Health-Related Quality of Life and Mental Health of Adolescents Involved in School Bullying and Homophobic Verbal Content Bullying.

Natalia Albaladejo-Blázquez,Elisa Delvecchio,Nicolás Ruiz-Robledillo,Miriam Sánchez-SanSegundo,Juan Carlos Arango-Lasprilla,Manuel Fernández-Alcántara,Rosario Ferrer-Cascales

doi:10.3390/ijerph16142622

Abstract

Bullying has been traditionally related to a significant reduction in well-being and Health-Related Quality of Life (HRQoL) of adolescents. This negative impact on HRQoL seems to be modulated by the developed role in bullying (uninvolved, bully, victim or bully-victim). However, no studies have identified if these negative results are the same when other types of bullying, such as homophobic bullying, are evaluated. The main aim of the present study was to analyze the prevalence of different roles of bullying and homophobic bullying and the relationship between these roles in both types of bullying with HRQoL, depression and anxiety levels in a sample of 1723 Spanish adolescents. Although results exhibited lower prevalence of homophobic bullying roles when compared to traditionally bullying in general, in the case of victims, the prevalence was high in the case of homophobic bullying. When differences between roles in HRQoL, depression and anxiety were evaluated, in both types of bullying, uninvolved adolescents showed the best results and bully-victim adolescents the worst. The obtained results suppose an improvement in the understanding of the negative effects of different types of bullying on HRQoL and mental health in adolescents. Future research could advance in this comprehension, analyzing possible differences with other types of bullying, such as cyberbullying.

Highlights

Bullying is defined as aggressive, unjustified, intentional and persistent behavior, characterized by the power imbalance between victim and aggressor [1,2] with negative psychological and social consequences for the lives of children and adolescents [3]
Students who were present on the day of data collection and accepted to participate in the study were instructed to complete an anonymous online survey in the classroom that included measures of bullying, homophobic content bullying and Health-Related Quality of Life measures
The present study aimed to identify the prevalence of bullying and homophobic verbal content bullying in a sample of Spanish adolescents, considering the specific frequency of adolescents involved in different roles in each case

Summary

Introduction

Bullying is defined as aggressive, unjustified, intentional and persistent behavior, characterized by the power imbalance between victim and aggressor [1,2] with negative psychological and social consequences for the lives of children and adolescents [3]. Its prevalence varies in different studies between 10 and 50% in adolescents [3,4,5]. In terms of sex differences in victimization, various investigations attribute greater protagonism to boys [6,7]; in contrast, other works highlight that females are more frequently victims of bullying than males [8,9], whereas other studies find no sex differences in victimization [10,11]. Public Health 2019, 16, 2622; doi:10.3390/ijerph16142622 www.mdpi.com/journal/ijerph

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