The Healthy Context Paradox: Victims\u2019 Adjustment During an Anti-Bullying Intervention

Gijs Huitsing,René Veenstra,Jaana Juvonen,Gerine M A Lodder,Beau Oldenburg,Christina Salmivalli,Hannah L Schacter

doi:10.1007/s10826-018-1194-1

Abstract

This study investigated the “healthy context paradox”: the potentially adverse effects of school anti-bullying norms on victims’ psychological (depression, social anxiety, and self-esteem) and school adjustment. Based on the person-group (dis)similarity model, social comparison theory, similarity attraction in friendship formation, and attributional theory, it was hypothesized that the emotional plight of victims is intensified in intervention schools with a visible, school-wide anti-bullying program, as compared with victims in control schools with “a care as usual” approach. Longitudinal multilevel regression analyses were conducted on Randomized Controlled Trial data from the Dutch implementation of the KiVa anti-bullying program (baseline and 1-year follow-up data on 4356 students from 245 classrooms in 99 schools, 68% intervention students, 49% boys, 9–10 years-old). The findings revealed that—despite the overall success of the intervention—those who remained or became victimized in intervention schools had more depressive symptoms and lower self-esteem after being targeted by the intervention for 1 year, compared to those who remained or became victimized in control schools. These effects were not found for social anxiety and school well-being. The findings underscore the importance of individual × environment interactions in understanding the consequences of victimization and emphasize the need for adults and classmates to provide continuing support for remaining or new victims who are victimized in schools that implement anti-bullying interventions.

Highlights

Bullying is aggressive, systematic, and goal-directed behavior that harms individuals within the context of a power imbalance (Olweus 1993; Volk et al 2014)
The norm in a group can be regarded as a guideline that prescribes which behaviors are appropriate or which experiences are typical or shared. Such norms can be related to bullying and victimization (Dijkstra et al 2008; Huitsing et al 2012; Sentse et al 2007): when children are victimized in the context of a successful anti-bullying intervention, they deviate from the group norm
We focused on indicators of psychological adjustment that are known to be associated with victimization: depressive symptoms, social anxiety, and self-esteem

Summary

Participants

The longitudinal evaluation of the Dutch implementation in a Randomized Controlled Trial (with randomization at the school level) of the KiVa anti-bullying program followed children from the start of the intervention for 2 years, resulting in five data waves in the RCT. We focused on children from grades three and four (Dutch grades five and six) in the implementation year, because this was the target sample of the intervention (T1 Mage = 8.67, SD = 0.68; T3 Mage = 9.70, SD = 0.69). The sample used in the subsequent analyses consisted of 4356 students in 245 classrooms in 99 schools (49% boys; see the CONSORT flow diagram in the Appendix). There were 2954 students in 166 classrooms in 65 intervention schools (68% of the total sample), and the remaining 1402 students came from 79 classrooms in 34 control schools (32% of the total sample). The remaining 11.1% of children reported another Western (5.9%) or non-Western (5.2%) ethnicity

Procedure

Victimization FU

Results

Discussion

Limitations and Future