Blueprints
for Violence Prevention - Bullying Prevention Program
Executive Summary Highlights
A History of Bullying
Bullying among school children is no doubt a very old
phenomenon. The fact that some children are frequently
and systematically harassed and attacked by other children
has been described in literary works, and many adults
have personal experiences of it from their own school
days. Though many are acquainted with the "bully/victim
problem," it was not until fairly recently -- in
the early 1970's -- that efforts were made to systematically
study it. For a number of years, these attempts were
largely confined to Scandinavia. More recently, however,
bullying among school children has received considerable
public and research attention in countries such as England,
Scotland, Ireland, Japan, Germany, Australia, Canada,
and the United States. The Bullying Prevention Program
was developed and evaluated in an intervention project
involving 2500 children in 42 schools from the city
of Bergen, Norway. There have been numerous replications
of the program, both within Norway and in several other
countries, including the United States.
What is Bullying?
Bullying or victimization can be generally defined in
the following way: A student is being bullied or victimized
when he or she is exposed, repeatedly and over time,
to negative actions on the part of one or more other
students. Such negative actions include intentionally
inflicting, or attempting to inflict injury or discomfort
upon another. These behaviors can be carried out physically
(e.g., hitting, kicking, pushing, choking), verbally
(e.g., by calling names, threatening, taunting, malicious
teasing, spreading nasty rumors), or in other ways,
such as making faces or obscene gestures, or intentional
exclusion from a group. The latter (usually more subtle)
forms are usually termed "indirect bullying,"
whereas "direct bullying" comprises behaviors
that represent relatively open (usually verbal or physical)
attack on the victim.
In order to be considered bullying, there should also
be an imbalance in power or strength. In other words,
students who are exposed to the negative actions generally
have difficulty in defending themselves and are somewhat
helpless against the student or students who harass.
It is not considered bullying when two students of approximately
the same physical or psychological power are in conflict,
nor is friendly or playful teasing considered bullying.
However, repeated degrading and malicious teasing which
is continued despite clear signs of distress and opposition
on the part of the target does qualify as bullying.
In the context of school bullying, the victim is usually
a single student who is generally harassed by a group
of two or three students, often with a "negative
leader." A considerable proportion of victims (20-40%),
however, report that they are mainly bullied by a single
student.
Bullying is thus characterized by the following three
criteria: (a) it is aggressive behavior or intentional
"harmdoing;" (b) it is carried out repeatedly
and over time; and (c) it occurs within an interpersonal
relationship characterized by an imbalance of power.
One might add that bullying behavior often occurs without
apparent provocation. These characteristics clearly
suggest that bullying can be considered a form of abuse:
peer abuse. What sets it apart from other forms of abuse,
such as child or domestic abuse, is the context in which
it occurs and the relationship of the interacting parties.
Prevalance of Bullying
According to more than 150,000 Norwegian and Swedish
students, 15 percent of Norwegian and Swedish elementary
and middle/junior high schools are involved in bully/victim
problems. Approximately 9 percent are victims and 7
percent bullied other students. A relatively small percentage
of the students are both victim and bully (17% of the
victims). Five percent of the students are involved
in more frequent bullying problems, occuring once a
week or more frequently.
These figures emphasize that bullying is a considerable
problem in Norwegian and Swedish schools, affecting
a very large number of students. Moreover, data collected
in many other countries, including the United States,
clearly indicate that these problems are not limited
to Scandinavia. In fact, the prevalence rates in these
countries are as high, if not higher, than those reported
in Scandinavia. For example, in a recent large study
of more than 6,000 middle school students from South
Carolina, 23 percent reported that they had been bullied
by other students "several times" or more
frequently during the past three months. Approximately
20 percent reported they had bullied other students
with the same frequency.
In terms of gender differences, boys are much more
likely to bully others than are girls, and a relatively
large percentage of girls report that they are bullied
mainly by boys. Also, a slightly higher percentage of
boys report being victims of bullying. Although direct
bullying is a greater problem among boys, bullying also
occurs among girls. Girls are less apt to use physical
means of bullying; instead, they use more subtle and
indirect ways of harassment such as slandering, spreading
rumors, intentionally excluding others from the group,
and manipulating friendship relations (e.g., depriving
a girl of her "best friend"). In addition,
these forms of bullying may be more difficult for adults
to detect.
Age trends in bullying also exist. Generally, younger
and weaker students are more often exposed to bullying.
Although most incidents occur among students in the
same grade, a good deal of bullying is also carried
out by older students towards younger ones.
Most bullying occurs on the playground or in the classroom,
but these behaviors also occur in hallways/corridors,
the gymnasium, the locker room, and the bathroom. Although
a substantial portion of students are bullied on their
way to and from the school, this percentage is usually
considerably lower than the percentage being bullied
at school.
Why Focus on Bully/Victim
Problems?
There are several key reasons for examining and attempting
to counteract bully/victim problems in school: the short-term
effects on the victims, the long-term effects on the
victims, the long-term effects on the bullies if the
bullying behavior goes unchecked, and school social
climate.
In addition to being painful and humiliating, the short-term
effects of bullying experiences make victims unhappy,
distressed and confused. These students tend to lose
self-esteem and become anxious and insecure. Moreover,
victims may suffer physical injury, their concentration
and learning may be affected, and they may refuse to
go to school. They may tend to feel stupid, ashamed
and unattractive, and gradually begin to view themselves
as failures. Many of the victims develop psychosomatic
symptoms such as headaches and stomach pains. In some
cases, the victims' devaluation of themselves becomes
so overwhelming that they see suicide as the only possible
solution.
Persistent bullying during the school years may also
have long-term negative effects on the victims many
years beyond school. As young adults (age 23), former
victims tended to be more depressed and had poorer self-esteem
than their nonvictimized peers. The pattern of results
suggested that earlier, persistent bullying can leave
many scars. Thus, it is obviously crucial to stop bullying
in school in order to reduce and prevent its negative
short and long-term consequences.
With regard to bullies, bullying is not just isolated
behavior, instead, it is part of a more generally antisocial
and rule-breaking behavior pattern. As research has
shown, students (particularly boys) who bully others
are especially likely to engage in other antisocial/delinquent
behaviors such as vandalism, shoplifting, truancy and
frequent drug use. This antisocial behavior pattern
often continues into young adulthood. Approximately
60 percent of boys who were characteriezed as bullies
in grades 6-9 had been convicted of at least one officially
registered crime by the age of 24, compared to 23 percent
of boys who were not characterized as bullies. Even
more dramatic, as many as 35-40 percent of the former
bullies had three or more convictions by this age, compared
to only 10 percent of the non-bullies/non-victims. It
is important, then, to try to stop their development
along an antisocial pathway and to redirect it in a
more prosocial direction.
In addition, there is a connection between the level
of bully/victim problems in a classroom or school and
aspects of the social climate. In classrooms or schools
with high levels of bullying problems, students tend
to feel less safe and are less satisfied with school
life. This implies that, for many students, and particularly
for the victims, the classroom is no longer a place
of concentrated work and learning. The social climate
of the classroom or school also affects the students
not involved in bullying incidents. It can either reinforce
the acceptability of bullying over time, resulting in
harsher, less empathetic social climates which foster
new bullying episodes and other problems; or a positive
social climate can elicit more appropriate reaction
patterns in students.
Common Myths about Bullying
In the public debate, several hypotheses about the causes
of bully/victim problems have been suggested. Even though
these have failed to be supported by research, they
are still quite popular. It is therefore important to
briefly discuss and dispel some of the myths associated
with bullying.
One assumption is that bully/victim problems are, in
part, a consequence of large classes and/or schools:
the larger the class or school, the higher the level
of bully/victim problems. Closer analysis reveals that
the size of the class or school is of little influence
to the level of bullying situations, and one large-scale
study has found that the larger the class or school,
the lower the levels of bullying problems.
Second, it has been argued that the aggressive behavior
of bullies toward their environment can be explained
as a reaction to failures and frustrations in school.
This hypothesis has also failed to receive support from
data. Though there is a moderate association between
agressive behavior and poor grades, no evidence suggests
that aggressive behavior is a consequence of poor grades
and failure in school.
A third, widely held view, especially among students,
is that external deviations cause victimizations. It
is argued that students who are over-weight, red-haired,
wear glasses, speak with an unusual dialect, or have
a different ethnic background, for example, are particularly
likely to become victims of bullying. This view has
received no support in studies, and suggests that external
deviations play a much smaller role in bullying issues
than generally assumed. The relationship between ethnic
background and victimization has not been closely examined
in the United States, however. Given the greater ethnic
heterogeneity of the U.S., it is possible that ethnic
background may be related to victimization.
It may be added that in the case of Scandinavian students,
being a bully or a victim is unrelated to the socioeconomic
conditions of the student's family such as parental
education or income. Accordingly, the common belief
that bullying behavior is more prevalent in lower social
classes can be considered a myth as regards Scandinavia.
However, this hypothesis has not yet been well investigated
in large-scale North-American studies. Given the greater
socioeconomic heterogeneity of the U.S., it is possible
that there may be such link, although it is likely to
be weak.
Causes of Bullying
All of these assumptions or hypotheses have failed to
receive support from empirical data. As a result, one
must look for other factors to determine the (partial)
origins of these problems. In this context, it is important
to realize that the search for causes must be conducted
at different levels of analyses, including the individual,
the classroom, and school levels. The research evidence
collected to date clearly suggests that personality
characteristics and typical reaction patterns, in combination
with physical strength or weakness in the case of boys,
are quite important for the development of these problems
in individual students (making them more likely to become
victims or bullies). At the same time, environmental
factors such as the teachers' attitudes, routines, and
behaviors play a major role in determining the extent
to which the problems will manifest themselves in a
larger unit such as the classroom or the school. In
addition, environmental-organizational factors such
as the way in which break periods are arranged, may
be of some importance.
Basic Principles of Understanding
Bullying
Given the considerable stability of aggressive behavior
over time and the generally low or modest success in
reducing such behavior with a number of individual-oriented
approaches, an important premise of the Bullying Prevention
Program is that bullying behavior can be checked and
redirected into a more prosocial direction through a
systematic restructuring of the social environment.
Among other outcomes, this restructuring is expected
to result in fewer opportunities for bullying behavior
and fewer or smaller rewards (e.g., in the form of prestige
or peer support) for displaying such behavior. More
specifically, the program aims to effect systematic
changes of the "opportunity" and "reward
structures" for bullying and similar behavior in
the school and other relevant contexts. In addition,
positive, friendly, and prosocial behaviors are encouraged
and rewarded.
Generally, the Bullying Prevention Program is built
around a limited set of key principles and findings
derived chiefly from research on the development and
modification of problem behaviors, particularly aggressive
behavior. More specifically, the program strives to
develop a school (and ideally, a home) environment:
- characterized by warmth, positive interest, and
involvement by adults;
- firm limits to unacceptable behavior;
- where non-hostile, nonphysical negative consequences
are consistently applied in cases of violations of
rules and other unacceptable behaviors; and,
- where adults act as authorities and positive role
models.
The first three principles represent the antithesis
of child-rearing dimensions that research has linked
to the development of aggressive reaction patterns:
negativism on the part of the primary caretaker, general
permissiveness, lack of clear limits, and use of power-assertive
methods such as spanking and violent verbal outbursts.
The fourth principle encourages adults to emulate an
authoritative (not authoritarian) adult-child interaction
model in which they take responsibility for the students'
total situation, including both academic learning and
social relationships in school.
A basic premise of the Bullying Prevention Program
is that most efforts to create a better school environment
must be initiated and driven by the adults at school.
However, a number of the program measures (below) include
the students in these efforts. Moreover, the students'
role in changing the normative context of the school
will gradually increase in importance as the program
evolves.
Brief Description of
the Bullying Prevention Program
Adult behavior is crucial to the success of the Bullying
Prevention Program, and in order to achieve the program's
goals the following two conditions must be met. First,
the adults at school and, to some degree, at home must
become aware of the extent of bully/victim problems
in their own school. Secondly, the adults must engage
themselves, with some degree of seriousness, in changing
the situation. Without adults' acknowledgment of schools'
existing bully/victim problems and a clear commitment
by a majority of the school staff to participate actively
in the anti-bullying efforts, the program is likely
to have limited success. Administration of the Olweus
Bully/Victim Questionnaire is usually an effective way
to achieve awareness and involvement. In general, staff
members will be more inclined to initiate countermeasures
if they realize the number of students in their own
school who are directly involved in bully/victim problems
and learn how these problems affect students.
The principles described above have been translated
into a number of specific measures, or interventions,
that are used at the school, class, and individual levels,
and taking action at all of these levels is vital to
counteract bully/victim situations. In this way, students
will be exposed to consistent messages, from different
persons/sources and in different contexts, regarding
the school's views of and attitudes toward bullying.
All of the components are very important; however, the
focus has been to highlight adult involvement because
adults are the key implementors of the program. The
basic message of the program is successfully demonstrated
through all the components: Bullying is not accepted
in our class/school, and we will see to it that it comes
to an end.
School Level. Core interventions at the school level
include administration of the Olweus Bully/Victim Questionnaire
to assess the nature and prevalence of bullying at each
school, a school conference day/meeting, formation of
a Bullying Prevention Coordinating Committee, and the
development of a coordinated system to supervise students
during break periods. The school conference day provides
an opportunity for program consultants and school personnel
to review results of the survey, discuss elements of
the Bullying Prevention Program, and make specific plans
for implementing the program during the upcoming school
year. Ongoing coordination of the school's efforts will
be guided by a Bullying Prevention Coordinating Committee,
which may include a school administrator, a teacher
representative from each grade, a guidance counselor
and/or a school-based mental health professional, and
parent and student representatives. The final core component,
increasing teacher supervision of students in locations
where bullying occurs most frequently at school, can
be implemented after the Questionnaire has identified
particular "hot spots" within a school, which
commonly include the playground, classroom, and lunchroom.
Classroom Level. Core program interventions at the
classroom level include establishing and enforcing specific
rules against bullying, as well as holding regular classroom
meetings with students to discuss various aspects of
bullying and related antisocial behaviors and adherence
to agreed upon classroom rules. Classroom meetings also
are used to engage students in a variety of activities
(e.g., role playing, writing, and small-group discussions)
through which they gain a better appreciation of the
harm caused by bullying and learn strategies to combat
it. Meetings with parents to foster their active involvement
are considered highly desirable components both at the
classroom and the school levels.
Individual Level. Additional core components of the
program involve interventions with individual bullies
(or small groups of bullies), victims, and their parents
to both ensure that bullying behaviors cease and that
victims receive necessary support to avoid future bullying.
In order to foster the implementation and execution
of the program, the program emphasizes using the existing
social environment: teachers and other school personnel,
students, and parents. Thus, non-mental health professionals
play a major role in the desired restructuring of the
social environment. However, experts such as school
mental health professionals, guidance counselors, and
social workers also serve important functions as planners
and coordinators, in counseling and consulting with
the school, and in possibly handling more serious cases.
Evidence of Program Effectiveness
The Bullying Prevention Program has been implemented
in a variety of cultures (e.g, Bergen, Norway; the southeastern
United States; Sheffield, England; and the state of
Schleswig-Holstein, Germany) and school contexts (elementary,
middle, and junior high schools). The first and most
comprehensive evaluation was conducted with 2,500 students
from elementary and junior high schools in Bergen, Norway,
between 1983 and 1985. Results from this quasi-experimental
study revealed substantial reductions (typically by
50 percent or more) in the frequency with which students
reported being bullied and bullying others. Roughly
similar results were obtained using peer and teacher
ratings of levels of bully/victim problems. Furthermore,
there were substantial reductions in students' reports
of participation in general antisocial behaviors such
as vandalism, fighting, theft, and truancy. Improvements
were also observed in the social climate of classrooms.
Students reported better order and discipline at school,
more positive social relationships, and more positive
attitudes toward schoolwork and school. The effects
of the program appeared to be cumulative: for some of
the outcome variables studied, the program effects were
more marked after 20 months than after 8 months of intervention.
Finally, a "dosage-response" relationship
was documented: those classrooms that had implemented
certain essential components of the intervention program
(including establishment of classroom rules against
bullying and use of regular classroom meetings) showed
larger reductions in bully/victim problems than those
classrooms that implemented fewer components.
Evaluations of programs in the United States, England,
Germany, and a subsequent study in Bergen, Norway, have
produced somewhat more modest but still quite positive
findings. For example, the U.S. study of middle school
students revealed significant decreases in students'
self-reports of bullying in the intervention schools
compared to control schools. Moreover, the program appeared
to slow the natural rate of increase in students' engagement
in several other antisocial behaviors.
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