Abstract
Victims of bullying are at increased risk of developing psychosocial problems. It is often claimed that it helps victims when others stand up against the bullying and when defending is typical (descriptive norm) or rewarded with popularity (popularity norm) in classrooms. However, recent work on the healthy context paradox suggests that victims – paradoxically – tend to do worse in more positive classrooms. Therefore, it is possible that defending norms are counterproductive and exacerbate victims’ adjustment difficulties, possibly because social maladjustment is more apparent in classrooms where everybody else is doing well. The current study examined whether descriptive and popularity norms for defending predicted victims’ classroom climate perceptions and psychosocial adjustment. Using data of 1,206 secondary school students from 45 classrooms (Mage = 13.61), multi-level analyses indicated that descriptive norms for defending increased rather than decreased negative classroom climate perceptions and maladjustment of victimized youths. In contrast, popularity norms for defending positively predicted all students’ classroom climate perceptions and feelings of belonging, except victims’ self-esteem. Interventions may benefit more from promoting popularity norms for defending rather than descriptive norms for defending in secondary schools.
Highlights
In adolescence, when the desire for inclusion and acceptance by peers is high, being victimized by peers takes a significant social-emotional toll
Higher individual-level victimization correlated with more negative classroom climate perceptions, lower self-esteem, lower feelings of belonging, and higher levels of loneliness
The current study examined whether the healthy context paradox phenomenon emerges when classrooms are characterized by positive aspects that are aimed at making victims to feel better (Cohen and Wills 1985), namely the defending norms
Summary
In adolescence, when the desire for inclusion and acceptance by peers is high, being victimized by peers takes a significant social-emotional toll. The goal of this study was to examine how descriptive and popularity norms for defending are related to perceptions of classroom climate and psychosocial adjustment (self-esteem, belonging, loneliness) of secondary school students who are victimized by their peers. We considered four classroom climate indicators (cf Boor-Klip et al 2016), assessing the extent to which students perceive a positive, inclusive group structure (cohesion), and a lack of exclusion (isolation), as well as high degrees of helping (cooperation) and a lack of conflictive, negative behaviors (conflict). Both interactional and relational aspects of the classroom climate were captured (Rubin et al 2006)
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