Bullying Victimization And Its Effects

Have you ever been a target of an individual’s cruelty and hatred? It does not necessarily have to be physical, but more like being verbally degraded or publicly humiliated. The effects bullying can have on its victims is something that may last throughout their lives, or something that may end their life(Braithwaite, Hyde, Pope, 2010).We all are well aware of childhood bullying but as evidence shows bullying does not stop on the

Bullying is defined as the prolonged malicious act of harming peers by abusing their own--or an existing imbalance of--power, and has become one of the most common sources of trauma among adolescents. One report shows that one of three children were victims of bullying during some point in their life, and that 10-14% of all adolescents were victims of chronic bullying for at least six months prior to participating in the survey. Children who were victims of bullying are also found to be at a higher risk of diagnoses for anxiety disorders and depression during young and middle adulthood. These victims are reported to be more likely to have lower levels of general/physical health, and lower educational acquirements than young and middle-aged adults who were not bullied (Wolke & Lereya, 2015). Because bullying is such a prominent problem, citizens, policymakers, and social scientists alike, should feel or have some social and moral obligation to address, and hopefully avert bullying. The state of bullying, and how it is enacted, is constantly changing and adapting to social frameworks. Because bullies can adapt to social changes and regulations, we, as a society, should be equally adaptive in how we perceive, address, prevent, and punish bullying.

According to an article about bullying and victimization, it was noted that male victimization rates for bullies was among the highest and because bullying became more detrimental in the later stages of middle to late adolescents, due to self-blame, loneliness, anxiety and low self-esteem (Graham and Juvonen 1998). Also, peer victimization may lead to depression, low self-evaluation, anxiety and other different mental health problems (Crick &

At some point in our lives we have either bullied, been a victim of a bully, or known someone that’s been bullied. It affects how we encounter the next person, and how we approach our future. I was very touched by this story and it crushed my heart. The child wanted to fit in so bad, and accepted ridicule just to have friends. How can the kids look in another child’s eyes and not see their hurt? Andy had a hard, rough life and I’m sure when he went to school he forgot about the problems he had to face alone. The “popular” boys found amusement in picking and making a mockery of Andy. Who really is the coward? In my personal opinion the coward are the boys who wronged Andy and the leader of the boys who knew it was wrong from the start.

“Bullying” has three key features (Olweus, 1978): aggressiveness, repetitiveness, and power imbalance. First, bullying involves aggressiveness intentionally enacted by a group or individual. Next, bullying is repeated over time upon the same victim. Finally, the bully–victim relationship is asymmetrical in power, such that victims are unable to defend themselves by their own efforts. Bullying does not specify the age or life stage of involved parties, although bullying in school is the most talked about. Bullying remains a serious social problem from childhood through early adolescence and adulthood, as college and the workplace provide frequent sites of bullying. In college, 40–45% of students experienced some form of bullying on campus (Lento,

Face to face bullying and more recently cyberbullying victimization in the youth has been associated with multiple negative psychological aspects including, but not limited to, an increase in different internalizing difficulties and lower subjective well being. Even though both those aspects has been independently associated to victimization, little is known about the mediating effect of the perceived well being in relation with internalizing difficulties and both type of

This article explores the prevalence rates of bullying victimization among special needs students in the United States. Investigators of this study report an advanced rate of bullying and victimization among students with disabilities when compared with mainstream peers. However, special needs students are prey for bullies because of characteristics related to their disabilities. Typically, many special needs students may be unaware of bullying victimization because of poor social and communication skills that comprise of misread facial expressions, body language, and tone. Furthermore, disabilities

Peer victimization referred as bullying is known to be an increasing issue for students of all ages in school settings. As noted by Perry, Kusel, & Perry (1988) article studies approximately found that about 10% of children in the United States have experienced extreme victimization by bullying. Most likely, bullying can also impact children throughout their school years all the way through their college years. A study which investigated the continuity of being a bully, victim or bully victim from elementary school throughout college in 119 undergraduates found that out of the 25 students that was bullied in college, 18 students which is about 72% of them had been bullies in high school and elementary school (Chappell et

The Publication “Understanding Bullying and Victimization During Childhood and Adolescence: A Mixed Methods Study” was originally published in a journal called Child Development. The study’s place of publication was at The University of California at Riverside. The original date of publication for this study was in the January/February 2011 issue. The study was first published in print, but was made available on the web on February 3rd, 2011 (Guerra, Williams, Sadek, 2011)

A research shown that bullying not only affects the victim but also the bully themselves. It often resulted in individuals growing up to be more aggressive and reclusive to others. Bullies are not born the way they are, according to researchers. These individuals should also be guided immediately in order to avoid that kind of behavior to be integrated into their character and conduct forever. Based on a survey, bullies and their victims are more likely to engage in disruptive acts compared to those not involved in bullying in any way. Bullying can be encountered in all ages as young as preschoolers on a playground. Individuals who have been bullied were observed to develop depressive actions as they grew older. Parents

In all cases which I have witnessed, one who bullies others has typically been bullied or continues to be bullied by someone (or something) in control of them. Whether it be another student, a family member, or fate, traumatic events in the life of a young person can spawn the thoughts and actions of bullying in their minds without intending to cause anyone else harm. In Confronting School Bullying: Kids, Culture, and the Making of a Social Problem, Cohen and Brooks (2014) describe the different types of bullies as “Elites… Predators… The Wounded… [and] Bully-Victim[s]” (p. 41-43). The “Elites” were described as “highly popular students” who “generally perceive themselves to be powerful” such as jocks or popular students (Cohen & Brooks, 2014, p. 41). Cohen and Brooks (2014) describe the “Predators” as “Bullies… whose only motivation seemed to be to hurt others” (p. 41). Both Elites and Predators, however, seem to only bully others for the fun of it without any motivation. Along with “The Wounded,” described by Cohen and Brooks (2014) as “bullies at school [who] are often victims at home” (p. 42), Elites and Predators can also fall into the category of bully-victims. Bully-victims are people who fall into both categories of being a bully and a victim, sometimes without realizing it (Cohen & Brooks, 2014, p. 43). Bully-victims have reported being bullied,

Recognizing the complex variables, researchers have modified existing psychological inventory tools such as the Rutter scales and the Child Depression Inventory, to better measure and assess the long-term victim outcomes (Vaillancourt, Hymel, & McDougall, 2003). One area of increasing concern among researchers is the inadequacy of the survey tools that may be impeding our understanding of the scope of the victimization, most prior research efforts have relied on survey based models that were either self-reported or provided by educators or parents, this may have diminished the sample quality and reduced the validity of the measurements (Hawker & Boulton, 2000). Acknowledging that bullying victimizations extend across a wide spectrum of the population and is not merely limited to adolescent experiences; researchers are striving to explore a number of overlapping social environments, including the workplace and social media where these types of victimizations also occur. Bullying victimizations represent a large class of victims that deserve the attention and efforts of researchers to minimize the effects of past abuse and help prevent future or continual abuse. The next paragraph introduces three specific theories of victimology as they are applied to bullying victimizations.

Bullying is defined as unwanted aggressive behaviors by another youth or group of youth, who are not sibling or current dating partners, involving an observed or perceived power in balance and is repeated multiple times or highly likely to be repeated (CDC 2016). Bullying can result in physical injuries, social and emotional difficulties and academic problems. An estimate of 2.7 million youth are victims to bullying and estimated 160,000 children miss school every due to fear of attack or intimidation by other students (National school safety center, national educational association). Victims of bullying are more likely than who are not bullied to report feeling of low self- esteem and isolation, to form

There are major inconsistencies in research, as identified in an article by Solberg, Olweus and Endresen (2007) asking the question if bullies and victims at school are the same pupils. When estimating the prevalence of bully-victims in 10 studies using bully-victim as a basis of classification with similar populations, the percentages varied between 0.4 and 29% (Solberg et al., 2007). This has been a particularly confusing part of this present research project, in that classification criteria, definitions and other measurements may be used differently in studies on the topic. If there are inconsistencies with determining who and what the bully-victim is, surely there are major gaps in understanding the possible cyclical nature of bully-victims.

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