• Research article
  • Open access
  • 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

78k Accesses

12 Citations

30 Altmetric

Metrics details

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.

Code availability

Not applicable.

Olweus D. School bullying: development and some important challenges. Ann Rev Clin Psychol. 2013;9(9):751–80. https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev-clinpsy-050212-185516 .

Article   Google Scholar  

Arseneault L, Bowes L, Shakoor S. Bullying victimization in youths and mental health problems: “Much ado about nothing”? Psychol Med. 2010;40(5):717–29. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0033291709991383 .

Article   CAS   PubMed   Google Scholar  

Arseneault L. The long-term impact of bullying victimization on mental health. World Psychiatry. 2017;16(1):27–8. https://doi.org/10.1002/wps.20399 .

Article   PubMed   PubMed Central   Google Scholar  

Moore SE, Norman RE, Suetani S, Thomas HJ, Sly PD, Scott JG. Consequences of bullying victimization in childhood and adolescence: a systematic review and meta-analysis. World J Psychiatry. 2017;7(1):60–76. https://doi.org/10.5498/wjp.v7.i1.60 .

Hagquist C, Due P, Torsheim T, Valimaa R. Cross-country comparisons of trends in adolescent psychosomatic symptoms—a Rasch analysis of HBSC data from four Nordic countries. Health Qual Life Outcomes. 2019;17(1):27. https://doi.org/10.1186/s12955-019-1097-x .

Deighton J, Lereya ST, Casey P, Patalay P, Humphrey N, Wolpert M. Prevalence of mental health problems in schools: poverty and other risk factors among 28 000 adolescents in England. Br J Psychiatry. 2019;215(3):565–7. https://doi.org/10.1192/bjp.2019.19 .

Article   PubMed Central   Google Scholar  

Le HTH, Tran N, Campbell MA, Gatton ML, Nguyen HT, Dunne MP. Mental health problems both precede and follow bullying among adolescents and the effects differ by gender: a cross-lagged panel analysis of school-based longitudinal data in Vietnam. Int J Ment Health Syst. 2019. https://doi.org/10.1186/s13033-019-0291-x .

Bayer JK, Mundy L, Stokes I, Hearps S, Allen N, Patton G. Bullying, mental health and friendship in Australian primary school children. Child Adolesc Ment Health. 2018;23(4):334–40. https://doi.org/10.1111/camh.12261 .

Article   PubMed   Google Scholar  

Hysing M, Askeland KG, La Greca AM, Solberg ME, Breivik K, Sivertsen B. Bullying involvement in adolescence: implications for sleep, mental health, and academic outcomes. J Interpers Violence. 2019. https://doi.org/10.1177/0886260519853409 .

Hogberg B, Strandh M, Hagquist C. Gender and secular trends in adolescent mental health over 24 years—the role of school-related stress. Soc Sci Med. 2020. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.socscimed.2020.112890 .

Kidger J, Araya R, Donovan J, Gunnell D. The effect of the school environment on the emotional health of adolescents: a systematic review. Pediatrics. 2012;129(5):925–49. https://doi.org/10.1542/peds.2011-2248 .

Saminathen MG, Låftman SB, Modin B. En fungerande skola för alla: skolmiljön som skyddsfaktor för ungas psykiska välbefinnande. [A functioning school for all: the school environment as a protective factor for young people’s mental well-being]. Socialmedicinsk tidskrift [Soc Med]. 2020;97(5–6):804–16.

Google Scholar  

Bibou-Nakou I, Tsiantis J, Assimopoulos H, Chatzilambou P, Giannakopoulou D. School factors related to bullying: a qualitative study of early adolescent students. Soc Psychol Educ. 2012;15(2):125–45. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11218-012-9179-1 .

Vukojevic M, Zovko A, Talic I, Tanovic M, Resic B, Vrdoljak I, Splavski B. Parental socioeconomic status as a predictor of physical and mental health outcomes in children—literature review. Acta Clin Croat. 2017;56(4):742–8. https://doi.org/10.20471/acc.2017.56.04.23 .

Reiss F. Socioeconomic inequalities and mental health problems in children and adolescents: a systematic review. Soc Sci Med. 2013;90:24–31. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.socscimed.2013.04.026 .

Stockholm City. Stockholmsenkät (The Stockholm Student Survey). 2021. https://start.stockholm/aktuellt/nyheter/2020/09/presstraff-stockholmsenkaten-2020/ . Accessed 19 Nov 2021.

Zeebari Z, Lundin A, Dickman PW, Hallgren M. Are changes in alcohol consumption among swedish youth really occurring “in concert”? A new perspective using quantile regression. Alc Alcohol. 2017;52(4):487–95. https://doi.org/10.1093/alcalc/agx020 .

Hagquist C. Psychometric properties of the PsychoSomatic Problems Scale: a Rasch analysis on adolescent data. Social Indicat Res. 2008;86(3):511–23. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11205-007-9186-3 .

Hagquist C. Ungas psykiska hälsa i Sverige–komplexa trender och stora kunskapsluckor [Young people’s mental health in Sweden—complex trends and large knowledge gaps]. Socialmedicinsk tidskrift [Soc Med]. 2013;90(5):671–83.

Wu W, West SG. Detecting misspecification in mean structures for growth curve models: performance of pseudo R(2)s and concordance correlation coefficients. Struct Equ Model. 2013;20(3):455–78. https://doi.org/10.1080/10705511.2013.797829 .

Holt MK, Espelage DL. Perceived social support among bullies, victims, and bully-victims. J Youth Adolscence. 2007;36(8):984–94. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10964-006-9153-3 .

Mark L, Varnik A, Sisask M. Who suffers most from being involved in bullying-bully, victim, or bully-victim? J Sch Health. 2019;89(2):136–44. https://doi.org/10.1111/josh.12720 .

Tsaousis I. The relationship of self-esteem to bullying perpetration and peer victimization among schoolchildren and adolescents: a meta-analytic review. Aggress Violent Behav. 2016;31:186–99. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.avb.2016.09.005 .

Veldkamp SAM, Boomsma DI, de Zeeuw EL, van Beijsterveldt CEM, Bartels M, Dolan CV, van Bergen E. Genetic and environmental influences on different forms of bullying perpetration, bullying victimization, and their co-occurrence. Behav Genet. 2019;49(5):432–43. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10519-019-09968-5 .

Janssen I, Craig WM, Boyce WF, Pickett W. Associations between overweight and obesity with bullying behaviors in school-aged children. Pediatrics. 2004;113(5):1187–94. https://doi.org/10.1542/peds.113.5.1187 .

Kelly EV, Newton NC, Stapinski LA, Conrod PJ, Barrett EL, Champion KE, Teesson M. A novel approach to tackling bullying in schools: personality-targeted intervention for adolescent victims and bullies in Australia. J Am Acad Child Adolesc Psychiatry. 2020;59(4):508. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jaac.2019.04.010 .

Gunnell D, Kidger J, Elvidge H. Adolescent mental health in crisis. BMJ. 2018. https://doi.org/10.1136/bmj.k2608 .

O’Reilly M, Dogra N, Whiteman N, Hughes J, Eruyar S, Reilly P. Is social media bad for mental health and wellbeing? Exploring the perspectives of adolescents. Clin Child Psychol Psychiatry. 2018;23:601–13.

Unnever JD, Cornell DG. Middle school victims of bullying: who reports being bullied? Aggr Behav. 2004;30(5):373–88. https://doi.org/10.1002/ab.20030 .

Download references

Acknowledgements

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

Open access funding provided by Karolinska Institute. None to declare.

Author information

Authors and affiliations.

Stockholm Prevents Alcohol and Drug Problems (STAD), Center for Addiction Research and Department of Clinical Neuroscience, Karolinska Institutet, Solna, Sweden

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

Mats Hallgren

You can also search for this author in PubMed   Google Scholar

Contributions

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.

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Mats Hallgren .

Ethics declarations

Ethics approval and consent to participate.

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).

Consent for publication

Competing interests.

The authors declare that they have no competing interests.

Additional information

Publisher's note.

Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.

Supplementary Information

Additional file 1..

Principal factor analysis description.

Rights and permissions

Open Access This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article's Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article's Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this licence, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ . The Creative Commons Public Domain Dedication waiver ( http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/ ) applies to the data made available in this article, unless otherwise stated in a credit line to the data.

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Cite this article.

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

Download citation

Received : 05 October 2021

Accepted : 23 November 2021

Published : 14 December 2021

DOI : https://doi.org/10.1186/s13034-021-00425-y

Share this article

Anyone you share the following link with will be able to read this content:

Sorry, a shareable link is not currently available for this article.

Provided by the Springer Nature SharedIt content-sharing initiative

  • Mental health
  • Adolescents
  • School-related factors
  • Gender differences

Child and Adolescent Psychiatry and Mental Health

ISSN: 1753-2000

sample of research paper about bullying

Q Methodology as an Innovative Addition to Bullying Researchers’ Methodological Repertoire

  • Original Article
  • Open access
  • Published: 11 May 2022
  • Volume 4 , pages 209–219, ( 2022 )

Cite this article

You have full access to this open access article

  • Adrian Lundberg   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0001-8555-6398 1 &
  • Lisa Hellström   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0002-9326-1175 1  

5332 Accesses

2 Altmetric

Explore all metrics

A Correction to this article was published on 18 July 2022

This article has been updated

The field of bullying research deals with methodological issues and concerns affecting the comprehension of bullying and how it should be defined. For the purpose of designing relevant and powerful bullying prevention strategies, this article argues that instead of pursuing a universal definition of what constitutes bullying, it may be of greater importance to investigate culturally and contextually bound understandings and definitions of bullying. Inherent to that shift is the transition to a more qualitative research approach in the field and a stronger focus on participants’ subjective views and voices. Challenges in qualitative methods are closely connected to individual barriers of hard-to-reach populations and the lack of a necessary willingness to share on the one hand and the required ability to share subjective viewpoints on the other hand. By reviewing and discussing Q methodology, this paper contributes to bullying researchers’ methodological repertoire of less-intrusive methodologies. Q methodology offers an approach whereby cultural contexts and local definitions of bullying can be put in the front. Furthermore, developmentally appropriate intervention and prevention programs might be created based on exploratory Q research and could later be validated through large-scale investigations. Generally, research results based on Q methodology are expected to be useful for educators and policymakers aiming to create a safe learning environment for all children. With regard to contemporary bullying researchers, Q methodology may open up novel possibilities through its status as an innovative addition to more mainstream approaches.

Similar content being viewed by others

sample of research paper about bullying

Using Qualitative Methods to Measure and Understand Key Features of Adolescent Bullying: A Call to Action

Natalie Spadafora, Anthony A. Volk & Andrew V. Dane

The Importance of Being Attentive to Social Processes in School Bullying Research: Adopting a Constructivist Grounded Theory Approach

Camilla Forsberg

sample of research paper about bullying

Problems and Coping Strategies in Conducting Comparative Research in School Bullying Between China and Norway

Avoid common mistakes on your manuscript.

Introduction

Bullying, internationally recognized as a problematic and aggressive form of behavior, has negative effects, not only for those directly involved but for anybody and in particular children in the surrounding environment (Modin, 2012 ). However, one of the major concerns among researchers in the field of bullying is the type of research methods employed in the studies on bullying behavior in schools. The appropriateness of using quantitative or qualitative research methods rests on the assumption of the researcher and the nature of the phenomena under investigation (Hong & Espelage, 2012 ). There is a need for adults to widen their understanding and maintain a focus on children’s behaviors to be able to provide assistance and support in reducing the amount of stress and anxiety resulting from online and offline victimization (Hellström & Lundberg, 2020 ). A crucial step for widening this understanding is an increased visibility of children’s own viewpoints. When the voices of children, particularly those of victims and perpetrators, but also those of bystanders are heard in these matters, effective support can be designed based specifically on what children want and need rather than what adults interpret and understand to be supporting the child (O’Brien, 2019 ). However, bullying victims and their perpetrators are hard-to-reach populations (Shaghaghi et al., 2011 ; Sydor, 2013 ) for a range of reasons. To name but a few, researchers perennially face difficulties regarding potential participants’ self-identification, the sensitivity of bullying topics, or the power imbalance between them and their young respondents. Furthermore, limited verbal literacy and/or a lack of cognitive ability of some respondents due to age or disability contribute to common methodological issues in the field. Nevertheless, and despite ethical restrictions around the immediate questioning of younger children or children with disabilities that prohibit researchers to perform the assessments with them directly, it would be ethically indefensible to not study a sensitive topic like bullying among vulnerable groups of children. Hence, the research community is responsible for developing valid and reliable methods to explore bullying among different groups of children, where the children’s own voices are heard and taken into account (Hellström, 2019 ). Consequently, this paper aims to contribute to bullying researchers’ methodological repertoire with an additional less-intrusive methodology, particularly suitable for research with hard-to-reach populations.

Historically, the field of bullying and cyberbullying has been dominated by quantitative research approaches, most often with the aim to examine prevalence rates. However, recent research has seen an increase in the use of more qualitative and multiple data collection approaches on how children and youth explain actions and reactions in bullying situations (e.g., Acquadro Maran & Begotti, 2021 ; Eriksen & Lyng, 2018 ; Patton et al., 2017 ). This may be translated into a need to more clearly understand the phenomenon in different contexts. As acknowledged by many researchers, bullying is considerably influenced by the context in which it occurs and the field is benefitting from studying the phenomenon in the setting where all the contextual variables are operating (see, e.g., Acquadro Maran & Begotti, 2021 ; Scheithauer et al., 2016 ; Torrance, 2000 ). Cultural differences in attitudes regarding violence as well as perceptions, attitudes, and values regarding bullying are likely to exist and have an impact when bullying is being studied. For this reason, listening to the voices of children and adolescents when investigating the nature of bullying in different cultures is essential (Hellström & Lundberg, 2020 ; Scheithauer et al., 2016 ).

In addition to studying outcomes or products, bullying research has also emphasized the importance of studying processes (Acquadro Maran & Begotti, 2021 ). Here, the use of qualitative methods allows scholars to not only explore perceptions and understandings of bullying and its characteristics, but also interpret bullying in light of a specific social context, presented from a specific internal point of view. In other words, qualitative approaches may offer methods to understand how people make sense of their experiences of the bullying phenomenon. The processes implemented by a qualitative approach allow researchers to build hypotheses and theories in an inductive way (Atieno, 2009 ). Thus, a qualitative approach can enrich quantitative knowledge of the bullying phenomenon, paying attention to the significance that individuals attribute to situations and their own experiences. It can allow the research and clinical community to better project and implement bullying assessment and prevention programs (Hutson, 2018 ).

Instead of placing qualitative and quantitative approaches in opposition, they can both be useful and complementary, depending on the purpose of the research (Acquadro Maran & Begotti, 2021 ). In their review of mixed methods research on bullying and peer victimization in school, Hong and Espelage ( 2012 ) underlined that instead of using single methods, mixed methods have the advantage of generating a deeper and more complex understanding of the phenomenon. By combining objective data with information about the personal context within which the phenomenon occurs, mixed methods can generate new insights and new perspectives to the research field (Hong & Espelage, 2012 ; Kulig et al., 2008 ; Pellegrini & Long, 2002 ). However, Hong and Espelage ( 2012 ) also argued that mixed methods can lead to divergence and contradictions in findings that may serve as a challenge to researchers. For example, Cowie and Olafsson ( 2000 ) examined the impact of a peer support program to reduce bullying using both quantitative and qualitative data collection methods. While a quantitative approach collecting pre-test and post-test data showed no effects in decreasing bullying, interviews with peer supporters, students, and potential users of the intervention revealed the strength of the program and its positive impact, in light of students and peer supporters. Thus, rather than rejecting the program, the divergence in findings leads to a new rationale for modifying the program and addressing its limits.

Understandably, no single data collection approach is complete but deals with methodological issues and concerns affecting the research field and the comprehension of bullying. To provide a robust foundation for the introduction of an additional methodological perspective in bullying research, common data collection methods and methodological issues are outlined below.

Methodological Issues in Bullying Research

Large-scale cohort studies generating statistical findings often use R-statistics, descriptive analyses, averages, and correlations to estimate and compare prevalence rates of bullying, to explore personality traits of bullies and victims, and the main correlates and predictors of the phenomenon. Nevertheless, large-scale surveys have a harder time examining why bullying happens (O’Brian, 2019 ) and usually do not give voice to study objects’ own unique understanding and experiences (Acquadro Maran & Begotti, 2021 ; Bosacki et al., 2006 ; Woodhead & Faulkner, 2008 ). Other concerns using large-scale surveys include whether a definition is used or the term bullying is operationalized, which components are included in the definition, what cut-off points for determining involvement are being used, the lack of reliability information, and the absence of validity studies (Swearer et al., 2010 ).

Other issues include the validity in cross-cultural comparisons using large-scale surveys. For example, prevalence rates across Europe are often established using standard questionnaires that have been translated into appropriate languages. Comparing four large-scale surveys, Smith et al. ( 2016 ) found that when prevalence rates by country are compared across surveys, there are some obvious discrepancies, which suggest a need to examine systematically how these surveys compare in measuring cross-national differences. Low external validity rates between these studies raise concerns about using these cross-national data sets to make judgments about which countries are higher or lower in victim rates. The varying definitions and words used in bullying research may make it difficult to compare findings from studies conducted in different countries and cultures (Griffin & Gross, 2004 ). However, some argue that the problem seems to be more about inconsistency in the type of assessments (e.g., self-report, nominations) used to measure bullying rather than the varying definition of bullying (Jia & Mikami, 2018 ). When using a single-item approach (e.g., “How often have you been bullied?”) it is not possible to investigate the equivalency of the constructs between countries, which is a crucial precondition for any statistically valid comparison between them (Scheithauer et al., 2016 ). Smith et al. ( 2016 ) conclude that revising definitions and how bullying is translated and expressed in different languages and contexts would help examine comparability between countries.

Interviews, focus groups and the use of vignettes (usually with younger children) can all be regarded as suitable when examining youths’ perceptions of the bullying phenomenon (Creswell, 2013 ; Hellström et al., 2015 ; Hutson, 2018 ). They all allow an exploration of the bullying phenomenon within a social context taking into consideration the voices of children and might solve some of the methodological concerns linked to large-scale surveys. However, these data collection methods are also challenged by individual barriers of hard-to-reach populations (Ellard-Gray et al., 2015 ) and may include the lack of a necessary willingness to share on the one hand and the required ability to share subjective viewpoints on the other hand.

Willingness to Share

In contrast to large-scale surveys requiring large samples of respondents with reasonable literacy skills, interviews, which may rely even heavier on students’ verbal skills, are less plentiful in bullying research. This might at least partially be based on a noteworthy expectation of respondents to be willing to share something. It must be remembered that asking students to express their own or others’ experiences of emotionally charged situations, for example concerning bullying, is particularly challenging (Khanolainen & Semenova, 2020 ) and can be perceived as intrusive by respondents who have not had the opportunity to build a rapport with the researchers. This constitutes a reason why research in this important area is difficult and complex to design and perform. Ethnographic studies may be considered less intrusive, as observations offer a data collection technique where respondents are not asked to share any verbal information or personal experiences. However, ethnographical studies are often challenging due to the amount of time, resources, and competence that are required by the researchers involved (Queirós et al., 2017 ). In addition, ethnographical studies are often used for other purposes than asking participants to share their views on certain topics.

Vulnerable populations often try to avoid participating in research about a sensitive topic that is related to their vulnerable status, as recalling and retelling painful experiences might be distressing. The stigma surrounding bullying may affect children’s willingness to share their personal experiences in direct approaches using the word bullying (Greif & Furlong, 2006 ). For this reason, a single-item approach, in which no definition of bullying is provided, allows researchers to ask follow-up questions about perceptions and contexts and enables participants to enrich the discussion by adjusting their answers based on the suggestions and opinions of others (Jacobs et al., 2015 ). Generally, data collection methods with depersonalization and distancing effects have proven effective in research studying sensitive issues such as abuse, trauma, stigma and so on (e.g., Cromer & Freyd, 2009 ; Hughes & Huby, 2002 ). An interesting point raised by Jacobs and colleagues ( 2015 ) is that a direct approach that asks adolescents if they have ever experienced cyberbullying may lead to a poorer discussion and an underestimation of the phenomenon. This is because perceptions and contexts often differ between persons and because adolescents do not perceive all behaviors as cyberbullying. The same can be true for bullying taking place offline (Hellström et al., 2015 ).

When planning research with children, it is important to consider the immediate research context as it might affect what children will talk about (Barker & Weller, 2003 ; Hill, 2006 ; Punch, 2002 ). In addition to more material aspects, such as the room or medium for a dialog, the potential power imbalance created in an interview situation between an adult researcher and the child under study adds to a potentially limited willingness to share. Sitting in front of an adult interviewer may create situations where children may find it difficult to express their feelings and responses may be given based on perceived expectations (Punch, 2002 ). This effect is expected to be even stronger when studying a sensitive topic like bullying. Therefore, respondents may provide more honest responses when they are unaware that the construct of bullying is being assessed (Swearer et al., 2010 ). Moreover, in research about sensitive topics, building a strong connection with participants (Lyon & Carabelli, 2016 ), characterized by mutual trust, is vital and might overcome the initial hesitation to participate and share personal accounts. Graphic vignettes have successfully been used as such unique communication bridges to collect detailed accounts of bullying experiences (Khanolainen & Semenova, 2020 ). However, some reluctance to engage has been reported even in art-based methods, usually known to be effective in research with verbally limited participants (Bagnoli, 2009 ; Vacchelli, 2018 ) or otherwise hard-to-reach populations (Goopy & Kassan, 2019 ). Most commonly, participants might not see themselves as creative or artistic enough (Scherer, 2016 ). In sum, the overarching challenging aspect of art-based methods related to a limited willingness to share personal information is an often-required production of some kind.

Ability to Share

Interviews as a data collection method demand adequate verbal literacy skills for participants to take part and to make their voices heard. This may be challenging especially for younger children or children with different types of disabilities. There is a wide research gap in exploring the voices of younger children (de Leeuw et al., 2020 ) and children with disabilities (Hellström, 2019 ) in bullying research. Students’ conceptualization of bullying behavior changes with age, as there are suggestions that younger students tend to focus more on physical forms of bullying (such as fighting), while older students include a wider variety of behaviors in their view of bullying, such as verbal aggression and social exclusion (Hellström & Lundberg, 2020 ; Monks & Smith, 2006 ; Smith et al., 2002 ; Hellström et al., 2015 ). This suggests that cognitive development may allow older students to conceptualize bullying along a number of dimensions (Monks & Smith, 2006 ). Furthermore, the exclusion of the voices of children with disabilities in bullying research is debated. It is discussed that the symptoms and characteristics of disabilities such as Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) or Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD), i.e., difficulties understanding the thoughts, emotions, reactions, and behaviors of others, which makes them the ideal target for bullying may also make it hard for them to perceive, verbalize and report bullying and victimization in a reliable and valid manner (Slaughter et al., 2002 ). It may also be difficult for children with ASD to differentiate between playful teasing among friends and hurtful teasing. While many argue that children with ASD are unreliable respondents of victimization, under-reporting using parental and teacher reports has been shown in research on bullying (Waters et al., 2003 ; Bradshaw et al., 2007 ) and child maltreatment (Compier-de Block et al., 2017 ).

This Paper’s Contribution

The present paper contributes to this special issue about qualitative school bullying and cyberbullying research by reviewing and discussing Q methodology as an innovative addition to more mainstream approaches in the field. Despite the fact that Q methodology had been proclaimed as “especially valuable […] in educational psychology” (Stephenson, 1935 , p. 297) nearly 90 years ago, the approach has only relatively recently been described as an up-and-coming methodological choice of educational researchers interested in participants’ subjective views (Lundberg et al., 2020 ). Even though, Q enables researchers to investigate and uncover first-person accounts, characterized by a high level of qualitative detail in its narrative description, only few educational studies have applied Q methodology to investigate the subject of bullying (see Camodeca & Coppola, 2016 ; Ey & Spears, 2020 ; Hellström & Lundberg, 2020 ; Wester & Trepal, 2004 ). Within the wider field of bullying, Q methodology has also been used to investigate workplace bullying in hospitals (Benmore et al., 2018 ) and nursing units (Choi & Lee, 2019 ). By responding to common methodological issues outlined earlier, the potential Q methodology might have for bullying research is exemplified. A particular focus is thereby put on capturing respondents’ subjective viewpoints through its less-intrusive data collection technique. The present paper closes by discussing implications for practice and suggesting future directions for Q methodological bullying and cyberbullying research, in particular with hard-to-reach populations.

An Introduction to Q Methodology

Q as a methodology represents a larger conceptual and philosophical framework, which is by no means novel. However, the methodology has largely been marginalized since its invention in the 1930s by William Stephenson (Brown, 2006 ). As a research technique, it broadly consists of three stages that each can be split into a set of steps (see Fig.  1 ); (1) carefully constructing a data collection instrument, (2) collecting data, and (3) analyzing and interpreting data. The central, and therefore also best-known feature of Q methodology is Q sorting to collect data in the form of individual Q sorts. Participants thereby rank order a sample of self-referent stimuli along a continuum and in accordance with a central condition of instruction; for example, children might be asked to what extent particular scenarios describe bullying situations (Hellström & Lundberg, 2020 ) or they might be instructed to sort illustrated ways to resolve social exclusion according to the single face-valid dimension of “least preferred to most preferred” (de Leeuw et al., 2019 ). As soon as all items are placed on a most often bell-shaped distribution grid (see Fig.  2 ), participants might be asked to elaborate on their item placement to add a further layer of qualitative data. Such so-called post-sorting activities might include written annotations of items placed at the ends of the continuum or form the structure for interviews (Shemmings & Ellingsen, 2012 ).

figure 1

Three stages and six steps of a Q methodological research process (adapted from Lundberg et al., 2020 )

figure 2

A vertical distribution grid with two examples of face-valid dimensions. This rather small distribution is designed for a 16-item Q sample and therefore contains 16 slots to be filled

For participants to provide their subjective viewpoint toward a specific topic in the form of a Q sort, researchers need to construct the data collection instrument, called Q sample. Such a set of stimulus items is a representative sample from all possible items concerning the topic, which in the technical language in Q methodology is called concourse (Brown, 1980 ). The development of such a concourse about the topic at hand might stem from a wide range of sources, including academic literature, policy documents, informal discussions, or media (Watts & Stenner, 2012 ). Moreover, in a participatory research fashion, participants’ statements can be used verbatim to populate the concourse. This way, children’s own words and voices are part of the data collection instrument. A sophisticated structuring process then guides the researchers in selecting a Q sample from all initial statements in the concourse (Brown et al., 2019 ). In Hellström & Lundberg ( 2020 ), a literature review on findings and definitions of bullying, stemming from qualitative and quantitative research, provided the initial concourse. A matrix consisting of different modes, types, and contexts of bullying supported the construction of the final Q sample.

As a student and assistant of Charles Spearman, Q’s inventor Stephenson was well-informed about R-methodological factor analysis based on correlating traits. The British physicist-psychologist however inverted the procedure and thereby suggested correlating persons to study human behavior (Stephenson, 1935 , 1953 ). A detailed description of the statistical procedure of Q factor analysis is outside the scope of this article, especially as the focus of this special issue is put on qualitative research methods. In addition, with its focus on producing quantifiable data from highly subjective viewpoints (Duncan & Owens, 2011 ), it is safe to say that Q methodology is more often treated as a qualitative methodology with quantitative features than the other way around. Nevertheless, it is important to note that through factor analysis, individual viewpoints are clustered into so-called factors, representing shared viewpoints if they sufficiently correlate (see Fig.  3 ). In that sense, no outside criterion is applied to respondents’ subjective views and groups of similar sorts (factors/viewpoints) are not logically constructed by researchers. Instead, they inductively emerge through quantitative analysis, which helps “in learning how the subject, not the observer, understands and reacts to items” (Brown, 1980 , p. 191). This procedure allowed Hellström & Lundberg ( 2020 ) to describe two age-related definitions of bullying. Older students in particular perceived offline bullying as more severe than online bullying and their younger peers were mostly concerned about bullying situations taking place in a private setting.

figure 3

A simplified illustration of Q factor analysis (step 5). Arrow A represents the statistical correlation of all collected individual viewpoints. Arrow B represents inverted factor analysis as the data condensation technique resulting in a manageable number of shared viewpoints

Despite its quantitative analysis, participant selection in Q methodology is largely in line with purposive sampling with small numbers. It, therefore, represents a major difference to R methodological research, where larger opportunity samples are desired. In Q methodology, participants are selected strategically in line with those who might likely “express a particularly interesting or pivotal point of view” (Watts & Stenner, 2012 , p. 71). Investigating a large number of similar respondents might therefore simply lead to more participants correlating with the same shared viewpoint and not necessarily add new viewpoints. In recent educational Q research, the average number of participants is 37 (Lundberg et al., 2020 ). Many studies have however been successfully conducted with considerably fewer, as for example illustrated by Benmore et al. ( 2018 ), who described three distinctive groups within their sample of 12 participants.

To illustrate Q methodology in bullying research, our small scale and exploratory study published in Educational Research (Hellström & Lundberg, 2020 ) serves as a practical example. The purpose of that study was to investigate definitions of bullying from young people’s perspectives and was guided by the following research question: What are students’ subjective viewpoints on bullying behavior? . In Table 1 , we describe the methodological steps introduced in Fig.  1 .

Q Methodology’s Response to the Methodological Issues Outlined Above

Above, methodological issues have been structured according to participants’ willingness and ability to share their subjective viewpoints and lived experiences. In order to respond to those, the present section focuses on Q methodology’s built-in features. A particularly important component is Q sorting as the central data collection technique that facilitates participants’ communicability of their subjectivity.

Engaging participants in a card sorting activity encourages students to express their viewpoints and thereby making their voices heard in a less-intrusive way, despite being cognitively engaging. Because they are asked to rank-order a predetermined sample of items, ideally in accordance with a carefully selected condition of instruction, they do not need to report or disclose their own personal experiences and are not obliged to actively create anything, as criticized in arts-based research. In that sense, Q methodology can be seen as a method to collect sensitive data in a more depersonalized way. This provides the basis to find a vital “balance between protecting the child and at the same time allowing access to important information” (Thorsen & Størksen, 2010 , p. 9), which is of particular importance for research about emotionally charged situations or sensitive topics as it is often the case with bullying (Ellingsen et al., 2014 ). Sharing their view through a fixed collection of items certainly makes participation in research for young children or otherwise hard-to-reach respondents less intimidating and results can be expected to be more truthful.

In comparison to researchers applying ethnographical approaches, who immerse themselves into the studied context to understand and document patterns of social behavior and interaction in a less intrusive way, Q methodologists are not expected to observe their participants. Even though the purpose of these approaches is different, being part of the culture under investigation or at least involving community partners in Q methodological research can still be useful for at least two reasons. As mentioned in Table 1 featuring the study by Hellström & Lundberg ( 2020 ), the pupils’ physical education and health teacher guided an exploratory and informal discussion and thereby provided valuable insights into the participants’ lifeworld that informed the Q sample. In addition to better tailoring the sample to the participants and making them feel seen and heard, the community partner could help build a positive rapport between participants and researchers, which otherwise requires much work. During the actual data collection exercise, participants were already familiar with the topic, well-informed about the research project, and perceived the sorting activity as an integral part of their lesson.

The play-like character of Q sorting has as well been reported as a positive influence on respondents’ motivation to participate (de Leeuw et al., 2019 ) and Wright ( 2013 ) mentions the engaging atmosphere created between the sorter and the researcher. The combination of these features allows assuming that obtaining participants’ viewpoint through Q methodology is less threatening than for example sitting in front of an interviewer and providing on-spot oral responses about a sensitive topic.

Q sorting as a data collection instrument represents a major advantage for Q methodological research with participants that do not (yet) possess sufficient verbal literacy and/or cognitive ability to process receptive or expressive language. To illustrate, two features are outlined here: first the flexibility of the Q sample, say the set of stimuli and second the fact that primary data collection in Q methodology is based on a silent activity.

Written statements are undoubtedly the most common type of items used in Q methodology and the number of such in a Q sample greatly varies. In recent research reporting from compulsory education settings, the average Q sample consists of about 40 items (Lundberg et al., 2020 ). In addition to applying a smaller set of items, their complexity can easily be adapted in line with participants’ receptive literacy skills and their developmental stage to facilitate understanding. Statements can for example be shortened or they can start identically to make the activity less taxing (Watts & Stenner, 2012 ). A different approach to cater to limited verbal literacy is the use of images instead of written statements. Constructing a visual Q sample might be more challenging for the researcher, in particular, if images are carefully selected and culturally tailored, meaning that they are clear, appealing and without too many details (Thorsen & Størksen, 2010 ). It might nevertheless be worth it, as such items provide a powerful tool to elicit viewpoints from otherwise marginalized or hard-to-reach research participants. Combes and colleagues ( 2004 ) for example, created a 37-item-Q sample with intellectually disabled participants’ own pictures to evaluate the planning of activities and de Leeuw et al. ( 2019 ) have used 15 images of hypothetical scenarios of social exclusion in a study with primary school pupils. Furthermore, as illustrated by Allgood and Svennungsen ( 2008 ) who photographed their participant’s own sculptures, Q samples consisting of objects (e.g., toys) or symbols (emojis) might be other options to investigate issues about bullying and cyberbullying without using text.

In addition to adaptations to the data collection instrument, the sorting process is usually carefully introduced and illustrated. Researchers might want to go through the entire Q sample to ensure the participants are able to discriminate each item (Combes et al., 2004 ). Even with adult participants without any cognitive impairments, it is suggested to pre-sort items into three provisional categories (Watts & Stenner, 2012 ). Two categories represent the respective ends of the continuum in the distribution grid and might be labeled and. Any items the sorter feels insecure or neutral about, are moved to the third category, which receives a question mark (?) for the sake of this exercise. During the actual rank-ordering process, the participants start to allocate items to one of the ends of the continuum (the top of the distribution grid in Fig.  2 ) with cards from the ☺ category and work themselves toward the center of the distribution grid. The process continues with items in the ☹ category, which are placed from the opposite end of the continuum toward the center. Any free spots are then filled with the remaining items in the (?) category. The graphic display of their viewpoint has been experienced as enabling for self-reflection (Combes et al., 2004 ) and might be utilized for a further discussion about the topic, for example as part of teacher workshops (Ey & Spears, 2020 ).

Meeting children at an appropriate cognitive level through adaptations of the data collection instrument and procedure, is not only a promising and important ethical decision in order to show young participants the respect they deserve (Thorsen & Størsken, 2010 ), but makes the sorting procedure a pleasant experience for the participants (John et al., 2014 ). Unsurprisingly, Q methodology has been described as a respectful, person-centered, and therefore child-friendly approach (Hughes, 2016 ).

Limitations

Despite its potential for bullying research, Q methodology has its limitations. The approach is still relatively unknown in the field of bullying research and academic editors’ and reviewers’ limited familiarity with it can make publishing Q methodological research challenging. Notwithstanding the limitation of not being based on a worked example, the contribution of the present paper hopefully fulfills some of the needed spadework toward greater acceptability within and beyond a field, which has only seen a limited number of Q methodological research studies. Because the careful construction of a well-balanced Q sample is time-consuming and prevents spontaneous research activities, a core set of items could be created to shorten the research process and support the investigation of what bullying means to particular groups of people. Such a Q sample would then have to be culturally tailored to fit local characteristics. Finally, the present paper is limited in our non-comprehensive selection of data collection methods as points of comparison when arguing for a more intensive focus on Q methodology for bullying research.

Future Research Directions

The results of Q methodological studies based on culturally tailored core Q samples would allow the emergence of local definitions connected to the needs of the immediate society or school context. As illustrated by Hellström & Lundberg ( 2020 ), even within the same school context, and with the same data collection instrument (Q sample), Q methodology yielded different, age-related definitions of bullying. Or in Wester and Trepal ( 2004 ), Q methodological analysis revealed more perceptions and opinions about bullying than researchers usually mention. Hence, Q methodology offers a robust and strategic approach that can foreground cultural contexts and local definitions of bullying. If desired, exploratory small-scale Q research might later be validated through large-scale investigations. A further direction for future research in the field of bullying research is connected to the great potential of visual Q samples to further minimize research participation restrictions for respondents with limited verbal or cognitive abilities.

Implications for Practice

When designing future bullying prevention strategies, Q methodology presents a range of benefits to take into consideration. The approach offers a robust way to collect viewpoints about bullying without asking participants to report their own experiences. The highly flexible sorting activity further represents a method to investigate bullying among groups that are underrepresented in bullying research, such as preschool children (Camodeca & Coppola, 2016 ). This is of great importance, as tackling bullying at an early age can prevent its escalation (Alsaker & Valkanover, 2001 ; Storey & Slaby, 2013 ). Making the voices of the hard-to-reach heard in an unrestricted way and doing research with them instead of about them (de Leeuw et al., 2019 ; Goopy & Kassan, 2019 ) is expected to enable them to be part of discussions about their own well-being. By incorporating social media platforms, computer games, or other contextually important activities when designing a Q sample, the sorting of statements in Hellström & Lundberg, ( 2020 ) turned into a highly relevant activity, clearly connected to the reality of the students. As a consequence, resulting policy creation processes based on such exploratory studies should lead to more effective interventions and bullying prevention programs confirming the conclusion by Ey and Spears ( 2020 ) that Q methodology served as a great model to develop and implement context-specific programs. Due to the enhanced accountability and involvement of children’s own voices, we foresee a considerable increase in implementation and success rates of such programs. Moreover, Q methodology has been suggested as an effective technique to evaluate expensive anti-bullying interventions (Benmore et al., 2018 ). Generally, research results based on exploratory Q methodology that quantitatively condensates rich data and makes commonalities and diversities among participants emerge through inverted factor analysis are expected to be useful for educators and policymakers aiming to create a safe learning environment for all children. At the same time, Q methodology does not only provide an excellent ground for participatory research, but is also highly cost-efficient due to its status as a small-sample approach. This might be particularly attractive, when neither time nor resources for other less-intrusive methodological approaches, such as for example ethnography, are available. Due to its highly engaging aspect and great potential for critical personal reflection, Q sorting might be applied in classes regardless of representing a part of a research study or simply as a learning tool (Duncan & Owens, 2011 ). Emerging discussions are expected to facilitate and mediate crucial dialogs and lead toward collective problem-solving among children.

The use of many different terminologies and different cultural understandings, including meaning, comprehension, and operationalization, indicates that bullying is a concept that is difficult to define and subject to cultural influences. For the purpose of designing relevant and powerful bullying prevention strategies, this paper argues that instead of pursuing a universal definition of what constitutes bullying, it may be of greater importance to investigate culturally and contextually bound understandings and definitions of bullying. Although the quest for cultural and contextual bound definitions is not new in bullying research, this paper offers an additional method, Q methodology, to capture participants’ subjective views and voices. Since particularly the marginalized and vulnerable participants, for example, bullying victims, are usually hard to reach, bullying researchers might benefit from a methodological repertoire enriched with a robust approach that is consistent with changes in methodological and epistemological thinking in the field. In this paper, we have argued that built-in features of Q methodology respond to perennial challenges in bullying research connected to a lack of willingness and limited ability to share among participants as well as studying bullying as a culturally sensitive topic. In summary, we showcased how Q methodology allows a thorough and less-intrusive investigation of what children perceive to be bullying and believe that Q methodology may open up novel possibilities for contemporary bullying researchers through its status as an innovative addition to more mainstream approaches.

Availability of Data and Material

Not applicable.

Code Availability

Change history, 18 july 2022.

A Correction to this paper has been published: https://doi.org/10.1007/s42380-022-00135-9

Acquadro Maran, D., & Begotti, T. (2021). Measurement ideas relevant to qualitative studies. In P. K. Smith & J. O’Higgins Norman (Editors). Handbook of bullying (no pages assigned yet). John Wiley & Sons Limited.

Allgood, E., & Svennungsen, H. O. (2008). Toward an articulation of trauma using the creative arts and Q-methodology: A single-case study. Journal of Human Subjectivity, 6 (1), 5–24.

Google Scholar  

Alsaker, F. D., & Valkanover, S. (2001). Early diagnosis and prevention of victimization in kindergarten. In J. Juvonen & S. Graham (Eds.), Peer harassment in school (pp. 175–195). Guilford Press.

Atieno, O. P. (2009). An analysis of the strengths and limitation of qualitative and quantitative research paradigms.  Problems of Education in the 21st Century ,  13 (1), 13–38.

Bagnoli, A. (2009). Beyond the standard interview: The use of graphic elicitation and arts-based methods. Qualitative Research, 9 (5), 547–570. https://doi.org/10.1177/1468794109343625

Article   Google Scholar  

Barker, J., & Weller, S. (2003). “Is it fun?” Developing children centred research methods. International Journal of Sociology and Social Policy, 23 (1/2), 33–58. https://doi.org/10.1108/01443330310790435

Benmore, G., Henderson, S., Mountfield, J., & Wink, B. (2018). The Stopit! programme to reduce bullying and undermining behaviour in hospitals: Contexts, mechanisms and outcomes. Journal of Health Organization and Management, 32 (3), 428–443. https://doi.org/10.1108/JHOM-02-2018-0047

Article   PubMed   Google Scholar  

Bosacki, S. L., Marini, Z. A., & Dane, A. V. (2006). Voices from the classroom: Pictorial and narrative representations of children’s bullying experiences. Journal of Moral Education, 35 , 231–245. https://doi.org/10.1080/03057240600681769

Bradshaw, C. P., Sawyer, A. L., & O’Brennan, L. M. (2007). Bullying and peer victimization at school: Perceptual differences between students and school staff. School Psychology Review, 36 , 361–382. https://doi.org/10.1080/02796015.2007.12087929

Brown, S. (1980). Political subjectivity: Applications of Q methodology in political science . Yale University Press.

Brown, S. (2006). A match made in heaven: A marginalized methodology for studying the marginalized. Quality and Quantity, 40 (3), 361–382. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11135-005-8828-2

Brown, S., Baltrinic, E., & Jencius, M. (2019) From concourse to Q sample to testing theory. Operant Subjectivity, 41 , 1–17. https://doi.org/10.15133/j.os.2019.002

Camodeca, M., & Coppola, G. (2016). Bullying, empathic concern, and internalization of rules among preschool children: The role of emotion understanding. International Journal of Behavioral Development, 40 , 459–465.

Choi, J. K., & Lee, B. S. (2019). Response patterns of nursing unit managers regarding workplace bullying: A Q methodology approach. Journal of Korean Academy of Nursing, 49 , 562–574.

Combes, H., Hardy, G., & Buchan, L. (2004). Using Q-methodology to involve people with intellectual disability in evaluating person-centred planning. Journal of Applied Research in Intellectual Disabilities, 17 , 149–159. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1468-3148.2004.00191.x

Compier-de Block, L. H., Alink, L. R., Linting, M., van den Berg, L. J., Elzinga, B. M., Voorthuis, A., Tollenaar, M. S., & Bakermans-Kranenburg, M. J. (2017). Parent-child agreement on parent-to-child maltreatment. Journal of Family Violence, 32 , 207–217. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10896-016-9902-3

Cowie, H., & Olafsson, R. (2000). The role of peer support in helping the victims of bullying in a school with high levels of aggression. School Psychology International, 21 , 79–95.

Creswell, J. (2013). Qualitative inquiry and research design: Choosing among five approaches (3 rd ed.). Sage.

Cromer, L. D., & Freyd, J. J. (2009). Hear no evil, see no evil? Associations of gender, trauma history, and values with believing trauma vignettes. Analyses of Social Issues and Public Policy, 9 (1), 85–96. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1530-2415.2009.01185.x

De Leeuw, R. R., de Boer, A. A., Beckmann, E. J., van Exel, J., & Minnaert, A. E. M. G. (2019). Young children’s perspectives on resolving social exclusion within inclusive classrooms. International Journal of Educational Research, 98 , 324–335. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijer.2019.09.009

De Leeuw, R. R., Little, C., & Rix, J. (2020). Something needs to be said – Some thoughts on the possibilities and limitations of ‘voice.’ International Journal of Educational Research, 104 , 101694. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijer.2020.101694

Duncan, N., & Owens, L. (2011). Bullying, social power and heteronormativity: Girls’ constructions of popularity. Children & Society, 25 , 306–316. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1099-0860.2011.00378.x

Ellard-Gray, A., Jeffrey, N. K., Choubak, M., Crann, S. E. (2015). Finding the hidden participant: Solutions for recruiting hidden, hard-to-reach, and vulnerable populations.  International Journal of Qualitative Methods, 1–10.  https://doi.org/10.1177/1609406915621420

Ellingsen, I. T., Thorsen, A. A., Størksen, I. (2014). Revealing children’s experiences and emotions through.  Q Methodology Child Development Research, 1–9. https://doi.org/10.1155/2014/910529

Eriksen, M. I., & Lyng, S. T. (2018). Relational aggression among boys: Blind spots and hidden dramas. Gender and Education, 30 (3), 396–409. https://doi.org/10.1080/09540253.2016.1214691

Ey, L., & Spears, B. (2020). Engaging early childhood teachers in participatory co-design workshops to educate young children about bullying. Pastoral Care in Education, 38 , 230–253. https://doi.org/10.1080/02643944.2020.1788129

Greif, J. L., & Furlong, M. J. (2006). The assessment of school bullying. Journal of School Violence, 5 , 33–50. https://doi.org/10.1300/J202v05n03_04

Griffin, R. S., & Gross, A. M. (2004). Childhood bullying: Current empirical findings and future directions for research. Aggression and Violent Behavior, 9 , 379–400. https://doi.org/10.1016/S1359-1789(03)00033-8

Goopy, S., & Kassan, A. (2019). Arts-based engagement ethnography: An approach for making research engaging and knowledge transferable when working with harder-to-reach communities. International Journal of Qualitative Methods, 18 , 1–10. https://doi.org/10.1177/1609406918820424

Hellström, L. (2019). A systematic review of polyvictimization among children with Attention Deficit Hyperactivity or Autism Spectrum Disorder. International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, 16 (13), 2280. https://doi.org/10.3390/ijerph16132280

Hellström, L. & Lundberg, A. (2020). Understanding bullying from young people’s perspectives: An exploratory study. Educational Research, 62 (4), 414-433. https://doi.org/10.1080/00131881.2020.1821388

Hellström, L., Persson, L. & Hagquist, C. (2015). Understanding and defining bullying– adolescents’ own views. Archives of Public Health 73 (4), 1-9. https://doi.org/10.1186/2049-3258-73-4

Hill, M. (2006). Children’s voices on ways of having a voice: Children’s and young people’s perspectives on methods used in research and consultation. Childhood, 13 (1), 69–89. https://doi.org/10.1177/0907568206059972

Hong, J. S., & Espelage, D. L. (2012). A review of mixed methods research on bullying and peer victimization in school. Educational Review, 64 (1), 115–126. https://doi.org/10.1080/00131911.2011.598917

Hughes, M. (2016). Critical, respectful, person-centred: Q methodology for educational psychologists. Educational and Child Psychology, 33 (1), 63–75.

Hughes, R., & Huby, M. (2002). The application of vignettes in social and nursing research. Journal of Advanced Nursing, 37 (4), 382–386. https://doi.org/10.1046/j.1365-2648.2002.02100.x

Hutson, E. (2018). Integrative review of qualitative research on the emotional experience of bullying victimization in youth. Journal of School Nursing, 34 (1), 51–59. https://doi.org/10.1177/1059840517740192

Jacobs, N., Goossens, L., Dehue, F., Völlink, T., & Lechner, L. (2015). Dutch cyberbullying victims’ experiences, perceptions, attitudes and motivations related to (coping with) cyberbullying: Focus group interviews. Societies, 5 (1), 43–64. https://doi.org/10.3390/soc5010043

Jia, M., & Mikami, A. (2018). Issues in the assessment of bullying: Implications for conceptualizations and future directions. Aggression and Violent Behavior, 41 , 108–118. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.avb.2018.05.004

John, A., Montgomery, D., & Halliburton Tate, A. (2014). Using Q methodology in conducting research with young children. In O. Saracho (Editor): Handbook of Research Methods in Early Childhood Education , Volume 1, (pp. 147–173), University of Maryland.

Khanolainen, D., & Semenova, E. (2020). School bullying through graphic vignettes: Developing a new arts-based method to study a sensitive topic. International Journal of Qualitative Methods, 19 , 1–15. https://doi.org/10.1177/1609406920922765

Kulig, J. C., Hall, B., & Grant Kalischuk, R. (2008). Bullying perspectives among rural youth: A mixed methods approach. Rural and Remote Health, 8 , 1–11.

Lyon, D., & Carabelli, G. (2016). Researching young people’s orientations to the future: The methodological challenges of using arts practice. Qualitative Research, 16 (4), 430–445. https://doi.org/10.1177/1468794115587393

Lundberg, A., de Leeuw, R., & Aliani R. (2020). Using Q methodology: sorting out subjectivity in educational research. Educational Research Review, 31 , 100361. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.edurev.2020.100361

Modin, B. (2012). Beteendeproblem bidrar till utsatthet för mobbning och psykisk ohälsa. I: Skolans betydelse för barns och ungas psykiska hälsa - en studie baserad på den nationella totalundersökningen i årskurs 6 och 9 hösten 2009 behavior problems contribute to victimization from bullying and poor self-related mental health. in: The role of the school for young people’s mental health. A study based on the national Swedish survey of students in grades 6 and 9 in 2009. ( No. 2012–5–15). National Board of Health and Welfare and Centre for Health Equity Studies.

Monks, C. P., & Smith, P. K. (2006). Definitions of bullying: Age differences in understanding of the term, and the role of experience. British Journal of Developmental Psychology, 24 (4), 801–821. https://doi.org/10.1348/026151005X82352

O’Brien, N. (2019). Understanding alternative bullying perspectives through research engagement with young people. Frontiers in Psychology, 10 , 1984. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2019.01984

Article   PubMed   PubMed Central   Google Scholar  

Patton, D. U., Hong, J. S., Patel, S., & Kral, M. J. (2017). A systematic review of research strategies used in qualitative studies on school bullying and victimization. Trauma, Violence & Abuse, 18 (1), 3–16. https://doi.org/10.1177/1524838015588502

Pellegrini, A. D., & Long, J. D. (2002). A longitudinal study of bullying, dominance, and victimization during the transition from primary school through secondary school. British Journal of Developmental Psychology, 20 , 259–280. https://doi.org/10.1348/026151002166442

Punch, S. (2002). Research with children: The same or different from research with adults? Childhood, 9 (3), 321–341. https://doi.org/10.1177/0907568202009003005

Queirós, A., Faria, D., & Almeida, R. (2017). Strengths and limitations of qualitative and quantitative research methods. European Journal of Education Studies, 3 (9), 369–387. https://doi.org/10.46827/ejes.v0i0.1017

Scheithauer, H., Smith, P. K., & Samara, M. (2016). Cultural issues in bullying and cyberbullying among children and adolescents: Methodological approaches for comparative research. International Journal of Developmental Science 10 , 3–8.  https://doi.org/10.3233/DEV-16000085

Scherer, L. (2016). Children’s engagements with visual methods through qualitative research in the primary school as “Art that didn’t work.” Sociological Research Online, 21 (1), 1–16. https://doi.org/10.5153/sro.3805

Shaghaghi, A., Bhopal, R. S., & Sheikh, A. (2011). Approaches to recruiting ‘hard to reach’ populations into research: A review of the literature. Health Promotion Perspectives, 1 , 86–94. https://doi.org/10.5681/hpp.2011.009

Shemmings, D., & Ellingsen, I. T. (2012). Using Q methodology in qualitative interviews. In J.F. Gubrium, J.A. Holstein, A.B. Marvasti, & K.D. McKinney (Eds.), The SAGE handbook of interview research: The complexity of the craft (2 nd ed), (pp. 415–426). Sage.

Slaughter, V., Dennis, M. J., & Pritchard, M. (2002). Theory of mind and peer acceptance in preschool children. British Journal of Developmental Psychology, 20 , 545–564.

Smith, P. K., Cowie, H., Olafsson, R. F., & 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 Development 73 (4): 1119–1133.  https://doi.org/10.1111/1467-8624.00461

Smith, P. K., Robinson, S., & Marchi, B. (2016). Cross-national data on victims of bullying: What is really being measured? International Journal of Developmental Science, 10 (1–2), 9–19. https://doi.org/10.3233/DEV-150174

Stephenson, W. (1935). Technique of factor analysis. Nature, 136 , 297.

Stephenson, W. (1953). The study of behavior: Q technique and its methodology. Chicago University Press.

Storey, K., & Slaby, R. (2013). Eyes on bullying in early childhood. Education Development Center. Retrieved from www.eyesonbullying.org

Swearer, S. M., Siebecker, A. B., Johnsen-Frerichs, L. A., & Wang, C. (2010). Assessment of bullying/victimization. The problem of comparability across studies and across methodologies. In S.R. Jimerson, S.M. Swearer, & D.L. Espelage (Eds.), Handbook of bullying in schools: An international perspective (pp 305- 328). Routledge

Sydor, A. (2013). Conducting research into hidden or hard-to-reach populations. Nurse Researcher, 20 , 33–37.

Thorsen, A. A., & Størksen, I. (2010). Ethical, methodological, and practical reflections when using Q methodology in research with young children. Operant Subjectivity, 33 (1–2), 3–25.

Torrance, D. A. (2000). Qualitative studies into bullying within special schools. British Journal of Special Education, 27 , 16–21.

Vacchelli, E. (2018). Embodiment in qualitative research: Collage making with migrant, refugee and asylum seeking women. Qualitative Research, 18 (2), 171–190. https://doi.org/10.1332/policypress/9781447339069.003.0004

Waters, E., Stewart-Brown, S., & Fitzpatrick, R. (2003). Agreement between adolescent self-report and parent reports of health and well-being: Results of an epidemiological study. Child Care Health Development, 29 , 501–509. https://doi.org/10.1046/j.1365-2214.2003.00370.x

Watts, S., & Stenner, P. (2012). Doing Q methodological research: Theory, method and interpretation . Sage.

Book   Google Scholar  

Wester, K. L., & Trepal, H. C. (2004). Youth perceptions of bullying: Thinking outside the box. Operant Subjectivity, 27 , 68–83.

Woodhead, M., & Faulkner, D. (2008). Subjects, objects or participants? Dilemmas of psychological research. In P. Christensen & A. James (Eds.), Research with children (2nd ed., pp. 10–39). Routledge.

Wright, P. N. (2013). Is Q for you?: Using Q methodology within geographical and pedagogical research. Journal of Geography in Higher Education, 37 (2), 152–163. https://doi.org/10.1080/03098265.2012.729814

Download references

Open access funding provided by Malmö University.

Author information

Authors and affiliations.

Malmö University, Malmö, Sweden

Adrian Lundberg & Lisa Hellström

You can also search for this author in PubMed   Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Adrian Lundberg .

Ethics declarations

Ethics approval, consent to participate, consent for publication, conflict of interest.

The authors declare no competing interests.

Additional information

The original online version of this article was revised: References are not in alphabetical order.

Rights and permissions

Open Access This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article's Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article's Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this licence, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ .

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Lundberg, A., Hellström, L. Q Methodology as an Innovative Addition to Bullying Researchers’ Methodological Repertoire. Int Journal of Bullying Prevention 4 , 209–219 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s42380-022-00127-9

Download citation

Accepted : 26 April 2022

Published : 11 May 2022

Issue Date : September 2022

DOI : https://doi.org/10.1007/s42380-022-00127-9

Share this article

Anyone you share the following link with will be able to read this content:

Sorry, a shareable link is not currently available for this article.

Provided by the Springer Nature SharedIt content-sharing initiative

  • Bullying prevention
  • Children’s voice
  • Hard-to-reach
  • Methodological issues
  • Q methodology
  • Find a journal
  • Publish with us
  • Track your research

154 Bullying Topics & Bullying Essay Examples

Looking for an exciting research topic about bullying? This problem is very controversial, sensitive, and definitely worth studying

🏆 Top 10 Bullying Topics for Research Papers

📃 bullying essay: writing tips, 🏆 best bullying topics to write about, ⚡ most shocking bullying topics to write about, ✅ simple & easy shocking bullying essay titles, ✍️ bullying essay topics for college, ❓ research questions about bullying.

Examples of bullying can be found everywhere: in schools, workplaces, and even on the Internet (in the form of cyberbullying).

In this article, we’ve collected top bullying research paper topics and questions, as well as bullying essay samples and writing tips. Get inspired with us!

  • Direct and indirect bullying: compare & contrast
  • The causes of bullying
  • Classroom bullying and its effects
  • Social isolation as a form of bullying
  • Bullying and academic performance
  • Passive and active victims of bullying: compare and contrast
  • The role of social agencies in bullying prevention
  • Public policy for bullying and aggression
  • Bullying behavior and psychological health
  • Aggressive children and their family background

A bullying essay is a popular assignment in various subjects, including psychology, sociology, and education. Writing an excellent paper on the matter requires more than just in-depth research and planning. Don’t worry; there are some tips that will make writing an essay on bullying much easier:

  • Choose a topic that allows analyzing and interpreting the problem. Instead of merely describing what bullying is, try to dig deeper into its causes, consequences, and solutions. If your professor didn’t suggest any topics, you may research bullying essay topics online and select one that would be exciting for you to explore.
  • Read sample articles and papers online to see how other students approached the subject. Notice the bits that work and don’t work, and write them out to make the process of creating your essay easier. If you’re struggling with finding enough examples online, you may want to expand your search to discrimination essay topics and materials.
  • Research what scholars say about bullying. Articles in scholarly journals are an excellent source of information because they are usually trustworthy. If you’re still in school, your ability to navigate the library or online databases will also impress your tutor. As you start researching, you will find that there is a great variety of studies, and it’s challenging to find the relevant ones. Narrowing down your search would help you to do that. For instance, if you are writing a cyber bullying essay, try searching for social media bullying or online anti-bullying services.
  • Include real-life experiences where relevant. Unfortunately, bullying is a common problem in many institutions, and if you haven’t experienced it, your friends or family members probably have. If your tutor allows personal input, explore real-life experiences with bullying. Note the effects, preventive measures that worked or didn’t work, and what a person used to cope with bullying. If personal input is not allowed, you could ask your friends or relatives for ideas and then find high-quality sources that discuss similar problems.
  • If you can, be creative about it! A powerful bullying essay example draws from a variety of sources to present material in a creative way and engage readers. Hence, this might be an excellent opportunity for you to include images or graphs in your paper. For example, anti-bullying posters could complement the sections of your work that talks about solutions to the problem. Quotes about bullying coming from famous persons would also be influential, especially if you include them at the beginning of your piece. If you like drawing or painting, you could try to put some of your ideas in graphic form – this will definitely earn you some extra marks! Just make sure to check with your tutor to see whether or not creative input is allowed.
  • Structure your paper well to avoid gaps or inconsistencies. It would be beneficial to create a detailed bullying essay outline before you start working. A typical essay should include an introduction, two to three main paragraphs, and a conclusion. The first paragraph of your work should consist of some background information, whereas the last one should restate the points and close up the paper. A good bullying essay introduction should also feature a thesis statement that shows what the piece is about.

These tips will help you to write top-notch essays on bullying, as well as on related subjects. Don’t forget to browse our blog some more to find other helpful materials, including essay titles!

  • Troubled Adolescent due to Bullying His lowered self-esteem would make him to observe the common behaviours of the older boys quietly and accept the situation as a cultural practice.
  • The Issue of Bullying in the Schools It gives me joy to know that the issue of bullying is now a pubic affair since bullying stories were unheard of when I was growing up.
  • Bullying in the Schools Furthermore, the law states that training should be done to the teachers as well as the other members of staff on how to deal with bullying and the law also needs the schools to report […]
  • Character Traits of Bullying Despite the fact that such characteristics may differ from child to child, it is the common feature of difference that makes the target children get noticed by the bullies.
  • Bullying in School Face-to-face bullying is an interesting area of study because it clearly demonstrates bullying in school. Students consider bullying as a school culture even though it is contrary to the school rules and regulations of schools.
  • Bullying on the Rise: Should Federal Government Enact Federal-Bullying Laws? This paper will thus use both primary and secondary data to discuss the prevalence of bullying in schools and whether the federal govern should enact federal laws to curb the social vice at school.
  • 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.
  • The Problem of Bullying While most states in the United States of America have laws to protect people from bullying, the federal government is yet to enact an anti-bullying law.
  • 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.
  • Ban High School Bullying A number of stakeholders contribute to the high prevalence of bullying in American schools. Schools that ignore bullying are a big part of the problem and they need to be held accountable.
  • Does Bullying Cause Emotional Problems? However, the current study was relevant because of this design, for the scope of the study covered as well as the results were accurate, and the conclusions drawn were correct.
  • 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 […]
  • School Bullying: Causes and Police Prevention It is for this reason that there has been need for the intervention of the community and the government to address the issue of bullying schools lest the school environment becomes the worst place to […]
  • Problem of the Managing Bullying and Harassment in the Workplace Employees in an organization have a specific role that they are supposed to play and this means that there might be shortcomings which should not lead to bullying.
  • Problem of Childhood Bullying in Modern Society To begin with, the family which is the basic and the most important unit in the society as well as the primary socializing agent plays a major role in shaping behavior of children include bullying.
  • Is Cyber Bullying Against Teenagers More Detrimental Than Face-To-Face Bullying? Social networking has also contributed greatly to the issue of cyber bullying especially in making it more harmful as compared to face-to-face bullying.
  • Problem of Workplace Bullying Authority intervention should occur when the employees fail to respond to awareness intervention, and thus decide to continue with their behaviors.
  • Social Influence on Bullying in Schools The theory helps us to understand why the stronger members of the school population are likely to “rule” over the weaker members of the school as described in the social hierarchy concept in the theory.
  • 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.
  • 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.
  • Social Bullying in Jeff Cohen’s “Monster Culture” It is clear that his part of character is mostly dominant in the childhood stages, as children are not able to develop a sense of morality and predict the consequences of their actions.
  • Bullying in the Workplace Organizational leaders have an ethical obligation to ensure that they deal with cases of bullying within the workplace in a professional manner that demonstrates equality, honesty, and high sensitivity to the needs of others.
  • Bullying as a Relational Aggression This resistance has been one of the obstacles to eliminating the cyber bullying in the schools. Schools and districts have been involved in the Challenge Day activities where children are advised on how to handle […]
  • Bullying and Suicide Among Teenagers Specific objectives Analyze the causes of bullying among teenagers in the country Analyze the effects of bullying among victims, perpetrators and by-standers Analyze the relationship between bullying in school and suicide among teenagers in the […]
  • High School Bullying Effective Responses Emphasis will also be made on the kind of audience to read this article because the contents of this study need to be at par with other similar articles in the journal to be selected.
  • The Impact of Workplace Bullying The negative impacts of bullying in the workplace develop as a result of ignorance among employees regarding the vice, unreported cases, as well as the negligence of organizational leaders.
  • School Bullying: Methods for Managing the Problem The investigation of relevant studies on the methods for stopping school bullying reveals that the most effective ways of eliminating this type of behavior include providing training for teachers, encouraging students to participate in 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 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 […]
  • 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 […]
  • Nature of Bullying In this paper, central focus is going to be on the nature of bullying of children in my hometown, Orlando Florida, how it can be solved, and most importantly; establishing the importance of having knowledge […]
  • Bullying and Suicide: The Correlation Between Bullying and Suicide Nonetheless, the extensive research shows that the correlation exists and bullying is one of the risk factors for development of suicidal ideas in adolescents.
  • Bullying and Its Effects in Society Secondary research is critical in the development of a background to the research, which helps in determining the validity of the problem and suggested research methodologies.
  • Bullying and Child Development Bullying is one of the common vices in schools that influences a lot of growth and development of children. Bullying also affects the ability of children to concentrate in school because they are always on […]
  • Social Psychology of Violence and Bullying in Schools Bullying is a common phenomenon in schools and it is reported that it results in violence in learning institutions in the end.
  • Homosexual Students and Bullying Specifically, the section addresses the prevalence of bullying in schools and the level of bullying in bisexuals, gay males, and lesbians.
  • Social Psychological Concepts of Bullying and Its Types Some of the factors that contribute to bullying include poor parenting, economic challenges, lack of mentorship, and jealousy among others. One of the main concepts used to explain bullying is that of parenting roles and […]
  • College Students: Suicide and Bullying The misconception that bullying is a minor issue among college students has contributed to the high number of students who suffer because of bullying.
  • The Problem of Workplace Bullying In particular, this paper will include the discussion of the research articles, reports and case studies that describe the causes of workplace bullying and the strategies used by companies in an effort to overcome it.
  • Workplace Bullying and Its Impact on Performance Workplace bullying refers to a deliberate, repeated, and continuous mistreatment of a worker or a group of workers by one or more colleagues in the workplace.
  • Association of Parenting Factors With Bullying The lack of the parental support is the main cause of students’ deviant behaviors at school, including the cases of bullying, and those parents who pay much attention to developing their career cannot provide the […]
  • Girl-To-Girl Bullying and Mean Stinks Program The positive results can be achieved by the implementation of the multiple educational programs, the increase in public awareness, and promotion of the values of the healthy relationships.”Mean Stinks” is exactly the program with the […]
  • Childhood Bullying and Adulthood Suicide Connection In this regard, the seriousness of the issue is depicted in research results that indicate that at least 50% of children and youth in the US have experienced bullying situations as either bullies or victims […]
  • College Students: Suicide and Bullying-Methods The analysts used this tool to report the mood of the participants by posting quizzes, which the students answered while filling the questionnaire.
  • School-Aged Children’ Bullying Behaviors It is due to this that the work of Janssen et al.sought to show just how potentially damaging this behavior could be and the potential psychological repercussions it could have on young children due to […]
  • Bullying and Suicide in High Schools The main limitation of this research is that the scholars surveyed the victims more often. The victims of cyberbullying also had a tendency to be depressed and contemplate suicide.
  • Workplace Bullying in The Playground Never Ends The primary reason for becoming a bully is primarily seen in fear to lose authority or formal positions in an organization and have more institutional power than that of the targets.
  • School Bullying and Moral Development The middle childhood is marked by the development of basic literacy skills and understanding of other people’s behavior that would be crucial in creating effective later social cognitions. Therefore, addressing bullying in schools requires strategies […]
  • Bullying at Australian School: Causes and Solution The technological breakthrough that was witnessed in the late 90s and the early 2000s also contributed to the development of the phenomenon, sparking the concepts such as cyberbullying and online bullying.
  • Bullying and Legislation in Australian Workplace According to the authors of the article, workplace bullying can be characterized as internal violence. According to the authors of the article, bullying is a widespread phenomenon and is a common attribute of many organizations.
  • Bullying as Social and Criminal Deviance The most important step in the student’s guide to research that I would need to analyze bullying is defining the topic.
  • Bullying, Facts and Countermeasures Whether it is the bully or the bullied, the parents will need to do a lot to see to it that their children are brought up in the best of the behaviors.
  • Bullying in America: Causes and Prevention That is why it is important to pay attention to the reasons why bullying occurs and ways in which it can be reduced.
  • Amanda Todd’s Bullying and Suicide Story She was fifteen years old, and her story created a major uproar in the press, as it showed the true nature of bullying and the effects it has on the person.
  • Bullying Policies in Walton School District and Georgia University The sample bullying policy language in Walton School District is very similar to the language in the policy of the University of Georgia.
  • Dealing With Workplace Bullying According to the report presented by the University of Louisville, workplace bullying is a repeated action of one employee or a group of employees towards another individual or group. Dealing with bullying in the workplace […]
  • Fights and Bullying Among Middle School Learners Alongside the positivist philosophy, the research adopted the survey strategy that involved the use of self-administered questionnaires to collect from the participants.
  • Bullying and Its Impact Thus, the current paper is dedicated to the issue of bullying and its effects as well as anti-bullying practices as related to peer victimization.
  • Bullying Prevention Programs Some teachers and professors claim that their students cannot show their potential in their hobbies due to the limitations they experience because of bullies around them. As it is mentioned above, educators do not control […]
  • Bullying in Schools: Worldwide Study and Survey The parents were asked to rate the frequency of the bullying that their children experience and to describe the experience of bullying that their children went through.
  • Bullying in Schools and Its Major Reasons As of now, the most important goal in research studies covering the topic of bullying in schools is to understand the mechanisms behind bullying promotion and prevention.
  • Bullying and Cyberbullying Among Peers They are facing the dilemma of how to react, whether they have to fight a superior force of the enemy or to complain to teachers and parents, undermining their reputation.
  • Gender and Bullying Issues in Nursing A lack of tolerance for workplace harassment and bullying is likely to lead to the deterioration of the situation and further misunderstanding and tension in an organization.
  • Free Speech vs. Bullying Laws One of the topical aspects of modern democracy is the freedom of speech expressed in an ability to come up with personal ideas and the lack of restrictions on the right of expression through publicity.
  • The Problem of Bullying and Possible Solutions In general, bullying is a critical and complex issue prevailing among children; thus, it is essential to adopt different solutions to tackle it.
  • The “Bully-Free” Initiative: Bullying in Education The students need to have a clear idea that bullying goes against the rules of the school and which actions may be considered bullying.
  • Staff Training as a Solution to Workplace Bullying Furthermore, it has an appeal to logos as the writer has facts about the prevalence of workplace bullying in the USA.
  • Domestic Violence and Bullying in Schools It also states the major variables related to bullying in schools. They will confirm that social-economic status, gender, and race can contribute to bullying in schools.
  • Workplace Bullying in Australia It is possible to offer several recommendations that can reduce the risk of bullying in organisations. In this case, more attention should be paid to the absence of mechanisms that can protect the victims of […]
  • Workplace Bullying, Salivary Cortisol and Long-Term Sickness Absence The purpose of this cohort-based study was to investigate the extent to which cortisol levels were associated with sickness absence and the relationships between workplace bullying and sickness absence through the prism of cortisol use.
  • Anti-Bullying and Work Quality Improvement Initiative Given the specifics of the work of nurses, conflicts of this kind negatively affect both the whole process of work and the health of patients in particular.
  • The Long Term Effects of Bullying in Elementary School Wolke and Lereya argue that the problem is that the majority of studies on bullying are cross-sectional and only use follow-ups after a short period of time.
  • “Adolescents’ Perception of Bullying” by Frisen et al. The second and the third aims of the study were “to describe how adolescents perceive bullies” and “to describe what adolescents believe to be important in order to stop bullying”, respectively.
  • Bullying in the Workplace as a Psychological Harassment Another form of bullying in the workplace is physical assault in the sense that if the workers are not at ease with each other and when the rules and regulations are not at all observed, […]
  • School Bullying: Case Analysis Even today there is no generally accepted definition of bullying but it is thought that when an individual is for a long period of time is exposed to repeat negative actions and behavior by one […]
  • Conflict Resolution Tactics and Bullying This study is interesting to the extent that it shows how the social environment impacts the development of a child and how it shapes his or her conflict resolution techniques.
  • Cyber-Bullying Is a Crime: Discussion It is easy to see the effects of cyber-bullying but it is hard to find out who is the bully making it hard for authorities to pin the blame on the perpetrator of a crime […]
  • Behaviour Management: Bullying The typical behaviors which I saw in the child who got bullied are: The victim of this bullying is physically weak and a soft-natured one.
  • Bullying: History and Mechanisms for Prevention Students are encouraged to not participate in bullying and to help prevent bullying of others through positive social reactions to incidences of bullying” and Sharing of Scenarios: “Each group will give feedback and share other […]
  • Aggression and Bullying in the Workplace Investigation Aggression, the effects of which are often equated with the death wish, is an instinct like any other and in natural conditions, it helps just as much as any other to ensure the survival of […]
  • Bullying and Worker’s Harassment in Western Australia In most of the armed services in Australia, new recruits and women are commonly the victims of bullying and harassment despite the fact that it is unacceptable.
  • Human Rights Issues in Australia: Bullying Among School-Going Age and Young People The focus of the topic of the day is on bullying. It is used to prevent or avoid the occurrence of a bullying experience.
  • “Bullying Behavior Among Radiation Therapists” by Johnson and Trad The literature review encompassed a considerable number of sources pertinent to the study and recent enough to be relevant; all the publications were dated within the last fifteen years.
  • Workplace Bullying and Its Impact on People and Society The paper follows a traditional structure with the introduction and body paragraphs that provide essential information devoted to the problem, and improve the understanding of the concept of bullying.
  • Bullying of LGBTQ Students in American Schools The chosen article focuses on the issue of bullying of LGBTQ students in American schools and its legal repercussions. The author shows that students who are openly gay or bi, as well as those who […]
  • Psychology: Social Media and Bullying The purpose of this paper is to discuss the issue of social media and bullying and express the author’s opinion on the matter.
  • Protection From Bullying: Methods That Work Because of this, it is vital that parents, teachers, and guardians educate themselves on the nature of bullying and work together to develop effective methods and strategies that would help to overcome the problem.
  • Cyberbullying and Bullying: Similarities While deciding on fitting and balanced sanctions, it is vital to reflect on the ways in which cyberbullying events differ in effect in comparison to other forms of bullying.
  • 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.
  • Bullying in the Nursing Workplace Bullying in the nursing workplace, in this case, causes the one bullied to have a feeling of defenselessness and takes away the nurses’ right to dignity at his or her workplace.
  • Bullying and Peer Abuse Especially at work, targets fear coming to work and this will have an adverse result in the efficiency of the staff in the hospital.
  • Bullying in the Workplace Old Nurse to New Nurse This unvoiced scourge in nursing is characteristically encouraged by the need of bullies to have a total control of a person. Resignation of nurses due to bullying can lead to shortage of nurses in hospitals.
  • Cyber-Bullying vs. Traditional Bullying: Its Psychological Effects The researchers presented the recent statistics in order to illustrate the negative social and psychological effects of cyber-bullying in contrast to the traditional bullying in schools.
  • Injury and Violence Prevention: – Bullying The aim of preventing injury and violence from bullying is to enable the student to have a healthy social and physical life that will enable them to perform well in their studies and live healthily.
  • Programming for a Year 5 Class on Bullying As a result, in Lesson 6, they will offer their project addressing bullying behaviour and present it to their class, which is the main aim of the Unit Plan.
  • Bullying Perpetration Among School-Aged Children Mucherah et al.examined how the school climate and teachers’ sanctions against bullying relate to the risk of becoming a victim or perpetrator of bullying.
  • Workplace Bullying Among Nurses in the Acute Setting Since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, the frequency of conflicts between nurses and their colleagues and managers has increased significantly in my workplace.
  • Bullying in Healthcare Organizations: Impact on Nursing Practice Bullying in business entities is a common phenomenon, but the extent of its influence on the “production process” in healthcare and medicine institutions is only beginning to be recognized.
  • Verbal Bullying at School: How It Should Be Stopped This paper highlights some of the best practices that can be used by teachers in order to address this problem. So, this information can be of great benefit to them.
  • Bullying of Nurses During the COVID-19 Pandemic Then, the principles of adult learning will be used to develop and implement an information product to improve the nursing workforce’s bullying awareness and the knowledge of healthy conflict resolution in the workplace.
  • Bullying Through Social Media In particular, inequality in the position of the persecutor and the victim is evident – the aggressor can be anonymous, and there can be many of them.
  • Bullying Through Social Media: Research Proposal The hypothesis of the study is as follows: the role of adolescents in a cyberbullying situation is interconnected with their psychological characteristics.
  • Bullying Through Social Media: Methods An Informed Consent Document will be provided to participants prior to the research, explaining the purpose of the study and promising to protect their identity.
  • An Anti-Bullying Program Integrated With PRAISE by Ackerman I chose to describe bullying because of the importance of the topic and due to my personal interest in it. Education will eliminate most of the reasons for bullying and provide students with the E […]
  • Bullying Management: Mass Awareness Program Bulletin.”Teachers, trained to help to rebuild trust, confidence, growth, and commitment through mass awareness to arrest bullying in high schools”. The proposed mass action program is meant to promote awareness on the need to stop […]
  • Hate Crimes – Bullying More than two-thirds of children and adolescents experience bullying and more than one-fourth of them report extreme forms of coercion.
  • Analysis of Bullying and Parenting Style Since the given topic usually refers to children and adolescents, it is evident that their parents hold a portion of responsibility because the adults affect the growth and development of young individuals.
  • Moral Development and Bullying in Children The understanding of moral development following the theories of Kohlberg and Gilligan can provide useful solutions to eliminating bullying in American schools.
  • “Bullying in Schools”: The Aspects of Bullying In their article, Menesini and Salmivalli examine the current state of knowledge on the topic and thoroughly discuss all of the aspects of bullying.
  • Bullying on Social Media Platforms It is consistent and repeating, taking advantage of the Internet’s anonymity with the main goal to anger, scare, or shame a victim.
  • Overview of the Problem of Bullying Undoubtedly, there is no way each person would be able to share and divide their opinion with everyone else because people are not identical, and they tend to have various perspectives.
  • Bullying and Its Influences on a Person It is common for victims of bullying to develop mental health issues, as they were placed in stressful situations and had a constant fear along with depression in some cases. Making friends is one of […]
  • Bullying and Incivility in Clinical Setting The problem of bullying and incivility in a clinical setting can negatively affect the quality of care provided, so it needs to be managed.
  • Bullying Behavior and Impact of Hegemonic Masculinity Rosen and Nofziger applied a quantitative research design to explore the relationships between students’ bullying experiences and race, age, and socioeconomic status and identify the frequency of bullying.
  • Bullying of Children: Misconceptions and Preventive Measures As a result, the density of shows and articles devoted to bullying creates an illusion that this event appears more often than it does in reality.
  • Queer (LGBT) Teenage Bullying at School The importance of this source to the research is associated with the significant role that youth organizations have to play towards minimizing bullying among LGBT students.
  • The ABC Model of Crisis: Bullying at School The next step is the identification of the nature of the crisis, and thus questions are as follows: Who is bullying you?
  • Bullying in Healthcare and Its Consequences Nancy was big and the manager used that to tease her every opportunity she got. It was important to confront the bully and support the victim.
  • Bullying and Harassment in the Healthcare Workplace This paper is written to explore the origins of discrimination and harassment in the healthcare workplace. Bullying begins early in medical college and residencies; it has been referred to as an element of the learning […]
  • Sexual Bullying in Schools and Its Influence The author states the difference in the mental and physical maturation of girls and boys as one of the core roots of the issue.
  • Eliminating the Problem of Online Bullying Eliminating the problem of online bullying is vital for improving the mental health of adolescents and young adults and allowing them to build their lives free of adverse external influences. It is possible to see […]
  • Bullying and Autism Spectrum Disorder In fact, bullying as a social phenomenon can be characterized as a social and interaction issue; therefore, it is possible to analyze the connection between autism and acts of bullying and inappropriate behavior.
  • Racist Bullying Among Black Students in US Universities This research focuses on the impact of bullying and racism among African American students in the country. What are the impacts of bullying and racism among Black students in U.S.universities?
  • Active Shooter and Nursing Bullying Nurses should lock all doors and use tables and other objects to reinforce them to prevent any possibility of the active shooter getting to the patients’ room.
  • How to Reduce Bullying in Senior Facilities One of the main reasons an individual may commit suicide due to bullying is because it may make an individual develop a negative self-image after the bullying incident. Some of the major bullying incidences that […]
  • Network Bullying: School Policy Framework The first step is to have a careful conversation with the student and an assessment by the school psychologist to ensure that there is a fright.
  • Bullying in Nursing: Preventive Measures The prevention of bullying within the workplace is the responsibility of the leaders and managers. One of the significant principles which the leaders can implement is the behavioral code for the employees.
  • The Gay Teen Suicide & Bullying The article explains that the ones who survive may have access to extensive facilities, support, and status beyond their world of bullies, which sounds reasonable for me.
  • Effective Ways to Deal With Bullying in US Schools Teachers should ensure the bully is aware of the improper behavior, why it is improper, and the repercussions of the behavior.
  • Incivility, Violence, and Bullying in the Healthcare Workplace The following step is to gather the team and communicate the necessity of change, assigning some individuals for the positions related to the change, in other terms, a support team.
  • Bullying, Its Forms, and Counteractions In addition, it is necessary to support those at the center of this bullying, as this can protect them from harmful effects and consequences.
  • Bullying and Cyberbullying in Modern Society Cyberbullying among adolescents and teenagers is defined as the purposeful and repetitive harm done by one or more peers in cyberspace as a result of using digital devices and social media platforms.
  • Bullying: Violence in Children and Adolescents Bullying is one of the most common manifestations of peer violence in children and adolescents. Prevention of bullying, cyberbullying included, has to occur in accordance with the IBSE Standards of social and emotional learning.
  • The Essence of Bullying: Healthy Societal Relations The aggressor frequently abuses the victim’s lower social standing to gain control of the situation and cause harm, which is another characteristic of the phenomenon.
  • Workplace bullying: does it exist?
  • What are the three key elements of bullying?
  • How does bullying affect those who observe it?
  • Direct and indirect bullying: what is the difference?
  • What families do bullies typically come from?
  • Aggressive children: what is their future?
  • How to prevent bullying in schools?
  • School bullying and domestic violence: is there a connection?
  • Cyberbullying: how to prevent it?
  • What can parents do to prevent their children from bullying?
  • Chicago (A-D)
  • Chicago (N-B)

IvyPanda. (2024, February 22). 154 Bullying Topics & Bullying Essay Examples. https://ivypanda.com/essays/topic/bullying-essay-examples/

"154 Bullying Topics & Bullying Essay Examples." IvyPanda , 22 Feb. 2024, ivypanda.com/essays/topic/bullying-essay-examples/.

IvyPanda . (2024) '154 Bullying Topics & Bullying Essay Examples'. 22 February.

IvyPanda . 2024. "154 Bullying Topics & Bullying Essay Examples." February 22, 2024. https://ivypanda.com/essays/topic/bullying-essay-examples/.

1. IvyPanda . "154 Bullying Topics & Bullying Essay Examples." February 22, 2024. https://ivypanda.com/essays/topic/bullying-essay-examples/.

Bibliography

IvyPanda . "154 Bullying Topics & Bullying Essay Examples." February 22, 2024. https://ivypanda.com/essays/topic/bullying-essay-examples/.

  • Cyber Bullying Essay Ideas
  • Abuse Research Topics
  • Crime Ideas
  • Discrimination Essay Titles
  • Criticism Research Topics
  • Social Democracy Essay Titles
  • Child Abuse Essay Topics
  • Children’s Rights Research Ideas
  • Equality Topics
  • Homophobia Topics
  • School Violence Ideas
  • Respect Essay Topics
  • Social Inequality Paper Topics
  • Suicide Topics
  • Youth Violence Research Topics
  • Bullying and Crime Research Paper

Academic Writing Service

This sample bullying research paper on bullying and crime features: 4300 words (approx. 22 pages) and a bibliography with 22 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.

School bullying has received the attention of researchers and program planners in both developed and developing countries. It is a special category of aggressive behavior that has been addressed through numerous anti-bullying programs and, in some cases, through wider multiple component programs. Various anti-bullying agencies have highlighted the importance of intervention research for the development of safer school communities, where students can develop their full potential without being exposed to bullying and its detrimental effects. A vast number of cross-sectional studies have provided evidence of the negative impact of bullying on children’s concurrent health.

Academic Writing, Editing, Proofreading, And Problem Solving Services

Get 10% off with 24start discount code.

This research paper reports on an updated systematic review and meta-analysis that was undertaken under the aegis of the Swedish National Council for Crime Prevention and further supported by the British Academy and conducted by the current authors. Only longitudinal prospective studies were included in the review, which aimed to examine to what extent school bullying predicts later offending and violence. Significant effect sizes were found even after controlling for other major childhood risk factors. Being a bully increased the likelihood of being an offender by more than half and increased the likelihood of being violent by two thirds. These results either reflect the persistence of an underlying aggressive or antisocial tendency or a facilitating effect of school bullying on later offending and violence (or both).

The implication is that high quality bullying prevention programs (and possibly multiple component programs which also target aggression) should be promoted. They could be viewed as an early form of crime prevention. They can potentially have long-term effects by improving the future psychosocial adjustment of school bullies and reducing the associated health, welfare, education, and other costs.

Introduction

School bullying has recently become a topic of major public concern and has attracted a lot of media attention, with articles in major newspapers and magazines reporting cases of children who committed (or attempted) suicide because of their victimization at school and parents suing school authorities for their failure to protect their offspring from continued bullying victimization (e.g., Ttofi and Farrington 2012). There is, nevertheless, a number of “skeptics” who still perceive school bullying as being part of a normal developmental process, or as one of those school experiences that prepare children for the grown-up world. Scientific evidence regarding possible detrimental effects of school bullying on children’s mental health and future psychosocial adjustment can only be provided through a systematic review and meta-analysis, providing an unbiased standardized effect size and defining the magnitude of the effect.

Background Research on Bullying and Crime

School bullying is a special category of aggressive behavior involving repeated unprovoked acts against less powerful (emotionally or physically) individuals (Farrington 1993; Olweus 1993). Of course, schools, like other institutions, will always be a place in which the basic human motive of aggression will be demonstrated. However, school bullying should not be confused with more or less normal aggressive interactions such as rough and tumble play.

Scientific interest in the problem of bullying and its negative short-term and long-term effects emerged after the well-publicized suicides of three Norwegian boys in 1982, which were attributed to severe peer bullying (Olweus 1993). School bullying has gradually become a topic of major public concern via “bullying awareness days,” national initiatives in various (European) countries (Smith and Brain 2000), and anti-bullying research networks across the world (e.g., Anti-Bullying Alliance; BRNET; International Observatory for Violence in Schools; PREVNet).

Any suggestion regarding the short-term negative impact of peer aggression and victimization seems reasonable even to the lay mind. Establishing, on the other hand, the long-term effects of school bullying and arguing that children involved in peer aggression are more likely to follow an antisocial path (compared with noninvolved students) is more challenging. Some early longitudinal studies did provide evidence of the long-term impact of school bullying and, notably, established the intergenerational transmission of school bullying. In the Cambridge Study in Delinquent Development, for example, boys who were bullies at age fourteen tended, at age thirty-two, to have children who were bullies (Farrington 1993). As another example, in his follow-up study of over 700 Stockholm boys, Olweus (1993) reported that 36 % of bullies at ages thirteen to sixteen were convicted three or more times between ages sixteen and twenty-four, compared with 10 % of the remainder.

There have been surprisingly few recently published longitudinal studies on the developmental pathways of children involved in school bullying since the seminal work of Olweus in Scandinavia and some other European examples. Two special issues in peer-reviewed journals have recently been published in an attempt to address this gap in research literature (Farrington et al. 2011; Ttofi et al. 2011a). Both issues presented new findings on the long-term negative consequences of school bullying based on major prospective longitudinal studies from around the world. Longitudinal investigators of twenty-nine studies conducted analyses for a more comprehensive British Academy funded project, which examined the long-term association of school bullying with both internalizing (such as anxiety, self-esteem, and stress) and externalizing (such as aggression, alcohol, and drug use) problems (see Farrington et al. 2012, Table 4, for a list of all contributors).

The special issue of Criminal Behaviour and Mental Health focused on the association between bullying perpetration at school and offending later in life. A systematic review and meta-analysis on the topic was carried out (Ttofi et al. 2011c). The special issue of the Journal of Aggression, Conflict and Peace Research focused on the association between bullying victimization (i.e., being bullied) and internalizing problems later in life, such as anxiety and depression. A systematic review and meta-analysis was again carried out examining the extent to which bullying victimization at school predicted depression (Ttofi et al. 2011b), showing that the probability of being depressed up to seven years later in life (M = 7.13 years; SD = 8.79) was significantly higher for victims of school bullying than for control students, i.e., children not involved in school bullying.

Building upon the above-mentioned research activities, an effort was made to update the relevant systematic reviews (Farrington et al. 2012) and to study further outcomes, such as violence (Ttofi et al. 2012). This research paper presents results from the updated systematic review on the association of school bullying with offending later in life. Additional analyses are presented on the long-term link of bullying with violence.

Bullying and Crime Research Methods

The main objectives of the systematic review were two-fold. Firstly, to assess whether bullying at school (perpetration and victimization) was a significant risk factor predicting offending and violence later in life (unadjusted effect sizes). Secondly, to assess whether these associations were still significant after controlling for other major childhood risk factors, measured at the baseline period (adjusted effect sizes). Results on offending and violence were carefully treated in separate analyses and the outcome measures under each category generally did not overlap. However, it is possible that in some studies, outcome measures such as “police arrests” would include violence. “Offending” included outcome measures such as police or court contact, property offending, criminal convictions, property theft, vandalism, shoplifting, vehicle theft, etc. “Violence” included outcome measures such as forced sexual contact, criminal violence, physical fights, violent convictions, violent offending, weapon carrying, assault, etc.

Further analyses were conducted to investigate moderators that might explain variability in effect sizes, such as the age at which bullying was measured (Time 1), the age at which the outcome measures were taken (Time 2), the number of covariates controlled for in the adjusted effect sizes, the length of the follow-up period (measured in years), and the way in which the outcomes were measured (i.e., official data versus self-reports).

Stringent inclusion and exclusion criteria were set in advance. For example, reports were included only if they were based on prospective longitudinal data. The predictor must have been a measure of school bullying (and not other more general forms of peer aggression/victimization) and must have preceded the outcome (i.e., offending or violence). A clear measurement of offending and/or violence must have been included in the report as an outcome measure. Studies were included if participants were school-aged children in the community and exposure to bullying (perpetration and victimization) specified the school years. Published and unpublished reports of the literature were included in order to minimize the possibility of publication bias in the results.

Reports were excluded if the character of the data was qualitative in nature (e.g., qualitative data based on interviews) and did not allow calculation of an effect size. This did not apply if a qualitative method (e.g., interviews or observation studies) was used to obtain a quantitative measure. If the outcome measure (offending or violence) was part of a wider theoretical construct (e.g., externalizing or antisocial behavior), then the relevant report was again excluded. Reports based on clinic samples or incarcerated youth were also excluded.

Extensive searches were carried out and a detailed description of them can be found in the Swedish report (Farrington et al. 2012) and the most recent work focusing on violent outcomes (Ttofi et al. 2012). In total, the same searching strategies were repeated in 19 electronic databases, and the full volumes of 63 journals were searched either online or in print. In the Swedish report, readers can also find detailed tables of the key features of each report, such as the sample size, the country where the study took place, the exact confounds controlled for at the baseline period, etc.

Bullying and Crime Research Results

In total, 661 reports concerned with the association of school bullying with internalizing (e.g., anxiety, depression, self-esteem, etc.) and externalizing (e.g., aggressive behavior, conduct problems, offending, etc.) problems were located. All reports were screened in line with the inclusion and exclusion criteria and classified in five different categories (see Farrington et al. 2012, Table 5). Further to a detailed screening of all manuscripts, a total number of 48 reports, corresponding to 29 longitudinal studies, presented data on the long-term association of school bullying (perpetration and victimization) with offending in adolescence or young adulthood (see Farrington et al. 2012, Table 6). A total number of 51 reports from 28 longitudinal studies were included in the systematic review on the association of school bullying (perpetration and victimization) with violence in adolescence or young adulthood (see Ttofi et al. 2012, Table 1).

When different manuscripts relating to the same longitudinal study reported different effect sizes (because of differences, e.g., in the sample size or in the follow-up period that the authors have used), the combination of effect sizes across reports is not straightforward as these effect sizes are based on dependent samples. These dependencies were taken into account, as ignoring them would result in standard errors that were too small, often by a large degree. Advice from leading experts in the field was sought on this matter (Wilson 2010). Clear rules were set in advance for computing effect sizes across reports from the same longitudinal study (see Farrington et al. 2012; Ttofi et al. 2012).

Bullying Perpetration At School And Offending Later In Life

Eighteen studies provided an effect size for bullying perpetration versus offending. The summary unadjusted effect size across the 18 studies was OR = 2.64 (95 % CI: 2.17–3.20; z = 9.83) for the random-effects model. The random-effects model was used since the heterogeneity test, Q, of 84.89 was highly significant at p = 0.0001. When the three studies with only unadjusted effect sizes were excluded, the summary effect size for the remaining 15 studies – for the random-effects model – was O= 2.54 (95 % CI: 2.05–3.14, z=8.52). Again, there was significant variability in effect sizes across these studies (Q =76.03, p ¼ 0.0001).

After controlling for covariates, the adjusted summary effect size was reduced to OR=1.89 (95 % CI: 1.60–2.23; z =7.49) but this was still highly significant (see Farrington et al. 2012; Figs. 3 and 4). This OR indicates quite a strong relationship between bullying perpetration and later offending. For example, if a quarter of children were bullies and a quarter were offenders, this value of the OR would correspond to 34.5 % of bullies becoming offenders, compared with 21.8 % of non-bullies. Thus, being a bully increases the risk of being an offender (even after controlling for other childhood risk factors) by more than half.

For the adjusted summary effect size, various moderators were investigated to explain the heterogeneity in effect sizes across studies, which was significant (Q= 36.82, p=0.001). These included the number of covariates controlled for at baseline (range: 1–20; M= 7.00; SD=5.22), the age at which school bullying was measured (range: 6.23–15.54; M =11.26; SD=2.68), the age of participants when outcome measures were taken (range: 10.00–24.64; M = 17.10; SD = 4.91), and the length of the follow-up period, measured in years (range: 0.42–16.50; M = 5.84; SD = 4.56).

The age at which bullying was measured was positively associated with the effect size, but the regression coefficient was not statistically significant (B = 0.019, SE = 0.024, p= 0.428). The length of the follow-up period was significantly negatively associated with the effect size (B =- 0.027, SE = 0.012, p = 0.018). As expected, the age of the study participants when outcome measures were taken was significantly negatively related to the effect size (B = -0.025, SE = 0.012, p = 0.039). The above two negative relationships suggest that bullying perpetration has a stronger effect in the short term. The relationship between the number of covariates controlled for and the effect size was in the expected negative direction and also significant (B = – 0.027, SE = 0.013, p = 0.037). Therefore, the adjusted effect size decreased as the number of covariates controlled for increased.

Other moderators that may explain variability in effect sizes include the type of longitudinal studies (i.e., prospective versus retrospective) and the way in which the outcomes were measured (i.e., official data versus self-reports). In the Farrington et al. (2012) report, the reader can obtain information about these moderators (see their Table 6). Only three studies out of fifteen presented outcome measures based on official records for offending, making a moderator analysis inappropriate (due to uneven study numbers). Finally, only one study presented results based on a retrospective measure of bullying victimization, so any analyses on this matter would be meaningless.

If the studies included in a meta-analysis are a biased sample of all relevant studies, then the mean effect computed will reflect this bias (Borenstein et al. 2009, p. 277). It is clear from our thorough searching strategies that every precaution was taken to ensure that all eligible studies would be represented in the meta-analysis. In order to further increase the validity of the meta-analysis findings, a number of publication bias analyses were carried out.

Firstly, the Duval and Tweedie’s Trim-andFill procedure was used. This technique displays the differences in effect sizes that could be attributable to bias by imputing effect sizes until the error distribution more closely approximates normality, offering the best estimate of the unbiased effect size (Borenstein et al. 2009, p. 286). No imputed effect sizes appeared on the relevant funnel plot (they would have been presented as solid black dots; see Farrington et al. 2012, Fig. 6), indicating no publication bias. The imputed summary effect size (represented by a solid black diamond) had not shifted at all.

Indeed, under the fixed effect model, the point estimate and 95 % confidence interval for the combined studies was 1.86 (95 % CI: 1.71–2.03). Using Trim-and-Fill procedure, these values remained unchanged. Under the random-effects model, the point estimate and 95 % confidence interval for the combined studies was 1.89 (95 % CI: 1.60–2.23). Using Trim-and-Fill procedure, these values were again unchanged.

Furthermore, Rosenthal’s Fail-Safe N test (Rosenthal 1979) was conducted. One concern of publication bias is that some nonsignificant studies are missing from a given analysis and that these studies, if included, would nullify the observed effect. Rosenthal suggested that, rather than simply speculate about the impact of the missing studies, we compute the number of nonsignificant studies that would be required to nullify the effect. If this number is small, then there is reason for concern because some nonsignificant studies may have been never communicated to the scientific community (e.g., due to “publication bias”). However, if this number is large, one can be confident that the treatment effect, while possibly inflated by the exclusion of some studies, is nevertheless not zero.

Bullying Perpetration At School And Violence Later In Life

A total number of 15 studies were concerned with the association of bullying perpetration with aggression and violence later in life. The unadjusted summary effect size across these studies was OR = 3.09 (95 % CI: 2.35–4.07; z = 8.10). For one study, only an unadjusted effect size was available. The unadjusted effect size for the remaining 14 studies was OR = 2.97 (95 % CI: 2.25–3.92; z = 7.71; Q = 151.81, p =0.0001; I2 = 91.44). All individual studies yielded a significant effect size (see Ttofi et al. 2012, Fig. 1). After controlling for covariates, the adjusted summary effect size was reduced to OR = 2.04 (95 % CI: 1.69–2.45; z = 7.53) but this was still highly significant (see Ttofi et al. 2012, Fig. 2). This OR indicates quite a strong relationship between bullying perpetration and later violence. For example, if a quarter of children were bullies and a quarter were violent, this value of OR would correspond to 35.8 % of bullies becoming violent, compared with 21.4 % of non-bullies. Thus, being a bully increases the risk of being violent (even after controlling for other childhood risk factors) by two thirds.

Although all individual studies yielded an effect size supporting the link between school bullying and aggression/violence later in life, the magnitude and the significance of the effect varied across these studies. Various moderator analyses were conducted in order to explain this variability (Q = 75.801, p = 0.0001, I2 = 82.85). These included the number of covariates controlled for at baseline (range: 2–20; M = 6.93; SD = 5.25), the age at which school bullying was measured (range: 8.00–15.54; M = 12.04; SD = 2.35), the age of participants when outcome measures were taken (range: 10.00–24.64; M = 17.65; SD = 4.83), and the length of the follow-up period, measured in years (range: 0.42–16.50; M = 5.61; SD = 4.88).

The age of participants when bullying was measured was significantly negatively correlated with the effect size (B = 0.065; SE = 0.021; p=0.002), suggesting that the younger the children were when they exhibited this form of problem behavior, the more likely it was that they would be violent later in life. The age of participants when outcome measures were taken was also significantly negatively related to the effect size (B = – 0.033; SE = 0.009; p = 0.0005). In other words, the lower the age of the participants when aggression or violence was measured, the larger the effect, possibly because this was associated with a shorter follow-up period. This is consistent with the significant negative association between the length of follow-up period and the magnitude of the effect size (B = – 0.017; SE = 0.009; p = 0.051). As expected, the magnitude of the effect size decreased as the number of confounds controlled for increased (B = – 0.013; Intercept = 0.668; SE = 0.010; p = 0.185), but the relevant regression coefficient was not significant.

As with the previous meta-analysis, a number of sensitivity analyses were conducted. Firstly, the Duval and Tweedie’s Trim-and-Fill procedure was performed. Three imputed effect sizes appeared on the relevant funnel plot (see Ttofi et al. 2012, Fig. 3) and the imputed summary effect size (represented by a solid black diamond) had shifted slightly, suggesting a trivial overestimation of the summary effect size.

As already mentioned, the difference was very small. Under the fixed effect model, the point estimate and 95 % confidence interval for the combined studies was 1.83 (95 % CI: 1.71–1.95). Using Trim-and-Fill procedure, the imputed point estimate was 1.76 (95% CI: 1.65–1.88). Under the random-effects model, the point estimate and 95 % confidence interval for the combined studies was 2.04 (95% CI: 1.69–2.45). Using Trim-and-Fill procedure, the imputed point estimate was 1.77 (95 % CI: 1.45–2.16).

Finally, the Rosenthal’s Fail-Safe N test was performed. This meta-analysis incorporated data from 14 studies, which yielded a z-value of 17.12216 and corresponding 2-tailed p-value of 0.000001. The fail-safe N is 1055. This means that one would need to locate and include 1055 “null” studies in order for the combined 2-tailed p-value to exceed 0.050. Put another way, 75.4 missing studies would be needed for every observed study for the effect to be nullified. It is impossible that such a large number of studies were conducted but not published or not included in our analysis.

Further Findings

Further analyses were performed to examine the association of bullying victimization with later offending before (Unadjusted OR =1.32; 95 % CI: 1.13–1.55, z = 3.40) and after controlling for other major childhood risk factors (Adjusted OR = 1.14; 95 % CI: 0.997–1.310, z=1.91) and relevant forest plots are shown in the Farrington et al. (2012) report (see Figs. 11 and 12). This was a very weak relationship. Moderator analyses and publication bias analyses similar to those presented in the current entry were also presented in that report.

Finally, analyses were performed to examine the association of bullying victimization with later violence before (Unadjusted OR = 1.65; 95 % CI: 1.42–1.92; z = 6.48) and after (Adjusted OR = 1.42; 95 % CI: 1.248–1.6172; z = 5.3117) controlling for covariates (see Ttofi et al. 2012, Figs. 4 and 5). Again, moderator analyses and publication bias analyses similar to those presented in the current entry are also presented in that report.

Sensitivity analyses were performed for these two sets of meta-analyses and the results showed in general no evidence of publication bias (see Farrington et al. 2012; Ttofi et al. 2012).

Possible Controversies In The Literature

The results of these systematic reviews and meta-analyses suggest that there are long-term detrimental effects of school bullying on later offending and violence. This was even the case when confounded variables that are risk factors for bullying or victimization as well as the undesirable outcomes were controlled for. Therefore, one can conclude that school bullying is an independent predictor of the later psychosocial development of perpetrators as well as of victims. It is the first time that this conclusion is not only based on a few selected primary studies and narrative reviews, but, instead, on comprehensive meta-analyses of prospective longitudinal studies that included new data from a substantial body of yet unpublished research. The findings remained robust in sensitivity analyses testing potential publication biases, of which there was no sign.

The relation of bullying perpetration with later offending and violence might reflect the persistence of an underlying disposition for antisocial behavior that has different manifestations over time (Farrington 1993; Lo¨ sel and Bliesener 2003). However, as the relation remained after controlling for other childhood risk factors, bullying perpetration may also increase the likelihood of later offending and violence.

Of course, one should acknowledge that any direct mention of causality should be carefully treated. Although most studies use bullying as the predictor of later outcomes, implying in this way a specific temporal sequence, alternative models have been suggested. Very few bullying studies have examined alternative models on whether bullying is a cause or a consequence of psychopathologic behavior (e.g., Boulton et al. 2010; Kim et al. 2006). This is not a trivial matter and it would shed more light on the temporal sequence and the causal ordering between bullying and other internalizing or externalizing behaviors. The substantial adjusted effect size for victimization versus later depression found in a previous meta-analysis (Farrington et al. 2012; Ttofi et al. 2011b), for example, suggests in a way that the frequent internalizing symptoms of victims are not only a trigger for being bullied, but a psychological consequence.

Systematic reviews on risk factors are important as they can advance theory and also help to develop effective prevention programs (Murray et al. 2009). For example, it would be interesting to examine whether victims of bullying suffer from low self-esteem or whether school bullies lack cognitive or affective empathy. Such findings, based on relevant systematic reviews, could guide future intervention initiatives, while also refining theory about the causes of bullying perpetration and victimization.

Open Questions And Future Research Directions

In the current meta-analysis, studies were included and analyzed based on “level analyses.” Levels of bullying perpetration were compared with later levels of offending and violence. It would also have been interesting to complete a systematic review on “change analyses,” examining whether changes in bullying from Time 1 to Time 2 are followed by changes in an outcome from Time 2 to Time 3. However, there are hardly any studies on this matter, since such analyses would require relevant data from multiple waves. Such analyses would allow, to an extent, making safer inferences about causality, although change data are subject to greater variability than level data. Systematic reviews of longitudinal studies which control for confounded variables can give some hints on whether variables are simple correlational risk factors, risk markers, or causal risk factors (Kraemer et al. 2005).

Future research should also examine possible gender-specific and ethnic-specific effects of bullying on later violent behavior and offending. Such information was hardly ever available in the current literature. To investigate and disentangle the impact of these and other variables on the relation between bullying and later outcomes, more longitudinal studies with a sound control for childhood risk factors are needed. The results of meta-regression analyses were not always as expected in the meta-analyses for the British Academy project on “Health and Criminal Outcomes of School Bullying” because of the large differences in the type of covariates researchers controlled for. However, one should note that the lack of a sufficient number of studies with consistent patterns of characteristics is a typical problem in meta-analyses (Lipsey 2003).

Future research should also examine mediators or possible causal mechanisms between school bullying and the various outcomes. The underlying mechanisms, for example, may be the reinforcement obtained by dominating others and the development of an identity as a “bully” that goes beyond the school context.

Conclusions

This is the first time that research has provided an unbiased standardized effect size regarding the predictive efficiency of school bullying in relation to violence and offending later in life. The significant summary effect sizes have important implications for policy and practice as they give a stronger voice to anti-bullying agencies and reestablish the moral imperative of school communities to create an appropriate violence-free school climate.

High quality bullying prevention programs should be promoted (Farrington and Ttofi 2009; Ttofi and Farrington 2011). They could be viewed as an early form of crime prevention. These programs can potentially have long-term effects by improving the future psychosocial adjustment of school bullies and reducing the associated health, welfare, education, and other costs. The effectiveness of other school-based programs for the prevention of problem behaviors has been examined through thorough systematic reviews (e.g., Wilson et al. 2001) and it is possible that such programs, or other general multicomponent programs, might have positive effects in reducing aggression and bullying behavior.

Previous research has provided strong evidence about the monetary value of saving high-risk youth (Cohen and Piquero 2009). Children involved in school bullying are undoubtedly youth at risk, with significantly higher probabilities of following an antisocial path. What remains unanswered is the identification of protective factors that interrupt the continuity from school bullying to later adverse outcomes and confer resiliency on this special category of high-risk youth (Ttofi and Farrington 2012).

Bibliography:

  • Borenstein M, Hedges LV, Julian PTH, Rothstein HR (2009) Introduction to meta-analysis. Willey, Chichester
  • Boulton MJ, Smith PK, Cowie H (2010) Short-term longitudinal relationships between children’s peer victimization/bullying experiences and self-perceptions: evidence for reciprocity. School Psychol Int 31(3):296–311
  • Cohen MA, Piquero AR (2009) New evidence on the monetary value of saving a high risk youth. J Quant Criminol 25:25–49
  • Farrington DP (1993) Understanding and preventing bullying. In: Tonry M (ed) Crime and justice, vol 17. University of Chicago Press, Chicago
  • Farrington DP, Ttofi MM (2009) School-based programs to reduce bullying and victimization. Campbell Systematic Reviews 6
  • Farrington DP, Ttofi MM, Losel F (2011) Editorial: school bullying and later offending. Crim Behav Mental Health 21(2):77–79
  • Farrington DP, Losel F, Ttofi MM, Theodorakis N (2012) School bullying, depression and offending behaviour later in life: an updated systematic review of longitudinal studies. Swedish National Council for Crime Prevention, Stockholm
  • Kim YS, Leventhal BL, Koh Y-J, Hubbard A, Boyce TW (2006) School bullying and youth violence: causes or consequences of psychopathologic behavior? Arch Gen Psychiat 63:1035–1041
  • Kraemer HC, Lowe KK, Kupfer DJ (2005) To your health: how to understand what research tells us about risks. Oxford University Press, New York
  • Lipsey MW (2003) Those confounded moderators in meta-analysis: good, bad, and ugly. Ann Am Acad Polit Soc Sci 587(1):69–81
  • Losel F, Bliesener T (2003) Aggression und delinquenz unter jugendlichen: Untersuchungen von kognitiven und sozialen Bedingunger. Luchterhand, Hermann
  • Murray J, Farrington DP, Eisner MP (2009) Drawing conclusions about causes from systematic reviews of risk factors: the Cambridge quality checklists. J Exp Criminol 5(1):1–23
  • Olweus D (1993) Bullying at school: what we know and what we can do. Blackwell, Oxford
  • Rosenthal R (1979) The “File drawer problem” and tolerance for null results. Psychological Bulletin 86:638– 641.
  • Smith PK, Brain P (2000) Bullying in schools: lessons from two decates of research. Aggressive Behavior 26:1–9
  • Ttofi MM, Farrington DP (2011) Effectiveness of school-based programs to reduce bullying: a systematic and meta-analytic review. J Exp Criminol 7(1):27–56
  • Ttofi MM, Farrington DP (2012) Risk and protective factors, longitudinal research and bullying prevention. New Direct Youth Develop 133:85–98
  • Ttofi MM, Farrington DP, Losel F (2011a) Editorial: health consequences of school bullying. J Aggress Conflict Peace Res 3(2):60–62
  • Ttofi MM, Farrington DP, Losel F, Loeber R (2011b) Do the victims of school bullies tend to become depressed later in life? A systematic review and meta-analysis of longitudinal studies. J Aggress Conflict Peace Res 3(2):63–73
  • Ttofi MM, Farrington DP, Losel F, Loeber R (2011c) The predictive efficiency of school bullying versus later offending: a systematic/meta-analytic review of longitudinal studies. Crim Behav Mental Health 21(2):80–89
  • Ttofi MM, Farrington DP, Losel F (2012) School bullying as a risk marker for aggression and violence later in life: a systematic review and meta-analysis of prospective longitudinal studies. Aggression and Violent Behavior (Accepted, in press)
  • Wilson DB, Gottfredson DC, Najaka SS (2001) School-based prevention of problem behaviors: a meta-analysis. J Quant Criminol 17(3):247–272

More Bullying Research Paper Examples:

  • Bullying Prevention Research Paper
  • Bullying in School Research Paper

ORDER HIGH QUALITY CUSTOM PAPER

sample of research paper about bullying

U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

The .gov means it’s official. Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

The site is secure. The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

  • Publications
  • Account settings
  • Advanced Search
  • Journal List
  • v.5(3); 2019 Mar

Logo of heliyon

Cyberbullying and its influence on academic, social, and emotional development of undergraduate students

This study investigated the influence of cyberbullying on the academic, social, and emotional development of undergraduate students. It's objective is to provides additional data and understanding of the influence of cyberbullying on various variables affecting undergraduate students. The survey sample consisted of 638 Israeli undergraduate students. The data were collected using the Revised Cyber Bullying Survey, which evaluates the frequency and media used to perpetrate cyberbullying, and the College Adjustment Scales, which evaluate three aspects of development in college students. It was found that 57% of the students had experienced cyberbullying at least once or twice through different types of media. Three variables were found to have significant influences on the research variables: gender, religion and sexual preferences. Correlation analyses were conducted and confirmed significant relationships between cyberbullying, mainly through instant messaging, and the academic, social and emotional development of undergraduate students. Instant messaging (IM) was found to be the most common means of cyberbullying among the students.

The main conclusions are that although cyberbullying existence has been proven, studies of cyberbullying among undergraduate students have not been fully developed. This particular population needs special attention in future research. The results of this study indicate that cyberbullying has an influence on the academic, social, and emotional development of undergraduate students. Additional Implications of the findings are discussed.

1. Introduction

Cyberbullying is defined as the electronic posting of mean-spirited messages about a person (such as a student) often done anonymously ( Merriam-Webster, 2017 ). Most of the investigations of cyberbullying have been conducted with students in elementary, middle and high school who were between 9 and 18 years old. Those studies focused on examining the prevalence and frequency of cyberbullying. Using “cyberbullying” and “higher-education” as key words in Google scholar (January, 2019) (all in title) yields only twenty one articles. In 2009, 2012 and 2013 one article appeared each year, since 2014 each year there were few publications. Of these articles only seven relates to effect of cyberbullying on the students, thus a gap in the literature exists in that it only minimally reports on studies involving undergraduate students. Given their relationship and access to technology, it is likely that cyberbullying occurs frequently among undergraduates. The purpose of this study is to examine the frequency and media used to perpetrate cyberbullying, as well as the relationship that it has with the academic, social and emotional development of undergraduate students.

Undergraduate students use the Internet for a wide variety of purposes. Those purposes include recreation, such as communicating in online groups or playing games; academics, such as doing assignments, researching scholarships or completing online applications; and practical, such as preparing for job interviews by researching companies. Students also use the Internet for social communication with increasing frequency.

The literature suggests that cyberbullied victims generally manifest psychological problems such as depression, loneliness, low self-esteem, school phobias and social anxiety ( Grene, 2003 ; Juvonen et al., 2003 ; Akcil, 2018 ). Moreover, research findings have shown that cyberbullying causes emotional and physiological damage to defenseless victims ( Akbulut and Eristi, 2011 ) as well as psychosocial difficulties including behavior problems ( Ybarra and Mitchell, 2007 ), drinking alcohol ( Selkie et al., 2015 ), smoking, depression, and low commitment to academics ( Ybarra and Mitchell, 2007 ).

Under great emotional stress, victims of cyberbullying are unable to concentrate on their studies, and thus their academic progress is adversely affected ( Akcil, 2018 ). Since the victims are often hurt psychologically, the depressive effect of cyberbullying prevents students from excelling in their studies ( Faryadi, 2011 ). The overall presence of cyberbullying victimization among undergraduate college students was found to be significantly related to the experience of anxiety, depression, substance abuse, low self-esteem, interpersonal problems, family tensions and academic underperformance ( Beebe, 2010 ).

1.1. Cyberbullying and internet

The Internet has been the most useful technology of modern times, which has enabled entirely new forms of social interaction, activities, and organizing. This has been possible thanks to its basic features such as widespread usability and access. However, it also causes undesirable behaviors that are offensive or threatening to others, such as cyberbullying. This is a relatively new phenomenon.

According to Belsey (2006, p.1) , “Cyberbullying involves the use of information and communication technologies such as e-mail, cell-phone and pager text messages, instant messaging, defamatory personal web sites, blogs, online games and defamatory online personal polling web sites, to support deliberate, repeated, and hostile behavior by an individual or group that is intended to harm others.” Characteristics like anonymity, accessibility to electronic communication, and rapid audience spread, result in a limitless number of individuals that can be affected by cyberbullying.

Different studies suggest that undergraduate students' use of the Internet is more significant and frequent than any other demographic group. A 2014 survey of 1006 participants in the U.S. conducted by the Pew Research Center revealed that 97% of young adults aged from 18 to 29 years use the Internet, email, or access the Internet via a mobile device. Among them, 91% were college students.

1.2. Mediums to perpetrate cyberbullying

The most frequent and common media within which cyberbullying can occur are:

Electronic mail (email): a method of exchanging digital messages from an author to one or more recipients.

Instant messaging: a type of online chat that offers real-time text transmission between two parties.

Chat rooms: a real-time online interaction with strangers with a shared interest or other similar connection.

Text messaging (SMS): the act of composing and sending a brief electronic message between two or more mobile phones.

Social networking sites: a platform to build social networks or social relations among people who share interests, activities, backgrounds or real-life connections.

Web sites : a platform that provides service for personal, commercial, or government purpose.

Studies indicate that undergraduate students are cyberbullied most frequently through email, and least often in chat rooms ( Beebe, 2010 ). Other studies suggest that instant messaging is the most common electronic medium used to perpetrate cyberbullying ( Kowalski et al., 2018 ).

1.3. Types of cyberbullying

Watts et al. (2017) Describe 7 types of cyberbullying: flaming, online harassment, cyberstalking, denigration, masquerading, trickery and outing, and exclusion. Flaming involves sending angry, rude, or vulgar messages via text or email about a person either to that person privately or to an online group.

Harassment involves repeatedly sending offensive messages, and cyberstalking moves harassment online, with the offender sending threatening messages to his or her victim. Denigration occurs when the cyberbully sends untrue or hurtful messages about a person to others. Masquerading takes elements of harassment and denigration where the cyberbully pretends to be someone else and sends or posts threatening or harmful information about one person to other people. Trickery and outing occur when the cyberbully tricks an individual into providing embarrassing, private, or sensitive information and posts or sends the information for others to view. Exclusion is deliberately leaving individuals out of an online group, thereby automatically stigmatizing the excluded individuals.

Additional types of cyberbullying are: Fraping - where a person accesses the victim's social media account and impersonates them in an attempt to be funny or to ruin their reputation. Dissing - share or post cruel information online to ruin one's reputation or friendships with others. Trolling - is insulting an individual online to provoke them enough to get a response. Catfishing - steals one's online identity to re-creates social networking profiles for deceptive purposes. Such as signing up for services in the victim's name so that the victim receives emails or other offers for potentially embarrassing things such as gay-rights newsletters or incontinence treatment. Phishing - a tactic that requires tricking, persuading or manipulating the target into revealing personal and/or financial information about themselves and/or their loved ones. Stalking – Online stalking when a person shares her personal information publicly through social networking websites. With this information, stalkers can send them personal messages, send mysterious gifts to someone's home address and more. Blackmail – Anonymous e-mails, phone-calls and private messages are often done to a person who bear secrets. Photographs & video - Threaten to share them publicly unless the victim complies with a particular demand; Distribute them via text or email, making it impossible for the victim to control who sees the picture; Publish the pictures on the Internet for anyone to view. Shunning - persistently avoid, ignore, or reject someone mainly from participating in social networks. Sexting - send sexually explicit photographs or messages via mobile phone.

1.4. Prevalence of cyberbullying

Previous studies have found that cyberbullying incidents among college students can range from 9% to 34% ( Baldasare et al., 2012 ).

Beebe (2010) conducted a study with 202 college students in United States. Results indicated that 50.7% of the undergraduate students represented in the sample reported experiencing cyberbullying victimization once or twice during their time in college. Additionally, 36.3% reported cyberbullying victimization on a monthly basis while in college. According to Dılmaç (2009) , 22.5% of 666 students at Selcuk University in Turkey reported cyberbullying another person at least once and 55.35% reported being a victim of cyberbullying at least once in their lifetimes. In a study of 131 students from seven undergraduate classes in United States, 11% of the respondents indicated having experienced cyberbullying at the university ( Walker et al., 2011 ). Of those, Facebook (64%), cell phones (43%) and instant messaging (43%) were the most frequent technologies used. Students indicated that 50% of the cyberbullies were classmates, 57% were individuals outside of the university, and 43% did not know who was cyberbullying them.

Data from the last two years (2017–18) is similar to the above. A research, of 187 undergraduate students matriculated at a large U.S. Northeastern metropolitan Roman Catholic university ( Webber and Ovedovitz, 2018 ), found that 4.3% indicated that they were victims of cyberbullying at the university level and a total of 7.5% students acknowledged having participated in bullying at that level while A survey (N = 338) at a large midwestern university conducted by Varghese and Pistole (2017) , showed that frequency counts indicated that 15.1% undergraduate students were cyberbully victims during college, and 8.0% were cyberbully offenders during college.

A study of 201 students from sixteen different colleges across the United States found a prevalence rate of 85.2% for college students who reported being victims of cyberbullying out of the total 201 responses recorded. This ranged from only occasional incidents to almost daily experiences with cyberbullying victimization ( Poole, 2017 ).

In A research of international students, 20.7% reported that they have been cyberbullied in the last 30 days once to many times ( Akcil, 2018 ).

1.5. Psychological impact of cyberbullying

Cyberbullying literature suggests that victims generally manifest psychological problems such as depression, anxiety, loneliness, low self-esteem, social exclusion, school phobias and poor academic performance ( DeHue et al., 2008 ; Juvonen and Gross, 2008 ; Kowalski and Limber, 2007 ; Grene, 2003 ; Juvonen et al., 2003 ; Rivituso, 2012 ; Varghese and Pistole, 2017 ; Na, 2014 ; Akcil, 2018 ), low self-esteem, family problems, school violence and delinquent behavior ( Webber and Ovedovitz, 2018 ), which brings them to experience suicidal thoughts as a means of escaping the torture ( Ghadampour et al., 2017 ).

Moreover, research findings have shown that cyberbullying causes emotional and physiological damage to defenseless victims ( Faryadi, 2011 ) as well as psychosocial problems including inappropriate behaviors, drinking alcohol, smoking, depression and low commitment to academics ( Walker et al., 2011 ).

The victims of cyberbullying, under great emotional stress, are unable to concentrate on their studies, and thus their academic progress is adversely affected ( Faryadi, 2011 ). Since the victims are often hurt psychologically, the depressive effect of cyberbullying prevents students from excelling in their studies ( Faryadi, 2011 ).

In a Malaysian university study with 365 first year students, the majority of the participants (85%) interviewed indicated that cyberbullying affected their academic performance, specifically their grades ( Faryadi, 2011 ). Also, 85% of the respondents agreed that bullying caused a devastating impact on students' emotions and equally caused unimaginable psychological problems among the victims. Heiman and Olenik-Shemesh (2018) report that for students with learning disabilities, predictors of cybervictimization were low social support, low self-perception, and being female, whereas for students without learning disabilities, the predictors were low social support, low well-being, and low body perception.

1.6. Academic, social, and emotional development of undergraduate students

The transition to academic institutions is marked by complex challenges in emotional, social, and academic adjustment ( Gerdes and Mallinckrodt, 1994 ; Parker et al., 2004 ).

The adaptation to a new environment is an important factor in academic performance and future achievement. Undergraduate students are not only developing academically and intellectually, they are also establishing and maintaining personal relationships, developing an identity, deciding about a career and lifestyle, and maintaining personal health and wellness. Many students are interacting with people from diverse backgrounds who hold different values and making new friends. Some are also adapting to living away from home for the very first time ( Inkelas et al., 2007 ).

The concept of academic development involves not only academic abilities, but motivational factors, and institutional commitment. Motivation to learn, taking actions to meet academic demands, a clear sense of purpose, and general satisfaction with the academic environment are also important components of the academic field ( Lau, 2003 ).

A second dimension, the social field, may be as important as academic factors. Writers have emphasized integration into the social environment as a crucial element in commitment to a particular academic institution ( Tinto, 1975 ). Becoming integrated into the social life of college, forming a support network, and managing new social freedoms are some important elements of social development. Crises in the social field include conflict in a living situation, starting or maintaining relationships, interpersonal conflicts, family issues, and financial issues ( McGrath, 2005 ), which are manifested as feelings of loneliness ( Clark et al., 2015 ).

In the emotional field, students commonly question their relationships, direction in life, and self-worth ( Rey et al., 2011 ). A balanced personality is one which is emotionally adjusted. Emotional adjustment is essential for creating a sound personality. physical, intellectual mental and esthetical adjustments are possible when emotional adjustment is made ( Ziapour et al., 2018 ). Inner disorders may result from questions about identity and can sometimes lead to personal crises ( Gerdes and Mallinckrodt, 1994 ). Emotional problems may be manifested as global psychological distress, somatic distress, anxiety, low self-esteem, or depression. Impediments to success in emotional development include depression and anxiety, stress, substance abuse, and relationship problems ( Beebe, 2010 ).

The current study is designed to address two research questions: (1) does cyberbullying affect college students' emotional state, as measured by the nine factors of the College Adjustment Scales ( Anton and Reed, 1991 ); (2) which mode of cyberbullying most affects students' emotional state?

2.1. Research settings and participants

The present study is set in Israeli higher education colleges. These, function as: (1) institutions offering undergraduate programs in a limited number of disciplinary fields (mainly the social sciences), (2) centers for training studies (i.e.: teacher training curricula), as well as (3) as creators of access to higher education. The general student population is heterogeneous, coming from the Western Galilee. In this study, 638 Israeli undergraduate students participated. The sample is a representative of the population of the Western galilee in Israel. The sample was 76% female, 70% single, 51% Jewish, 27% Arabs, 7% Druze, and 15% other ethnicity. On the dimension of religiosity, 47% were secular, 37% traditional, 12% religious, 0.5% very religious, and 3.5% other. On the dimension of sexual orientation, 71% were straight women, 23.5% straight men, 4% bisexual, 1% lesbians, and 0.5% gay males (note: according to the Williams Institute, approximately 4% of the population in the US are LGBT, [ Gates, 2011 ], while 6% of the EU population are LGBT, [ Dalia, 2016 ]).

2.2. Instrumentation

Two instruments were used to collect data: The Revised Cyber Bullying Survey (RCBS), with a Cronbach's alpha ranging from .74 to .91 ( Kowalski and Limber, 2007 ), designed to measure incidence, frequency and medium used to perpetrate cyberbullying. The survey is a 32-item questionnaire. The frequency was investigated using a 5-item scale with anchors ranging from ‘it has never happened to me’ to ‘several times a week’. Five different media were explored: email, instant messaging, chat room, text messaging, and social networking sites. Each medium was examined with the same six questions related to cases of cyberbullying (see Table 1 ).

Description of the Revised Cyber Bullying Survey (RCBS) variables.

Note: the theoretical range is between zero to twenty-four.

Table 1 shows the five variables that composed the RCBS questionnaire (all of the variables are composed of 6 statements). The results indicate that the levels of all the variables is very low, which means that the respondents experienced cyberbullying once or twice. The internal consistency reliability estimate based on the current sample suggested that most of the variables have an adequate to high level of reliability, with a Cronbach's alpha of 0.68–0.87.

The College Adjustment Scales (CAS) ( Anton and Reed, 1991 ), evaluated the academic, social, and emotional development of college students. Values were standardized and validated for use with college students. The validity for each subscale ranged from .64 to .80, noting high correlations among scales. Reliability of the scales ranged from .80 to .92, with a mean of .86. The instrument included 128 items, divided into 10 scales: anxiety, depression, suicidal ideation, substance abuse, self-esteem problems, interpersonal problems, family problems, academic problems, career problems, and regular activities (see Table 2 ). Students responded to each item using a four-point scale.

Description of CAS variables.

Anxiety: A measure of clinical anxiety, focusing on common affective, cognitive, and physiological symptoms.

Depression: A measure of clinical depression, focusing on common affective, cognitive, and physiological symptoms.

Suicidal Ideation: A measure of the extent of recent ideation reflecting suicide, including thoughts of suicide, hopelessness, and resignation.

Substance Abuse: A measure of the extent of disruption in interpersonal, social, academic, and vocational functioning as a result of substance use and abuse.

Self-esteem Problems: A measure of global self-esteem which taps negative self-evaluations and dissatisfaction with personal achievement.

Interpersonal Problems: A measure of the extent of problems in relating to others in the campus environment.

Family Problems: A measure of difficulties experienced in relationships with family members.

Academic Problems: A measure of the extent of problems related to academic performance.

Career Problems: A measure of the extent of problems related to career choice.

Participants also responded to a demographic questionnaire that included items on gender, birth year, marital status, ethnicity, and sexual orientation. As sexual orientation is a major cause for bullying ( Pollock, 2006 ; Cahill and Makadon, 2014 ), it was included in the background information.

Convenience sampling and purposive sampling were used for this study. Surveys with written instructions were administered in classrooms, libraries and online via Google Docs at the end of the semester.

The surveys were translated to Hebrew and back translated four times until sufficient translation was achieved. The research was approved by the Western Galilee College Research and Ethic Committee.

A sizeable percentage, 57.4% (366), of the respondents reported being cyber bullied at least once and 3.4% (22) reported being cyber bullied at least once a week. The types of bullies can be seen in Fig. 1 .

Fig. 1

Types of bullies.

Three variables were found to have significant influences on the research variables: (1) gender (see Table 3 ); (2) religion (see Table 4 ); and (3) sexual preferences (see Table 5 ).

Results of independent t-tests for research variables by gender.

Note: n male = 127, n female = 510, *p < .05.

Results of independent t-tests for research variables by level of religion.

Note: n religious = 345, n secular = 293, ∗ p < .05, ∗∗ p < .01, ∗∗∗ p < .001.

Results of independent t-tests for research variables by sexual preference.

Note: n heterosexual = 596, n other = 42, ∗ p < .05, ∗∗ p < .01, ∗∗∗ p < .001.

Independent t-tests between the CAS variables and gender show significant differences between females and males (see Table 3 ).

Independent t-tests between the CAS variables and level of religiosity show significant differences between secular and religious persons, i.e., observant believers (see Table 4 ).

Independent t-tests between the CAS variables and sexual preference show significant differences between heterosexual individuals and others (see Table 5 ).

The research population was divided into three age groups having five year intervals. One respondent who was 14 years old was removed from the population.

For the variable “career problems” it was found that there was a significant difference between the 26–30 year age group [p < .05, F(2,5815) = 3.49, M = 56.55] and the 31–35 (M = 56.07) as well as the 20–25 (M = 54.58) age groups.

For the variable "depression" it was found that there was a significant difference between the 20–25 year age group [p < .05, F(2,5815) = 3.84, M = 54.56] and the 31–35 (M = 51.61) as well as the 26–30 (M = 52.83) age groups.

For the variable “interpersonal problems” it was found that there was a significant difference between the 20–25 year age group [p < .06, F(2,5815) = 3.84, M = 53.85] and the 31–35 (M = 51.29) as well as the 26–30 (M = 52.19) age groups.

For the variable “suicidal ideation” it was found that there was a significant difference between the 20–25 year age group [p < .06, F(2,5815) = 3.84, M = 55.45] and the 31–35 (M = 49.71) as well as the 26–30 (M = 50.13) age groups (see Table 6 ).

Results of one way Anova for research variables by age.

Note: n 20-25 = 216, n 26-30 = 287, n 31-35 = 82, ∗ p < .05, ∗∗ p < .01, ∗∗∗ p < .001.

To confirm that there was no effect among the independent variables, a Pearson correlation analysis of cyberbullying with CAS variables was run. As the correlations between the independent variables are weak, no multicollinearity between them was noted (see Table 7 ).

Pearson correlation of cyberbullying with CAS variables.

Note: n = 638, ∼ p < .06, ∗ p < .05, ∗∗ p < .01, ∗∗∗ p < .001.

Regression analyses on the effect of the cyberbullying variables on the CAS variables (see Fig. 2 ) show that an increase in cyberbullying by social networking and IM increases the academic problems variable. The model explained 6.1% of the variance (F (13,585) = 2.94, p < .001) and shows an increase in the suicidal ideation variable. There is also a marginal effect of cyberbullying by SMS on suicidal ideation, revealing that an increase in cyberbullying by SMS causes a decrease in suicidal ideation. The explained variance of the model is 24.8% (F (11,584) = 14.80, p < .001). Higher cyberbullying by social networking results in an increase in the anxiety variable. The explained variance of the model is 8.8% (F (13,584) = 4.32, p < .001). An increase in cyberbullying by chat and IM shows an increase in the substance abuse variable. The model explains 13% of the variance (F (13,584) = 6.71, p < .001). Increasing cyberbullying by social networking and IM increases the self-esteem problems variable. The explained variance of the model is 9% (F (13,584) = 4.43, p < .001). An increase of cyberbullying by email increases the problems students have with regular activities. The explained variance of the model is 5.2% (F (13,575) = 2.44, p < .01). Heightened cyberbullying by social networking and IM increases students' interpersonal problems. There is also an effect of cyberbullying by IM on suicidal ideation, such that an increase in cyberbullying by IM causes a decrease in interpersonal problems. The explained variance of the model is 8% (F (13,584) = 3.89, p < .001). An increase in cyberbullying by SMS decreases the family problems variable. The explained variance of the model is 11.4% (F (13,584) = 5.76, p < .001). And finally, heightened cyberbullying by IM and social networking decreases the depression variable. The variance explained by the model is 11.9% (F (13,584) = 6.04, p < .001).

Fig. 2

The influence of academic cyberbullying variables on the CAS variables.

4. Discussion

The objective of this study was to fill an existing gap in the literature regarding the influence of cyberbullying on the academic, social, and emotional development of undergraduate students.

As has been presented, cyberbullying continues to be a disturbing trend not only among adolescents but also undergraduate students. Cyberbullying exists in colleges and universities, and it has an influence on the development of students. Fifty seven percent of the undergraduate students who participated in this study had experienced cyberbullying at least once during their time in college. As previous studies have found that cyberbullying incidents among college students can range from 9% to 50% ( Baldasare et al., 2012 ; Beebe, 2010 ) it seems that 57% is high. Considering the effect of smartphone abundance on one hand and on the other the increasing use of online services and activities by young-adults can explain that percentage.

Considering the effect of such an encounter on the academic, social and emotional development of undergraduate students, policy makers face a formidable task to address the relevant issues and to take corrective action as Myers and Cowie (2017) point out that due to the fact that universities are in the business of education, it is a fine balancing act between addressing the problem, in this case cyberbullying, and maintaining a duty of care to both the victim and the perpetrator to ensure they get their degrees. There is a clear tension for university authorities between acknowledging that university students are independent young adults, each responsible for his or her own actions, on one hand, and providing supervision and monitoring to ensure students' safety in educational and leisure contexts.

Although there are increasing reports on connections between cyberbullying and social-networks (see: Gahagan et al., 2016 ), sending SMS or MMS messages through Internet gateways ensures anonymity, thus indirectly supporting cyberbullying. A lot of websites require only login or a phone number that can also be made up ( Gálik et al., 2018 ) which can explain the fact that instant-messaging (IM) was found to be the most common means of cyberbullying among undergraduate students with a negative influence on academic, family, and emotional development (depression, anxiety, and suicidal ideation). A possible interpretation of the higher frequency of cyberbullying through IM may be that young adults have a need to be connected.

This medium allows for being online in ‘real time’ with many peers or groups. With the possibility of remaining anonymous (by creating an avatar – a fake profile) and the possibility of exposing private information that remains recorded, students who use instant messaging become easy targets for cyberbullying. IM apps such as WhatsApp are extremely popular as they allow messages, photos, videos, and recordings to be shared and spread widely and in real time.

Students use the Internet as a medium and use it with great frequency in their everyday lives. As more aspects of students' lives and daily affairs are conducted online, coupled with the fact that excessive use may have consequences, it is important for researchers and academic policy makers to study the phenomenon of cyberbullying more deeply.

Sexual orientation is also a significant factor that increases the risk of victimization. Similarly, Rivers (2016) documented the rising incidence of homophobic and transphobic bullying at university and argues strongly for universities to be more active in promoting tolerance and inclusion on campus. It is worth noting that relationships and sexual orientation probably play a huge role in bullying among university students due to their age and the fact that the majority of students are away from home and experiencing different forms of relationships for the first time. Faucher et al. (2014) actually found that same sex cyberbullying was more common at university level than at school. Nonetheless, the research is just not there yet to make firm conclusions.

Finally, cyberbullying is not only an adolescent issue. Although its existence has been proven, studies of cyberbullying among undergraduate students have not been fully developed. This particular population needs special attention in future research.

The results of this study indicate that cyberbullying has an influence on the academic, social, and emotional development of undergraduate students.

In the academic field, findings revealed a statistically significant correlation between cyberbullying perpetrated by email and academic problems. Relationships between academic problems and cyberbullying perpetrated by other media were not found. This suggests that cyberbullying through instant messaging, chat room, text messaging, and social networking sites, have not influenced academic abilities, motivation to learn, and general satisfaction with the academic environment. However, cyberbullying perpetrated by email has an influence on academics, perhaps because of the high use of this medium among undergraduate students.

With regard to career problems, correlations with cyberbullying were not found. This indicates that cyberbullying has no influence on career problems, perhaps because these kinds of problems are related to future career inspirations, and not to the day-to-day aspects of a student's life.

In the social field, it was found that interpersonal problems such as integration into the social environment, forming a support network, and managing new social freedoms, were related to cyberbullying via social networking sites. This finding is consistent with the high use of social networking sites, the purpose of the medium, and the reported episodes of cyberbullying in that medium.

Family problems were also related to cyberbullying perpetrated by all kinds of media. This may indicate that as cyberbullying through the use of email, instant messaging, chat rooms, text messaging, and social networking sites increases, so do family problems. This could be due to the strong influence that cyberbullying generates in all the frameworks of students, including their families.

Finally, in the emotional field, correlations between cyberbullying perpetrated by all kinds of media and substance abuse were found. This may indicate that as cyberbullying through the use of email, instant messaging, chat rooms, text messaging, and social networking sites increases, so does substance abuse. This is important because cyberbullying may be another risk factor for increasing the probability of substance abuse.

Depression and suicidal ideation were significantly related to the same media – email instant messaging and chat cyberbullying – suggesting that depression may lead to a decision of suicide as a solution to the problem. Previous findings support the above that being an undergraduate student – a victim of cyberbullying emerges as an additional risk factor for the development of depressive symptoms ( Myers and Cowie, 2017 ). Also Selkie et al. (2015) reported among 265 female college students, being engaged in cyberbullying as bullies, victims, or both led to higher rates of depression and alcohol use.

Relationships between anxiety and cyberbullying, through all the media, were not found although Schenk and Fremouw (2012) found that college student victims of cyberbullying scored higher than matched controls on measures of depression, anxiety, phobic anxiety, and paranoia. This may be because it was demonstrated that anxiety is one of the most common reported mental health problems in all undergraduate students, cyberbullied or not.

Self-esteem problems were significantly related to cyberbullying via instant messaging, social networking sites, and text messaging. This may suggest that as cyberbullying through instant messaging, social networking sites, and text messaging increases, so do self-esteem problems. This is an important finding, given that these were the media with more reported episodes of cyberbullying.

5. Conclusions

This findings of this study revealed that cyberbullying exists in colleges and universities, and it has an influence on the academic, social, and emotional development of undergraduate students.

It was shown that cyberbullying is perpetrated through multiple electronic media such as email, instant messaging, chat rooms, text messaging, and social networking sites. Also, it was demonstrated that students exposed to cyberbullying experience academic problems, interpersonal problems, family problems, depression, substance abuse, suicidal ideation, and self-esteem problems.

Students have exhibited clear preferences towards using the Internet as a medium and utilize it with great frequency in their everyday lives. As more and more aspects of students' lives are conducted online, and with the knowledge that excessive use may have consequences for them, it is important to study the phenomenon of cyberbullying more deeply.

Because college students are preparing to enter the workforce, and several studies have indicated a trend of cyberbullying behavior and victimization throughout a person's lifetime ( Watts et al., 2017 ), the concern is these young adults are bringing these attitudes into the workplace.

Finally, cyberbullying is not only an adolescent issue. Given that studies of cyberbullying among undergraduate students are not fully developed, although existence of the phenomenon is proven, we conclude that the college and university population needs special attention in future areas of research. As it has been indicated by Peled et al. (2012) that firm policy in regard to academic cheating reduces its occurrence, colleges should draw clear guidelines to deal with the problem of cyberbullying, part of it should be a safe and if needed anonymous report system as well as clear punishing policy for perpetrators.

As there's very little research on the effect of cyberbullying on undergraduates students, especially in light of the availability of hand held devices (mainly smartphones) and the dependence on the internet for basically every and any activity, the additional data provided in this research adds to the understanding of the effect of cyberbullying on the welfare of undergraduate students.

Declarations

Author contribution statement.

Yehuda Peled: Conceived and designed the experiments; Performed the experiments; Analyzed and interpreted the data; Contributed reagents, materials, analysis tools or data; Wrote the paper.

Funding statement

This research did not receive any specific grant from funding agencies in the public, commercial, or not-for-profit sectors.

Competing interest statement

The authors declare no conflict of interest.

Additional information

No additional information is available for this paper.

  • Akbulut Y., Eristi B. Cyberbullying and victimization among Turkish university students. Australas. J. Educ. Technol. 2011; 27 (7):1155–1170. [ Google Scholar ]
  • Akcil S. Kent State University; 2018. Cyberbullying-Victimization, Acculturative Stress, and Depression Among International College Students. Doctoral dissertation. [ Google Scholar ]
  • Anton D.W., Reed R.J. Psychological Assessment Resources, Inc; 1991. College Adjustment Scales. [ Google Scholar ]
  • Baldasare A., Bauman S., Goldman L., Robie A. Cyberbullying: voices of college students. Cutting Edge Technol. Higher Educ. 2012; 5 :127–155. https://studentaffairs.arizona.edu/assessment/documents/CyberbullyChapterFinal.pdf Retrieved from. [ Google Scholar ]
  • Beebe J.E. University of Northern Colorado; 2010. The Prevalence of Cyber Bullying Victimization and its Relationship to Academic, Social, and Emotional Adjustment Among College Students. https://eric.ed.gov/?id=ED517400 ProQuest LLC, Ph.D. Dissertation. [ Google Scholar ]
  • Belsey B. 2006. Cyber Bullying: an Emerging Threat to “Always on” Generation. http://www.cyberbullying.ca/pdf/Cyberbullying_Article_by_Bill_Belsey.pdf From. [ Google Scholar ]
  • Cahill S., Makadon H. Sexual orientation and gender identity data collection in clinical settings and in electronic health records: a key to ending LGBT health disparities. LGBT Health. 2014; 1 (1):34–41. [ PubMed ] [ Google Scholar ]
  • Clark D.M.T., Loxton N.J., Tobin S.J. Declining loneliness over time: evidence from American colleges and high schools. Pers. Soc. Psychol. Bull. 2015; 41 (1):78–89. [ PubMed ] [ Google Scholar ]
  • Dalia–Global consumer understanding . 2016. Counting the LGBT Population: 6% of Europeans Identify as LGBT. https://daliaresearch.com/counting-the-lgbt-population-6-of-europeans-identify-as-lgbt/ [ Google Scholar ]
  • DeHue F., Bolman C., Völlink T. Cyberbullying: youngsters' experiences and parental perception. Cyberpsychol. Behav. 2008; 11 (2):217–223. [ PubMed ] [ Google Scholar ]
  • Dılmaç B. Psychological needs as a predictor of cyber bullying: a preliminary report on college students. Educ. Sci. Theor. Pract. 2009; 9 (3):1307–1325. [ Google Scholar ]
  • Faryadi Q. Cyber bullying and academic performance. Int. J. Comput. Eng. Res. 2011; 1 (1):2250–3005. [ Google Scholar ]
  • Faucher C., Jackson M., Cassidy W. Cyberbullying among university students: gendered experiences, impacts, and perspectives. Educ. Res. Int. 2014 [ Google Scholar ]
  • Gálik S., Hladíková V., Pavlák L. Cyberbullying and opportunities for its prevention. Media Lit. Acad. Res. 2018; 1 (1):6–17. [ Google Scholar ]
  • Gahagan K., Vaterlaus J.M., Frost L.R. College student cyberbullying on social networking sites: conceptualization, prevalence, and perceived bystander responsibility. Comput. Hum. Behav. 2016; 55 :1097–1105. [ Google Scholar ]
  • Gates G.J. The Williams Institute, UCLA School of Law; 2011. How many People Are Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender? https://escholarship.org/uc/item/09h684x2 [ Google Scholar ]
  • Gerdes H., Mallinckrodt B. Emotional, social, and academic adjustment of college students: a longitudinal study of retention. J. Couns. Dev. 1994; 72 (3):281–288. [ Google Scholar ]
  • Ghadampour F., Shafiei M., Heidarirad H. Relationships among cyberbullying, psychological vulnerability and suicidal thoughts in female and male students. J. Res. Psychol. Health. 2017; 11 :28–40. [ Google Scholar ]
  • Grene M.B. Counselling and climate change as treatment modalities for bullying in school. Int. J. Adv. Couns. 2003; 25 (4):293–302. [ Google Scholar ]
  • Heiman T., Olenik Shemesh D. Predictors of cyber-victimization of higher-education students with and without learning disabilities. J. Youth Stud. 2018:1–18. [ Google Scholar ]
  • Inkelas K.K., Daver Z.E., Vogt K.E., Leonard J.B. Living–learning programs and first-generation college students’ academic and social transition to college. Res. High. Educ. 2007; 48 (4):403–434. [ Google Scholar ]
  • Juvonen J., Graham S., Shuster M.A. Bullying among young adolescents: the strong, the weak, and the troubled. Paediatrics. 2003; 112 (6):1231–1237. [ PubMed ] [ Google Scholar ]
  • Juvonen J., Gross E.F. Extending the school grounds?—bullying experiences in cyberspace. J. Sch. Health. 2008; 78 (9):496–505. [ PubMed ] [ Google Scholar ]
  • Kowalski R.M., Limber S.P. Electronic bullying among middle school children. J. Adolesc. Health. 2007; 41 :S22–S30. [ PubMed ] [ Google Scholar ]
  • Kowalski R., Limber S.P., McCord A. A developmental approach to cyberbullying: prevalence and protective factors. Aggress. Violent Behav. 2018 [ Google Scholar ]
  • Lau L.K. Institutional factors affecting student retention. Education. 2003; 124 (1):126–137. [ Google Scholar ]
  • McGrath S. 2005. The Multiple Contexts of Vocational Education and Training in Southern Africa. Vocational Education and Training in Southern Africa: a Comparative Study; pp. 1–8. http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11910/7250 URI: [ Google Scholar ]
  • Merriam-Webster . 2017. On-line Dictionary. https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/cyberbullying [ Google Scholar ]
  • Myers C.A., Cowie H. Bullying at university: the social and legal contexts of cyberbullying among university students. J. Cross Cult. Psychol. 2017; 48 (8):1172–1182. [ Google Scholar ]
  • Na H. 2014. The Effects of Cyberbullying Victimization on Psychological Adjustments Among College Students. https://dspace-prod.lib.uic.edu/bitstream/handle/10027/11288/Na_Hyunjoo.pdf?sequence=1&isAllowed=y Doctoral dissertation. [ Google Scholar ]
  • Parker J.D., Summerfeldt L.J., Hogan M.J., Majeski S.A. Emotional intelligence and academic success: examining the transition from high school to university. Pers. Indiv. Differ. 2004; 36 (1):163–172. [ Google Scholar ]
  • Peled Y., Barczyk C., Sarid M. Institutional Characteristics and faculty perceptions of academic dishonesty. Educ. Pract. Theor. 2012; 34 (2):61–79. [ Google Scholar ]
  • Pollock S.L. Counsellor roles in dealing with bullies and their LGBT victims. Middle Sch. J. 2006; 38 (2):29–36. [ Google Scholar ]
  • Poole S.P. Vol. 115. 2017. The Experience of Victimization as the Result of Cyberbullying Among College Students: A Study of Demographics, Self-Esteem, and Locus of Control. http://scholarworks.sfasu.edu/etds/115 Electronic Theses and Dissertations. [ Google Scholar ]
  • Rey L., Extremera N., Pena M. Perceived emotional intelligence, self-esteem and life satisfaction in adolescents. Psychosoc. Interv. 2011; 20 (2) [ Google Scholar ]
  • Rivers I. Homophobic and transphobic bullying in universities. In: Cowie H., Myers C.-A., editors. Bullying Among university Students. Routledge; London, England: 2016. pp. 48–60. [ Google Scholar ]
  • Rivituso G. 2012. Cyberbullying: an Exploration of the Lived Experiences and the Psychological Impact of Victimization Among College Students an Interpretive Phenomenological Analysis. Education Doctoral Theses. Paper 21. [ Google Scholar ]
  • Selkie E.M., Kota R., Chan Y.F., Moreno M. Cyberbullying, depression, and problem alcohol use in female college students: a multisite study. Cyberpsychol. Behav. Soc. Netw. 2015; 18 (2):79–86. [ PMC free article ] [ PubMed ] [ Google Scholar ]
  • Schenk A.M., Fremouw W.J. Prevalence, psychological impact, and coping of cyberbully victims among college students. J. Sch. Violence. 2012; 11 :21–37. [ Google Scholar ]
  • Tinto V. Dropout from higher education: a theoretical synthesis of recent research. Rev. Educ. Res. 1975; 45 (1):89–125. [ Google Scholar ]
  • Varghese M.E., Pistole M.C. College student cyberbullying: self-esteem, depression, loneliness, and attachment. J. Coll. Couns. 2017; 20 (1):7–21. [ Google Scholar ]
  • Walker C.M., Sockman B.J., Koehn S. An exploratory study of cyberbullying with undergraduate university students. TechTrends. 2011; 55 (2):31–38. [ Google Scholar ]
  • Watts L.K., Wagner J., Velasquez B., Behrens P.I. Cyberbullying in higher education: a literature review. Comput. Hum. Behav. 2017; 69 :268–274. [ Google Scholar ]
  • Webber M.A., Ovedovitz A.C. Cyberbullying among college students: a look at its prevalence at a U.S. Catholic University. Int. J. Educ. Methodol. 2018; 4 (2):101–107. [ Google Scholar ]
  • Ybarra M.L., Mitchell K.J. Prevalence and frequency of internet harassment instigation: implications for adolescent health. J. Adolesc. Health. 2007; 41 :189–195. [ PubMed ] [ Google Scholar ]
  • Ziapour A., Khatony A., Jafari F., Kianipour N. Correlation of personality traits with happiness among university students. J. Clin. Diagn. Res. 2018; 12 (4) [ Google Scholar ]

Prominent pathologist leaves Johns Hopkins after allegations

Jonathan i. epstein resigned amid a review, telling the post he did not want to return to work with colleagues who he says falsely accused him of misconduct.

Internationally regarded pathologist Jonathan I. Epstein has resigned his post at Johns Hopkins Hospital, months after he was put on administrative leave amid misconduct allegations, the doctor and the hospital confirmed.

The resignation came before the hospital determined whether the allegations that he bullied or intimidated others in his department were founded, Hopkins spokeswoman Liz Vandendriessche said in an email. She did not say whether that inquiry would continue given his departure.

Epstein, who had been on paid leave since May, told The Washington Post in an email this month that Hopkins had “found no evidence of any professional misconduct (ie. no evidence of bullying).” Vandendriessche, however, said that The Post had been “misinformed” by Epstein and that his assertion that there was no evidence of misconduct was not true.

The disagreement punctuated a nearly four-decade relationship between Epstein and Johns Hopkins University, which he joined as a faculty member in 1985, developing a bustling consultation practice providing second opinions on pathology reports at the request of patients and other doctors.

Hospital officials do appear to have cleared Epstein of some issues related to his clinical care of patients, according to a statement Epstein said he and the Baltimore hospital agreed to in a legal document.

“Johns Hopkins Hospital conducted a review of Dr. Epstein’s clinical care and did not identify any areas of concern,” the statement said, according to Epstein. He declined to elaborate on the agreement, but he said the institution had committed to giving the statement to any prospective employers who call Hopkins to ask about him.

“Johns Hopkins University initiated an inquiry into allegations of professional misconduct,” the statement continued. “After seven months of inquiry, no determinations regarding professional misconduct had been made prior to Dr. Epstein’s resignation.”

The statement, the authenticity of which Vandendriessche did not confirm, went on to say that Epstein chose not to renew his clinical privileges at the hospital because of his decision to resign his faculty position at Johns Hopkins University, which Epstein said he did on Jan. 31. He had been the hospital’s director of surgical pathology.

Epstein told The Post he resigned because doctors who had made “anonymous false allegations” against him were still there, and he decided he “did not want to go back there to practice.”

A private accreditation report obtained by The Post last year detailed concerns under review by the Joint Commission, a nonprofit organization that accredits hospitals. The report, which did not name Epstein, referred to him when it pointed to “a department leader” as the subject of the complaints, according to people familiar with the situation who spoke to The Post on the condition of anonymity last year to discuss the then-ongoing review.

Epstein, according to the report, was accused by other doctors of pressuring them to change diagnoses and defer to his wishes over several years. In some cases, according to the people familiar with the accusations, doctors said they felt pressured to give second opinions that agreed with diagnoses made by Epstein’s wife, a pathologist at a urology center in Beltsville, Md. In one case, a misdiagnosis led to a patient’s bladder being removed, according to the report and the people.

The confidential Joint Commission report directed Hopkins to address long-standing concerns among physicians and others “regarding a culture of bullying and intimidation in the surgical pathology department,” which it said had left patients vulnerable to improper care. Accountability for safety in the hospital industry often relies on such private accreditation bodies, which make few, if any, of their findings public. Maureen Lyons, a Joint Commission spokeswoman, declined to comment beyond pointing to a website that lists Hopkins as accredited.

Experts say a proactive internal safety culture in which hospital staffers do not fear retaliation for speaking up is essential to ensuring good outcomes. Hopkins doctors and researchers have long pushed for safer medical institutions, efforts that have included the founding in 2017 of a Center for Diagnostic Excellence, which aims to eradicate misdiagnoses and the medical harm they cause.

This month, Epstein provided The Post a letter he received from the hospital, which said that a staff professionalism group conducted “an independent external review” of a sample of Epstein’s pathology cases and did not find significant clinical concerns. The hospital provided him the report, but Epstein said he could not share it because it included information about individual cases and was marked by Hopkins as confidential.

The hospital’s review, Epstein said, included the case involving the bladder. He said that an outside pathologist “agreed with my diagnosis and concluded that other pathologists would have arrived at the same diagnosis given the limited nature of the specimen, its morphology, and what clinical information I had at the time of the biopsy.”

The review, Epstein said, “concluded that all of these diagnoses were within good practice and what a reasonable pathologist would have diagnosed in the same situation.”

Vandendriessche said in an email that “some of the information provided to The Washington Post by Dr. Epstein was gathered pursuant to a confidential review process, which Dr. Epstein is not permitted to disclose.”

Epstein, recognized by urinary pathologists as a leader in his field, has written numerous papers on the detection of cancer and other diseases. He has steadfastly denied the allegations and told The Post last year that he was “profoundly distressed” by them. In a letter to colleagues last year, he wrote that he was “heartened by the outpouring of support from my pathologist friends and colleagues from all over the world in response to what they have termed a ‘hatchet job’ or a ‘smear campaign.’”

sample of research paper about bullying

Long Island county bans transgender athletes from competing with girls

In a move that a local official said was done to battle so-called “bullying” from people born biologically male, a Long Island county is banning transgender athletes from competing in women’s and girls’ sports at their facilities.

Nassau County Executive Bruce Blakeman announced the new ban at a Thursday morning press conference. It will take effect immediately.

“There’s too much bullying going on of biological males trying to inject themselves in female sports,” Blakeman said, surrounded by supporters and young girls. “It’s wrong and it’s a form of bullying.”

The executive order bars transgender athletes from competing against girls at all 100 sports facilities run by Nassau County, including ball fields and ice rinks. It is believed to be the first ban on transgender participation in sports on a county-wide level in the U.S.

“This is a matter that concerns the integrity, fairness and safety of women’s sports,” said Samantha Goetz, a former high school athlete and current county legislator. The mother of two argued it’s a matter of fairness for female athletes, who can’t compete physically with biological males.

“There is no training I could have engaged in to compete against a biological male,” Goetz said.

Blakeman argued that transgender athletes don’t belong on the same field as girls, adding that he has been considering instituting the ban for months.

More LGBTQ news from NBC New York

  • Backlash brews after church cuts transgender activist's funeral at St. Patrick's short
  • Arrest made 2 months after vandals damage dozens of Pride flags at Stonewall Monument
  • Runner hit in face in anti-LGBTQ attack in Manhattan's Hudson River Park: Police

When asked by reporters what spurred such a ban to be enacted, Blakeman could cite no examples of such a thing occurring in Nassau County. Neither could the executive director of the agency that oversees high school sports in the county.

“We have not had any issues with transgender athletes participating in section 8 athletics...no complaints, and I’m not sure that there are any,” noted Pat Pizzarelli, of the Nassau County Public High School Athletic Association.

Protestors outside the county office building condemned Blakeman’s action as illegal, discriminatory and unnecessary. They accused Blakeman of playing politics with the lives of vulnerable transgender kids.

A former high school athlete from Suffolk County who is now transitioning to become a woman said such a ban would take away any sense of community and cohesion for transgender athletes.

“We lose learning about each other and how to become closer,” the individual said. “There’s no reason to separate us and create division.”

 Nassau County, New York, Executive Bruce Blakeman speaks at a Long Island Association (LIA) event on Jan. 5, 2024 in Woodbury, New York.

LGBT Network CEO Robert Vitelli said the order “sends a message to trans kids that they don’t belong.”

A legal challenge is expected, but an unapologetic Blakeman believes his executive order will withstand any test.

“I know of no policy in the state to strike that down and I would encourage all elected officials to join us to protect girls and women,” Blakeman said. “Probably if you polled most women athletes, they would be 100% behind us.”

New York Gov. Kathy Hochul weighed in later Thursday, accusing Blakeman of bullying transgender kids and saying her office would enforce state laws designed to protect children. That message was echoed by New York Attorney General Letitia James, who said her office is reviewing the state’s legal options.

“This executive order is transphobic and deeply dangerous. In New York, we have laws that protect our beautifully diverse communities from hate and discrimination of any and every kind,” James said in a statement.

Greg Cergol is the Long Island Reporter for WNBC-TV in New York.

IMAGES

  1. Complete Research Paper About Bullying

    sample of research paper about bullying

  2. (PDF) Understanding Bullying: From Research to Practice

    sample of research paper about bullying

  3. (PDF) An Introduction in Cyberbullying Research

    sample of research paper about bullying

  4. Bullying Essay: Popular Topics and Useful Samples

    sample of research paper about bullying

  5. Research Paper On Stop Bullying

    sample of research paper about bullying

  6. Essay Proposal Bullying

    sample of research paper about bullying

COMMENTS

  1. PDF The Impact of School Bullying On Students' Academic Achievement from

    Shahria et al. (2015) reported that bullying is deemed as a serious problem in academic settings in all parts of the world. They found that bullying has negative impact on academic performance. Females were more affected than males by bullying. Bullying constitute a complex problem in school kids lives.

  2. 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.

  3. (PDF) Campus Bullying in the Senior High School: A ...

    International Journal of Scientific & Technology Research 8 (4):167-173 Authors: Norman Raotraot Galabo Department of Education of the Philippines Abstract The purpose of this qualitative case...

  4. Bullying in children: impact on child health

    Bullying in childhood has been classified by the WHO as a major public health problem 1 and for decades has been known to increase the risk of poor health, social and educational outcomes in childhood and adolescence. 2 Characterised by repeated victimisation within a power-imbalanced relationship, bullying encompasses a wide range of types, fre...

  5. Bullying in schools: the state of knowledge and effective interventions

    In the present paper, we discuss the prevalence, age and gender differences, and various types of bullying, as well as why it happens and how long it lasts, starting from the large surveys carried out in western countries and to a lower extent in low- and middle-income countries.

  6. Bullying at school and mental health problems among adolescents: a

    Mats Hallgren Child and Adolescent Psychiatry and Mental Health 15, Article number: 74 ( 2021 ) Cite this article 77k Accesses 12 Citations 30 Altmetric Metrics Abstract Objective To examine recent trends in bullying and mental health problems among adolescents and the association between them. Method

  7. Full article: Understanding bullying from young people's perspectives

    12,619 Views 9 CrossRef citations to date 0 Altmetric Listen Research Article Understanding bullying from young people's perspectives: An exploratory study Lisa Hellström & Adrian Lundberg Pages 414-433 | Received 11 Dec 2019, Accepted 06 Sep 2020, Published online: 23 Sep 2020 Cite this article https://doi.org/10.1080/00131881.2020.1821388

  8. A systematic literature review on the effects of bullying at school

    Read full-text. Bullying is a severe problem that is experienced, especially in schools. Children belong to the same social group, but some feel powerful than others and therefore take advantage ...

  9. Qualitative Methods in School Bullying and Cyberbullying ...

    In their recent analysis of articles published between 1976 and 2019 (in WoS, with the search terms "bully*; victim*; cyberbullying; electronic bullying; internet bullying; and online harassment"), Smith et al. ( 2021, pp. 50-51) found that of the empirical articles selected, more than three-quarters (76.3%) were based on quantitative data, 15.4...

  10. Full article: Bullying and cyberbullying: a bibliometric analysis of

    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 ...

  11. Tackling Bullying from the Inside Out: Shifting Paradigms in Bullying

    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 c...

  12. PDF Four Decades of Research on School Bullying

    Since then, bullying has received unprecedented attention in the media and in academia, both nationally and interna-tionally (e.g., Jimerson, Swearer, & Espelage, 2010; Smith, ... Studies report, based on a national sample of over 4,000 youth aged 12 to 18 years (DeVoe & Bauer, 2011), showed declines in victimization from 37% to 22% from Grade 6 to

  13. PDF Students' Perceptions of Bullying After the Fact: A Qualitative Study

    characterized as bullying, at some point in their educational experience (Oliver, Young, & LaSalle, 1994). Adolescent problem behaviors such as bullying are not considered simple isolated events but part of a syndrome (Bosworth et al., 1999). This culture of bullying that persists, and is carried through the media like a well-marketed campaign for

  14. Q Methodology as an Innovative Addition to Bullying Researchers

    Bullying, internationally recognized as a problematic and aggressive form of behavior, has negative effects, not only for those directly involved but for anybody and in particular children in the surrounding environment (Modin, 2012).However, one of the major concerns among researchers in the field of bullying is the type of research methods employed in the studies on bullying behavior in schools.

  15. A Case Study with an Identified Bully: Policy and Practice Implications

    INTRODUCTION. Bullying is one of the most significant school problems experienced by children and adolescents and affects approximately 30% of students in U.S. public schools. 1 This included 13% as bullies, 10.6% as victims and 6.3% as bully-victims. 2 Bullying has been defined as repeated exposure to negative events within the context of an imbalanced power relationship. 3 Bullying is a ...

  16. Bullying Research

    This study examined the longitudinal stability and the cumulative impact of victimization in a sample of 382 students assessed in the fall and the spring of grades 6, 7, and 8.Victimization assessed by both self- and peer-reports indicated substantial variability in who was bullied, with nearly 51% of students reporting bullying victimization du...

  17. Preventing Bullying: Consequences, Prevention, and Intervention

    Bullying is considered to be a significant public health problem with both short- and long-term physical and social-emotional consequences for youth. A large body of research indicates that youth who have been bullied are at increased risk of subsequent mental, emotional, health, and behavioral problems, especially internalizing problems, such as low self-esteem, depression, anxiety, and ...

  18. Bullying in School Research Paper

    This sample bullying research paper on bullying on school campuses features: 3800 words (approx. 12 pages) and a bibliography with 12 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.

  19. Bullying Prevention Research Paper

    This sample bullying research paper on bullying prevention features: 3000 words (approx. 10 pages) and a bibliography with 40 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.

  20. Bullying among High School Students

    ABSTRACT. Objective: The main aim of this research is to investigate the prevalence of bullying behaviour, its victims and the types of bullying and places of bullying among 14-17 year-old adolescents in a sample of school children in Bursa, Turkey. Methodology: A cross-sectional survey questionnaire was conducted among class 1 and class 2 high ...

  21. 154 Bullying Topics & Bullying Essay Examples

    1 hour! 151 Bullying Topics & Bullying Essay Examples Updated: Nov 8th, 2023 19 min Looking for an exciting research topic about bullying? This problem is very controversial, sensitive, and definitely worth studying We will write a custom essay specifically for you by our professional experts 809 writers online Learn More Table of Contents

  22. Bullying and Crime Research Paper

    This sample bullying research paper on bullying and crime features: 4300 words (approx. 22 pages) and a bibliography with 22 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.

  23. Cyberbullying and its influence on academic, social, and emotional

    1. Introduction Cyberbullying is defined as the electronic posting of mean-spirited messages about a person (such as a student) often done anonymously ( Merriam-Webster, 2017 ). Most of the investigations of cyberbullying have been conducted with students in elementary, middle and high school who were between 9 and 18 years old.

  24. Prominent pathologist leaves Johns Hopkins after allegations

    The confidential Joint Commission report directed Hopkins to address long-standing concerns among physicians and others "regarding a culture of bullying and intimidation in the surgical ...

  25. Long Island county bans transgender athletes from competing with girls

    Nassau County Executive Bruce Blakeman argued banning transgender athletes from competing with girls will battle so-called "bullying" from people born biologically male.