Examining the Social Context of Bullying Behaviors in Early Adolescence

Familial and adult influences, peer relations, and distal contextual factors were tested as correlates of a continuous measure of bullying behavior within a sample of 558 middle school students. Only 19.5% of the sample reported exhibiting no bullying behavior in the past 30 days. Parental physical discipline, time spent without adult supervision, negative peer influences, and neighborhood safety concerns were each positively associated with bullying behavior. In contrast, positive adult role models were associated with less bullying behavior. Results suggest that counselors should focus prevention and intervention efforts on the risk factors within the larger social context of an adolescent's life.     

Perceptions and Attitudes Toward Bullying in Middle School Youth

ABSTRACT

We examined middle school students' attitudes and perceptions of bullying during their middle school years. Participants were categorized along the bully/victim continuum as bullies, victims, bully-victims, and no-status students based on their self-nomination from a survey that queries students about their experiences with bullying (either as a bully, victim, or both), their observations of bullying, and their attitudes toward bullying. The majority of participants were classified as bullies, victims, and bully-victims as 70% of the participants reported involvement with bullying and/or victimization during their middle school years. Participants' perceptions about bullying and attitudes toward bullying were examined at three points in time. Participants' attitudes toward bullying became more supportive of bullying as students progressed through middle school. Additionally, external attributes for bullying were cited across all four status groups as reasons for involvement in bullying. Implications for prevention and intervention programs that address bullying are discussed.     

The Impact of a Brief Bullying Bystander Intervention on Depressive Symptoms

The authors evaluated the impact of a brief bullying bystander intervention (STAC) on depressive symptoms among high school students using a randomized controlled design. Results of path analyses provided support for a mediational model in which the intervention was associated with an increase in sense of school belonging, which in turn was associated with a reduction in depressive symptoms. The authors discuss implications for high school counselors and counselors in other settings working with adolescents.     

Social emotional learning (SEL) practices in schools: Effects on perceptions of bullying victimization

The direct and indirect effects of student perceptions of the extent to which social emotional learning (SEL) instruction is provided on bullying at school and student victimization experiences were examined for 2832 public school students. Students in grades 4–12 completed several subscales of the Delaware School Climate Survey (Bear et al., 2016) at a single timepoint to assess their perceptions of the extent to which SEL instruction is used at their school, their own SEL skills, bullying at school, and personal victimization experiences. Structural equation modeling revealed that students' perceptions of SEL instruction were inversely related to their perceptions of bullying at school and students' personal experiences of victimization. Effects were direct and indirect, through students' self-reported perceptions of their SEL skills. Effects were stronger in late elementary and middle school than in high school. The indirect effects of student perceptions of the extent of SEL instruction on perceived bullying at school through students' SEL skills varied as a function of victimization severity. For students with low self-reported victimization, there was a negative relation between student self-reported SEL skills and perceptions of bullying at school. In contrast, for students who reported experiencing high levels of victimization, students' self-reported SEL skills related positively to perceptions of bullying at school; there was no significant relation between SEL skills and perceptions of bullying at school for students who reported moderate levels of victimization. Implications for teachers' inclusion of SEL instruction and its effects on positive youth development are discussed.     

Bully Busters: A Psychoeducational Intervention for Reducing Bullying Behavior in Middle School Students

The present study examined the effectiveness of a bully prevention program counselors may use to modify teachers' knowledge/use of bullying intervention skills, teachers' self‐efficacy, and students' classroom bullying behaviors. Participants attended 3 training sessions and participated on a support team. The findings indicated that the treatment program effectively increased teachers' knowledge/use of intervention skills, teachers' personal self‐efficacy, and self‐efficacy related to working with specific types of children and reduced classroom bullying as measured by disciplinary referrals.     

School-wide social emotional learning (SEL) and bullying victimization: Moderating role of school climate in elementary,middle, and high schools

Guided by the school-wide social-emotional learning framework and social-ecological model, in this study we examined the associations between students' perceptions of four core social emotional learning (SEL) competencies (i.e., responsible decision-making, social awareness, self-management, and relationship skills) and school climate and their experience with bullying victimization through a multilevel framework. We also examined the multilevel moderating effects of students' perceptions of school climate, gender, and school levels (elementary, middle, and high schools) on the association between SEL competencies and bullying victimization. Participants were 23,532 students (4th to 12th grade) from 90 schools in Delaware. Using hierarchical linear modeling and controlling for demographic factors and school climate at both student and school levels, we found that three of the four core SEL competencies (i.e., social awareness, relationship skills, and self-management) and student-level school climate perceptions had significant associations with students' bullying victimization experiences. Moreover, the positive association between social awareness and bullying victimization and the negative association between self-management and bullying victimization were both mitigated in schools with more positive school climate at the student level. The association between some of the SEL competencies and bullying victimization varied depending on students' gender and grade levels. The findings highlight the unique and differentiated relations among the four core SEL competencies and students' bullying victimization experiences; they also suggest the importance of including school climate assessment and applying gender- and grade-level-specific efforts in bullying prevention programs with an SEL focus.     

Social Isolation of Youth at Risk: Conceptualizations and Practical Implications

A literature review led to a conceptualization of social isolation as a major factor in determining how youth are increasingly put at risk for both immediate and lifelong difficulties. Three common and particularly troubling at‐risk situations that counselors face are specifically examined to better understand the origins and implications affecting assessment and interventions: abuse by peers in the form of bullying and harassment, abuse and neglect of youth by adults, and suicide as a form of self‐abuse. The authors present practical implications for how school and mental health counselors can apply this information in practice.     

Teachers Matter: An Examination of Student-Teacher Relationships,Attitudes Toward Bullying,and Bullying Behavior

This study investigated the influence of student-teacher relationships and attitudes toward bullying on middle school students' bullying behaviors. Gender and grade differences were also examined. Data were collected from 435 middle school students. Results indicated that students' attitudes toward bullying mediated the relationship between student-teacher relationships and physical and verbal/relational bullying. There was a significant group difference on student-teacher relationships and attitudes toward bullying between bully, bully-victim, victim, and bystander groups and students not involved in bullying. In addition, sixth graders reported significantly more positive student-teacher relationships than seventh and eighth graders. Implications for the role of both cognitive and behavioral bullying intervention and prevention efforts are discussed.     

Are school policies focused on sexual orientation and gender identity associated with less bullying? Teachers' perspectives

Bullying is common in U.S. schools and is linked to emotional, behavioral, and academic risk for school-aged students. School policies and practices focused on sexual orientation and gender identity (SOGI) have been designed to reduce bullying and show promising results. Most studies have drawn from students' reports: We examined teachers' reports of bullying problems in their schools along with their assessments of school safety, combined with principals' reports of SOGI-focused policies and practices. Merging two independent sources of data from over 3000 teachers (California School Climate Survey) and nearly 100 school principals (School Health Profiles) at the school level, we used multi-level models to understand bullying problems in schools. Our results show that SOGI-focused policies reported by principals do not have a strong independent association with teachers' reports of bullying problems in their schools. However, in schools with more SOGI-focused policies, the association between teachers' assessments of school safety and bullying problems is stronger. Recent developments in education law and policy in the United States and their relevance for student well-being are discussed.     

Perceptions of adolescent bullying: Attributions of blame and responsibility in cases of cyber‐bullying

Cyber‐bullying (where victims are targeted via online social networking or other electronic means) has gained increased attention in research and the broadcast media, but previous research has not investigated attribution of blame in such cyber‐bullying events. This experiment hypothesized that participants would assign higher ratings of blame to bullying perpetrators when the bullying situations were depicted as having highly foreseeable outcomes (vs. unforeseeable outcomes), and as occurring in school (vs. online). In addition, a significant interaction was predicted between outcome foreseeability and bullying situation, with highly foreseeable in‐school events being rated as the most predictable and attributable to the bully's actions. One‐hundred sixty‐three participants completed surveys containing demographic items, items regarding their past experiences of victimization, and one of four randomly‐assigned vignettes detailing a bullying situation (which participants rated). While hypotheses regarding outcome foreseeability were supported, no cyber‐bullying vs. in‐school main effects (or corresponding interaction effects) were detected. Implications for future research and practice, as well as study limitations, are discussed.     

The School Counselor as Perceived by School Counselors and Their Principals

This study was designed to ascertain the perceptions of school counselors and school administrators of the school counselor's activities and the attributes necessary for him to be effective in his role. The findings were interpreted to suggest that differences that exist between the perceptions of counselors and administrators tend to be in the degree to which they view certain activities or attributes as important. Ranking of activities and the attributes by both groups tended to be similar but differences were found to exist between the mean scores of counselors and administrators in various areas. Sources of discrepancy were discussed as possibly relating to the need for counselors to establish clearer priorities for their activities and the administrators' perception of the counselor as fundamentally a quasi-administrator of guidance services.     

School Counselors as Social Capital: The Effects of High School College Counseling on College Application Rates

Using social capital theory as a framework, the authors examined data from the Educational Longitudinal Study of 2002 (Ingels, Pratt, Rogers, Siegel, & Stutts, 2004) to investigate how student contact with high school counselors about college information and other college‐related variables influence students' college application rates. In addition to some college‐related variables, the number of school counselors and student contacts were significant predictors of college application rates. Implications for school counselors and counselor training are included.     

The School Counselor's Role in School Dropout Prevention

The role of the school counselor has undergone numerous revisions over the past few decades. The current emphasis on accountability and academic performance of students has forced counselors to scrutinize their role in promoting students' academic success and school completion. In this article, the authors review the problem of school dropout from the school counselor's perspective and offer guidelines for how school counselors can deliver empirically supported strategies to address this problem as part of their comprehensive guidance programs.     

Evaluation of the effectiveness of an anti‐bullying programme in primary schools

A nationwide programme to prevent and manage bullying in Irish schools, based on that implemented in Norway in 1996, is currently being developed, and pilot work with a sample of primary schools within a single county of Ireland has been conducted and evaluated (the staff and pupils of 42 primary schools having been involved). A network of professionals (11 teachers) were trained to co‐ordinate the anti‐bullying programme in the schools, subsequent activities involving their training teachers (a total of 197) and parents in three to five schools each. In evaluation, pupils from 22 of the schools completed modified versions of the Olweus Bully/Victim Questionnaire [Olweus, 1989; Whitney and Smith, 1993]. Teachers completed a questionnaire (concerning their knowledge and feelings about bullying [Rigby, 1997]) both before and after the implementation of the anti‐bullying training programme. Significant reductions were found in pupils' reports of having been victimised after the implementation of the programme. Overall, 19.6 per cent fewer children were victimised. There was a reduction of 50.0 per cent amongst those frequently victimised within the last school term, and of 43.0 per cent in reports of having been bullied within the last five school days. A reduction of 17.3 per cent in pupils' reports of having taken part in bullying others was also observed after the implementation of the programme. There were, in particular, significant reductions (69.2 per cent) in reports of frequently bullying others within the last school term, and of 51.8 per cent in reports of having taken part in bullying others within the last five school days. Whilst the programme was shown to reduce the incidence of pupils' involvement in bullying behaviour, the perennial challenge of attempting to increase the levels of pupils' reporting of bullying to teachers and parents remains a challenge for the authors to attend to in the further development of the nationwide anti‐bullying programme. Aggr. Behav. 00:1–14, 2005. © 2005 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.     

The Development of an SVIB Interest Scale for School Counselors

A professional school counselor key was developed on the Strong Vocational Interest Blank using Campbell's revised procedures. Of the 403 counselors initially contacted, 340 responded. Of this number, 203 were identified as professional counselors and were included in the professional school counselor scale. Each of these individuals was fully certified, possessed three or more years' experience as a counselor, was a member of a professional guidance association, and was thoroughly satisfied with his job as a counselor. Differences between professional counselors and non-professional counselors seemed to indicate a greater people-orientation in the professional counselor group. This was further supported by relationships of the professional counselor key with other scales on the SVIB.     

Bystanders’ affect toward bully and victim as predictors of helping and non-helping behaviour

The current study examined how children's relationship with the bully and victim impacted their reactions as bystanders. An ethnically diverse sample of 2,513 Canadian students in grades 4–7 responded to questions about their experiences of bullying, including the frequency with which they witnessed bullying at school. Approximately 89% of the sample reported witnessing bullying at school during the current school year. Subsequently, participants were asked to recall a specific bullying incident that they witnessed and describe: (1) their relationship with the bully and victim; (2) how they felt while witnessing; and (3) how they responded as a bystander. Compared to situations where they didn't know the victim, bystanders were more likely to intervene directly (e.g., try to stop the bully, comfort the victim) if they liked the victim, and less likely to tell an adult if they disliked the victim. Aggressive intervention was more common if the witness didn't like the bully, but also if they didn't like the victim compared to if they didn't know them. Regarding emotions, anger emerged as an especially powerful predictor of bystander defending, with youth being over five times more likely to try to stop the bullying or comfort the victim if they felt angry. Implications of these findings for the development of ecologically valid, anti-bullying interventions are discussed.     

Intercultural Model of Ethical Decision Making: Addressing Worldview Dilemmas in School Counseling

The role of school counselors has expanded and deepened over the past few decades, just as the K–12 student population has become more diversified. Professional school counselors regularly encounter ethical dilemmas related to the intersection of their transformed role and students' needs. School counselors, therefore, need assistance and support to develop the skills and problem‐solving strategies to effectively, ethically, and respectfully negotiate these dilemmas. The authors propose the Intercultural Model of Ethical Decision Making as a practical, user‐friendly tool to help school counselors meet these complex challenges.     

Occupational prestige and appropriateness: The views of mental health specialists

Because of the extensive social and cultural changes associated with the women's equal rights movement, this study asked questions about how occupational prestige is related to differential views of women's roles with female and male psychotherapists, advanced graduate students, and secondary school counselors. The samples differ very little in their rankings of occupational prestige. However, differences did emerge between each sample's judgments of which occupations are appropriate for women, with school counselors being the most likely to rate occupations as inappropriate for women.     

Classroom‐ and School‐Level Contributions to Bullying and Victimization: A Review

School bullying is increasingly viewed by researchers as a group phenomenon that extends beyond the perpetrator–victim dyad and is embedded in the wider social context. This paper reviews the literature on classroom and school factors contributing to bullying and victimization among children and adolescents. Considerable variability in the prevalence of these problems exists between classrooms and schools, which are highly relevant contexts for students' social development. Along with individual characteristics, both classroom‐ and school‐related factors explain the bullying dynamic. The contexts may also exacerbate, or buffer against, the effects of individual‐level risk for bullying involvement and the consequences of victimization. We discuss findings on the contributions of demographic and structural characteristics (e.g. grade level, classroom and school size), peer contextual factors (e.g. status hierarchy, group norms and bystander behaviours) and the role of teachers. Finally, implications for research and school‐based antibullying programs are considered. Copyright © 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.