Act Raising Safe Kids (RSK) Study

Bullying has been recognized as a risk factor in improvement and personal growth of children and adulthood. It is a form of hostile conduct in which an individual engages to cause another individual harm or distress (Kirves, & Sajaniemi, 2012).. Therefore, it is vital to be able to detect signs of bullying in order to stop further consequences, such as self-harm, and suicide. Children who have experienced bullying become hopeless, anxious, have low self-efficacy, and have recurrent negative thoughts (Kirves, & Sajaniemi, 2012). Research in bullying has also concluded that children who bully other children are more prone to become anti-social and engage in criminal activity (Kirves, & Sajaniemi, 2012).

It is common for parents and their children to have disagreements and to have arguments but sometimes these disagreements can turn into abuse. Children usually use violence to try to “control or bully them” (Parenting and Child Health, n.d.) This violence usually occurs when the child “frightens, threatens or physically hurts them. It can involve using abusive language, pushing, shoving, kicking, throwing things, or threatening with knives or other weapons” ((Parenting and Child Heathen’s.) Children may abuse their parents due to the normalization of that parent getting abused by the other parent within their household. The child may use the parent that abusing the other parent as a model for the way they should act towards their parent as well and justify their actions simply as something that they observed in their household. The violence that children commit against their parents affects that subsystem because it leaves it broken. There is a strain within the parent and child relationship that forms a direct result of constant conflict and abuse between the child and parent. Sometimes, in child-child relationships, an older sibling may become “more aggressive” with their younger sibling because of the abuse that they have witnessed and been exposed to. (Fantuzzo, Mohr, 1999) The children can become socialized by the parents to believe that

Children with authoritative parents were more likely to become bullies (Lereya, Samara & Wolke, 2013). Good parent-child communication were less likely to become bullies but had higher chances to be the victims (Lereya, Samara & Wolke, 2013). Negative parenting behaviors were significantly more likely to have been neglected or abused (Lereya, Samara & Wolke, 2013). In this case the children were more likely to become bullies but not the victims (Lereya, Samara & Wolke, 2013). With victims the test showed a lack of communications between parents and child (Lereya, Samara & Wolke,

Younger children do not have the ability to express or show their emotions which can cause behavioral problems. Even a child who witness domestic violence between their caregivers is more likely to suffer from emotional consequences from seeing violence. The long-term effects of exposure in young children can have negative effects in their later years. These outcomes have been documented as leasing to behavioral problems that include school dropout, violence, teen pregnancy, substance abuse, eating disorders, and even suicide attempts. In conclusion, when parents engage in any type of dynamic of domestic violence or aggression, their children, can be at an extreme disadvantage when it comes to emotional development. There are a variety of risk factors that can affect a child

Bradshaw, C.P., Sawyer, A.L., & O’Brennan, L.M. “Bullying and peer victimization at school: Perceptual differences between students and school staff.” School Psychology Review, 36(3), 361-382. www.stopbullying.gov/media/facts/index.html. Accessed 2 March 2017.

Seals and Young (2003) studied the prevalence of bullying and its relationship to grade-level, gender, ethnicity, self-esteem, and depression. Participants in their study consisted of 454 seventh- and eighth-graders in five school districts in the Northern Delta area. These students were primarily African American (79%) and Caucasian (18%). Researchers gave these students three questionnaires to assess exposure to and effects of bullying/victimization: the Peer Relations Questionnaire, which assessed bully, victim, and prosocial behaviors; the Rosenberg Self-Esteem Scale; and the Children’s Depression Inventory. This study found that 24% of respondents reported being directly involved in bullying activities, of which 10% reported doing the bullying, and 13% reported being victims of bullying. The results also suggested that males were significantly more involved in bullying than females, and were twice as likely to be identified as a bully. Both genders, however,

47) Children experiencing and being witness of all the violence can become traumatic not only during their childhood but also can during their adulthood. Children living and watching their parents having domestic violence and living violence daily will behave the same way when they finally become adolescence. In another study, researchers have explained that the consequence of parents having domestic violence is on their children. Youth facing domestic violence is in a high risk and expose to numerous outcomes to become violent (Gardner, Browning, & Brooks-Gunn, 2012, pg.662). Another problem that children are in a big chance of developing is bullying. Problems between families can make children feel depressed and feel less than every friend around. On this study, researchers have found that children are the victims of bullying are suffering from depression, anxiety and doing poorly academically. Which all, if these problems come from children being abused and facing domestic violence (Shetgiri, Lin, & Flores, 2015,

Although schools, agencies and pediatricians can do much at the community level to mitigate bullying and its effects, the problem is clearly societal in scope. Bullying cannot be stopped with a single intervention or by a single social agency. The use of violence to solve problems is repeatedly illustrated through television and other visual media. Many parents of bullies believe that it is appropriate for their children to learn how to compete in the schoolyard and do not see bullying as an issue (Feldman Hertz, Donato, & Wright, 2013). Too many children in our society are exposed to domestic violence directed towards parents and themselves. Too many children are born into adverse family situations, including low maternal age at the birth

during their development from their childhood to their early adulthood. Sourander et al. (2007) studied the association between bullying and being a victim of bullying at an early childhood age of 8 and the mental disorder impact it has later in early adulthood. Some 2,540 boys born in 1981 were selected for the study. Information regarding bullying and being victims of bullying were captured from their parents, teachers and other children at the age of 8 or in 1989. Than further information was gathered on the subject during their life at the ages of 18 and 23 thru military registry information. Based on univariate logistic regression, children that only bullied frequently showed antisocial personality, issues with substance abuse, and mental

Children learn by observing those around them, and if they are surrounded by aggression and violence then they are going to attempt to mimic those behaviors. In addition, a family environment filled with, “... coercive interactions between parents and their children and children themselves affect the behavior of all parties and contribute to the development of a hostile family environment - a true breeding ground for aggression” (Shaffer & Kipp, 2014). This clearly demonstrates the impact that an aggressive environment can have on a child’s

Bullying can be hard to define, because research has shown that it comes in many forms which makes it difficult to find one set of characteristics that will describe a bully. Conclusively, studies have defined bullying as a set of repeated aggressive behavior that is intended to harm someone, which usually involves an imbalance of power between the victim and the perpetrator (Morgan, 2012, p. 174). Studies have shown that there are two distinct types of bullying, which is a direct form of verbal and physical aggression, and indirect, which often results in name calling, rumors and exclusion (Aluedse, 2006, p. 38). This form of peer victimization can have devastating effects on a child 's academic work and their physical and psychological well being (Limber, 2003, p. 23). In terms of gender, boys are more likely to be involved in physical bullying (direct) as for girls are more likely to be involved in indirect bullying (Wang et al, 2009, p. 371). Previous research indicates, that parents and friends are two important factors of social interaction associated with bullying and victimization among adolescences. Bullying is quite common among middle school children, because it is during this time that children go through puberty and hormonal changes. During this time students are looking to be accepted and fit into a specific group; however, when there is a lack of acceptance and esteem due to victimization, this can cause children to isolate themselves from those around them

“Parent-Child Relationships, Parental Psychological Control, and Aggression: Maternal and Paternal Relationships” written by Murray, Dwyer, Rubin, Knighton-Wisor and Booth-LaForce (2013) sought to understand the role of paternal and maternal parenting in predicting child developmental outcomes. Specifically, the study focused on the examination of the extent to which quality father-to-child and mother-to-child relationships moderate or lessen the impact of adversities arising from ineffective parenting practices on adolescent aggression that may follow.

S. Lee, J. Manganello, J. Rice, C. Taylor (2010) preformed a study to understand childhood aggression. The journal article of Mothers’ Spanking of 3-Year-Old Children and Subsequent Risk of Children’s Aggressive Behavior starts by saying that they are not the first to perform this research and many of studies have displayed connection between corporal punishment with children and child aggression. They are testing their research with new controlling factors, which have not been controlled together before. (Lee et al., 2010) The main goal of the article is to determine the association between the use of corporal punishment against 3-year-old children and recognize later aggressive behavior among those children.

adults, later on. A general assumption, according to Delson, et al., 2004 is that factors as the

California Bully-Victimization Scale. Previous childhood bullying victimization was assessed with the California Bully-Victimization Scale (CBVS; Felix et al., 2011). The CBVS asks about the three core definitional components of bullying: peer victimization that is (a) intentional, (b) repeated, and (c) involves an imbalance of power between the target and the aggressor. The presence of eight forms of victimization prior to college were assessed: teasing, rumor spreading, social exclusion, hitting, threatening, sexual jokes/gestures, stealing, and aggression via