Subjective Well-Being and Bullying Victimisation: A Cross-National Study of Adolescents in 64 Countries and Economies

Abstract

Bullying is a recognised serious public problem affecting many students worldwide. Despite the well-established empirical evidence for the negative consequences of bullying on adolescents? mental and physical health and educational outcomes, little is known about the link between bullying victimisation and adolescents? subjective well-being. Moreover, empirical studies using comparative large-scale survey data are particularly scarce. This study explores this question using nationally-representative data from 329,015 adolescents across 64 high and middle-income countries and economies from the 2018 PISA survey. Two measures of subjective well-being were considered: overall life satisfaction and positive affect. Multilevel regressions were estimated at three levels (student, school, and country). Results showed that bullying victimisation was negatively and significantly related to overall life satisfaction and positive affect after controlling for a wide set of factors affecting subjective well-being. Moreover, this negative relationship was more pronounced for top performing students. Locally adapted intervention programmes are needed to tackle the issue of school bullying and foster positive school climate and student well-being. Practical and policy implications are discussed in detail.