al. 2008). These discrepancies might be explained by differences in methodologies used, as studies drew on different informants to assess bullying victimization (mothers and peers, respectively). Although results to date have been contradictory, future breakthroughs in this area have the potential to transform radically the study of bullying.

To understand more fully how bullying behaviors develop, future research will also need to investigate in more depth how individual and classroom level factors interact to cause involvement in bullying. It is not currently understood whether the relationship between risk factors and bullying is the same across different school and class environments or the extent to which consequences of bullying and victimization are dependent on class-and school-level factors.

Finally, another area that would benefit from more attention is the investigation of resilience to bullying. Some initial evidence suggests that maternal warmth has an environmental effect in protecting children from negative outcomes associated with victimization (Bowes et al. 2010). However, we still know relatively little about the factors that promote resilience to bullying and victimization among at-risk children, and also what role bullying has to play in increasing resilience. We also know little about the factors that help victims cope better with the effects of victimization.

To conclude, what the recent flurry of research activity has highlighted is how complex the bullying phenomenon is and that, although much has been learned to date, there is clearly a great need to understand how variables describing the family, school, class, and community environment interact with individual characteristics to determine who gets bullied and who bullies others. Research should neither be blind to nor discouraged by these complexities.

Bibliography:

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Bowes L, Maughan B, Caspi A, Moffitt TE, Arseneault L (2010) Families promote emotional and behavioral resilience to bullying: evidence of an environmental effect. J Child Psychol Psychiatry 51(7):809–817
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154 Bullying Topics & Bullying Essay Examples
154 Bullying Topics & Bullying Essay Examples
Bullying at school and mental health problems among adolescents: a
Bullying involves repeated hurtful actions between peers where an imbalance of power exists [].Arseneault et al. [] conducted a review of the mental health consequences of bullying for children and adolescents and found that bullying is associated with severe symptoms of mental health problems, including self-harm and suicidality.Bullying was shown to have detrimental effects that persist into ...
165 Bullying Research Topics & Cyberbullying Topics for Research Papers
This type typically involves name-calling, insulting, teasing, or derogatory comments. 💢 Physical Bullying. This can include hitting, pushing, or other physical aggression. 💥 Social Bullying. This type of bullying focuses on exclusion, spreading rumors, and using other ways to isolate the victim. ⚡ Cyberbullying.
Full article: Understanding bullying from young people's perspectives
Introduction. With its negative consequences for wellbeing, bullying is a major public health concern affecting the lives of many children and adolescents (Holt et al. 2014; Liu et al. 2014). Bullying can take many different forms and include aggressive behaviours that are physical, verbal or psychological in nature (Wang, Iannotti, and Nansel ...
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Rather than systematically reviewing research from the past decade and ending with implications for interventions, we start the current paper with a summary of the effectiveness of the solutions that were offered a decade ago (i.e., implementing school‐based anti‐bullying programs) and then selectively focus on a few timely topics that ...
Bullying in children: impact on child health
Bullying in children: impact on child health - PMC
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Abstract. During the school years, bullying is one of the most common expressions of violence in the peer context. Research on bullying started more than forty years ago, when the phenomenon was defined as 'aggressive, intentional acts carried out by a group or an individual repeatedly and over time against a victim who cannot easily defend him- or herself'.
Bullying: What We Know Based On 40 Years of Research
WASHINGTON — A special issue of American Psychologist ® provides a comprehensive review of over 40 years of research on bullying among school age youth, documenting the current understanding of the complexity of the issue and suggesting directions for future research. "The lore of bullies has long permeated literature and popular culture. Yet bullying as a distinct form of interpersonal ...
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Research by UNESCO shows that one-third of children globally experience bullying in schools (UNESCO 2019), so one of the reasons the Chair was established was to ensure that all of the important work being done around the globe to tackle bullying and cyberbullying is amalgamated in one place to create a critical mass of researchers so that we ...
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Led by the U.S. Department of Education, the FPBP works to coordinate policy, research, and communications on bullying topics. The FPBP Website provides extensive resources on bullying behavior, including information on what bullying is, its risk factors, its warning signs, and its effects. 3 The FPBP Steering Committee also plans to provide ...
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Introduction. Bullying has been considered "one of the most outstanding topics in educational research" (Espinosa, Citation 2018), a public health problem among children and adolescents (Chester et al., Citation 2015), and also a reason for concern in schools and communities (Bradshaw, Citation 2015).According to the PISA 2018 report, on average, 23% of students reported being bullied at ...
129 Bullying Essay Topics & Research Titles at StudyCorgi
👍 Good Bullying Research Topics & Essay Examples. On-time delivery! Get your 100% customized paper done in as little as 1 hour. Let's start. The Consequences of High School Bullying. This annotated bibliography includes summaries of four academic studies that explore the effects of bullying on high school students.
PDF The Impact of School Bullying On Students' Academic Achievement from
The research importance stems from the importance of the topic it deals with, which is considered very important for many parties. Moreover it will enable those concerned know how to deal with the problem of bullying and its obvious consequences on school students achievement. It also enables the victims to know how to avoid being bullied.
Understanding Alternative Bullying Perspectives Through Research
Patton et al. (2017) in their systematic review of qualitative methods used in bullying research, found that the use of such methods can enhance academic and practitioner understanding of bullying. In this paper, I draw on four bullying studies; one systematic review of both quantitative and qualitative research (O'Brien, 2009) and three ...
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To assist you in your essay writing process, here are 116 bullying essay topic ideas and examples: The impact of bullying on mental health. Different types of bullying: physical, verbal, and cyberbullying. The role of schools in preventing and addressing bullying. How bullying affects academic performance. The consequences of ignoring bullying.
Bullying
Bullying. Bullying is a form of aggressive behavior in which someone intentionally and repeatedly causes another person injury or discomfort. Bullying can take the form of physical contact, words, or more subtle actions. The bullied individual typically has trouble defending him or herself and does nothing to "cause" the bullying.
78 Cyber Bullying Essay Topic Ideas & Examples
Cyber Bullying and Its Forms. The difference between the conventional way of bullying and cyber bullying is that in conventional bullying, there is contact between the bully and the victim. Ethics in Technology: Cyber Crimes. Furthermore, the defendant altered the data, which compromised the integrity of the information to the detriment of the ...
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Given the prevalence of bullying, many can relate, including perhaps your teachers. 2. Brainstorm and Collaborate: Discuss potential topics with peers to gauge their depth and relevance. 3. Hook Your Readers: Start with an engaging title and opening line to captivate your audience immediately. 4.
Research Topic: Bullying
Bullying involvement is associated with feelings of being unsafe, poor relationships and social support, poor academic outcomes, and an increased risk of depression and other mental health issues. Friends (64%) followed by parents or guardians (57%) and then teachers and other staff members (46%) are the people students most commonly turn to ...
73 School Bullying Research Topics & Essay Examples
The paper studies the phenomena of bullying in the school, its types and gives recommendations on how to minimize bullying. Physical Injury Bullying in High School. The research study provides a framework for understanding the various aspects of bullying such as causes, effects, and how it can be prevented. School Bullying and Its Causes.
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In the United States, the definition of bullying has expanded beyond traditional notions of a bigger, stronger child picking on a smaller, weaker victim and typically includes four key elements. The first part of the definition now includes significant physical, emotional, or psychological harm to the victim. The second is the inability of the ...
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Psychology essay sample: This discussion provides a detailed analysis of various examples of bullying and some of the evidence-based strategies to prevent the malpractice. Bullying and Suicide: Outcomes and Implications. Psychology essay sample: Bullying may occur in any society or time. Bulling is part of a wide-ranging pattern of antisocial ...
Bullying Research Paper
Bullying Research Paper. Bullying Research Paper. This sample bullying research paper features: 4600 words (approx. 15 pages), an outline, and a bibliography with 28 sources. Browse other research paper examples for more inspiration. If you need a thorough research paper written according to all the academic standards, you can always turn to ...