Hypothetical Bullying Research Articles

Understanding Teachers’ Likelihood of Intervention in Bullying Situations: Testing the Theory of Planned Behavior

AbstractDespite the expanding body of research on school bullying and interventions, knowledge of what makes teachers intervene in bullying situations remains limited. Based on the Theory of Planned Behavior, a theoretical framework that combined the predictive elements contributing to teachers’ likelihood of intervening was tested empirically. The model used teachers’ characteristics and behavior as predictors of their tendencies to identify, prevent, and reduce bullying. Survey data of 114 primary school teachers (Mage = 42 years, 87% female, 10 schools) and 66 secondary school teachers (Mage = 40 years, 44% female, 5 schools) were analyzed using multilevel regression models. Teachers’ attitudes (including perceived seriousness of bullying) and behavioral control (including attribution styles) were related to teachers’ likelihood of intervening in six hypothetical bullying situations. Two other main elements of the Theory of Planned Behavior (subjective norms, as measured with perceived collegial support) and the additional element of knowledge (about the distinguishing characteristics of bullying) were unrelated to the likelihood of intervention. These findings emphasize the importance of teachers’ attitudes and attribution styles to the likelihood of intervention. These can be emphasized in teacher training and anti-bullying programs to empower teachers more systematically.

The Influence of Parenting Dimensions and Junior High School Students’ Involvement in Bullying

ABSTRACT Bullying by peers remains a serious problem facing adolescents. A key social support for adolescents is their parents. The unique contributions of specific dimensions comprising authoritative parenting, and adolescents’ involvement in bullying situations was investigated. Self-report data were collected from 125 grade 7 students and 100 grade 8 students (60% female; mean age = 12.74 years). Model testing indicated a positive relationship between parent support, beliefs against aggression, high levels of communication, and low levels of bullying and victimization, both in self-reports, and in effectiveness of problem-solving in hypothetical bullying situations. Results indicate that warm, supportive parenting influences the way adolescents consult with their parents about how to manage conflict, deal with bullying issues, and identify solutions to interpersonal problems. The implications of these findings may influence the comprehensiveness of prevention and intervention models that focus on the aspects of parental education.

School staff responses to student reports of bullying: A scoping review.

Bullying in schools has been associated with poor academic and mental health outcomes in students. While students are often encouraged to report bullying incidents to school staff, some students avoid reporting incidents as they lack faith in staff members' ability to intervene. This scoping review explored what is known about: staff responses to student reports of bullying; individual and school factors influencing staff responses; and strategies to improve staff responses when students report bullying incidents. Articles published between 2000 and 2021 were identified from six databases: ProQuest, EMBASE, PsycInfo, MEDLINE, CINAHL Plus and Taylor & Francis. Fifteen studies were included in the final review. Three studies explored staff responses to student reports of bullying, while 12 studies examined responses to observed or hypothetical bullying incidents. Staff responses to student reports of bullying included no response, as well as responses addressing bullying targets, perpetrators, peers, and the school and wider community. Staff preparedness was a predictor of staff involvement following bullying incidents. Strategies to improve staff responses included whole-school antibullying programs and training to increase staff efficacy. Few studies have examined real-life responses to student reports of bullying, with most addressing staff responses to hypothetical bullying incidents. Professional development and preservice education for school staff should address responses to student reports of bullying. SO WHAT?: Further research is needed to understand staff responses to real-life student reports of bullying. Addressing individual and school factors influencing staff responses may ultimately prevent bullying behaviour in schools.

Cross-National evaluation of the ViSC social competence programme: Effects on teachers

ABSTRACT The effectiveness of the Viennese Social Competence (ViSC) programme on various bullying-related teacher variables was examined at two time points with a quasi-experimental intervention-control group design. In Austria, Cyprus, and Turkey, teachers participated in a series of in-school trainings and implemented an anti-bullying prevention programme in their schools for one year. At pre-test, 767 teachers (515 in the intervention and 252 in the control group) and at post-test 665 teachers (464 in the intervention and 201 in the control group) rated their perceived knowledge and competence, and the likelihood of using different interventions in a hypothetical bullying scenario. For pre-test and post-test data, two 3 (country) x 2 (intervention) MANOVAs were conducted. Findings showed that Cypriot teachers profited the most from the anti-bullying programme, while Austrian and Turkish teachers profited comparatively less. High-quality basic teacher education in addition to in-school trainings within anti-bullying programmes is an essential component to prevent bullying in schools.

Teachers’ empathy and likelihood of intervention in hypothetical relational and retrospectively reported bullying situations

ABSTRACT Prior research suggests that teachers with higher levels of empathy are more willing to intervene in bullying among students. However, these findings are based on hypothetical bullying situations and teachers’ self-reports. In this study with 2,071 German students and their 556 teachers, we analysed reactions to hypothetical relational bullying situations as well as retrospectively reported bullying situations both from the teachers’ as well as the students’ perspectives. Results showed that teachers with higher levels of empathy reported stronger intentions to intervene in hypothetical relational bullying situations but were not more likely to intervene in retrospectively reported bullying situations. From the students’ perspective, teachers’ empathy was neither connected to the teachers’ intention to intervene nor to the likelihood of intervention in the retrospectively reported situations. These different results could be taken as an opportunity to investigate whether existing findings could be influenced by methodological aspects such as teachers’ self-reports. Implications for future research are discussed.

Parental advice to preadolescent bystanders about how to intervene during bullying differs by form of bullying

AbstractThe current study examined parental advice given to fourth‐ and fifth‐grade preadolescents who imagined being bystanders to different forms of bullying (physical, verbal, property attack, social manipulation, exclusion). We assessed the frequency with which parents advised youth to follow specific intervention strategies (stop the bully, help/comfort the victim, tell adults), and we tested whether the frequency by which parents provided each kind of advice varied by the form of bullying described. One hundred and six fourth‐ and fifth‐grade preadolescents completed an interaction in which their parent gave them advice about how to respond if they were bystanders to five hypothetical bullying situations. Each situation described a different form of bullying. Across forms of bullying, parents most frequently told bystander children to intervene by telling an adult. However, advice differed based on the form of bullying presented. Parents most frequently advised children to “tell an adult” in response to physical bullying or property attacks, most frequently advised children to “help/comfort victims” in response to social exclusion and physical attacks, and most frequently advised children to “stop the bully” in response to verbal and social manipulation bullying.

Bullying immigrant versus non-immigrant peers: Moral disengagement and participant roles

This study examined (1) whether self-justifying bullying (i.e., moral disengagement) differs in hypothetical bullying situations of a newcomer peer depending on his or her immigrant status; and (2) whether the respondent's immigration status, age, gender, real life bullying participant role (as bully, assistant, reinforcer, defender, victim or outsider) and moral disengagement proneness moderate the differences in moral disengagement between non-immigrant vs. immigrant victims. Altogether, 342 ten-year olds (54% immigrants) and 292 twelve-year olds (45% immigrants) answered peer-report measures to assess participation in bullying and peer status, and self-report measures to assess moral disengagement proneness and situational moral disengagement related to vignettes in which the target of bullying was a non-immigrant vs an immigrant new classmate. For both non-immigrant and immigrant participants both types of moral disengagement were higher for non-immigrant than immigrant victims in the vignettes independent of the respondents' own immigration status. However, different participant bullying roles predicted the differences in moral disengagement between non-immigrant versus immigrant hypothetical victims among non-immigrant and immigrant students. Results suggest that, besides being a trait dimension, moral disengagement is also influenced by situational characteristics that need to be taken into account in order to prevent and tackle bullying effectively.

When the bullied peer is native-born vs. immigrant: A mixed-method study with a sample of native-born and immigrant adolescents.

An increasing number of immigrant students attend Italian schools, with the possibility of being involved in bullying episodes. A few studies have investigated this phenomenon, providing some evidence that immigrant students may face an increased risk of being bullied compared to native-born students. The present study adopted a mixed-method design, which may better detect the dynamics of bullying towards immigrant peers. Participants were 692 native-born and immigrant students (20.5% with immigrant background; 54.8% females) who filled in self-report measures about their bullying experiences, popularity, acceptance of diversity at school, and prejudice. Thirty-five pupils (54% with immigrant background) were also interviewed. Two hypothetical bullying scenarios were presented: one depicting a native-born victim and one depicting an immigrant victim. After each scenario, adolescents were encouraged to reason about the motives for bullying. Quantitative data showed that general bullying was associated with perceived popularity status among peers, while racial bullying was associated with prejudice but not peer status. The relevance of anti-immigrant prejudices in driving racial bullying emerged also from adolescents' interviews. The qualitative data indicated that among the reasons for bullying, adolescents mentioned a desire for dominance and popularity, in particular when the victim was non-immigrant. Findings suggest that, in addition to individual and peer group-related risk factors, prejudice also needs to be addressed in anti-bullying interventions aimed to counteract racial bullying.

Why does decreased likeability not deter adolescent bullying perpetrators?

This study examines why the lower likeability of bullying perpetrators does not deter them from engaging in bullying behavior, by testing three hypotheses: (a) bullying perpetrators are unaware that they are disliked, (b) they value popularity more than they value likeability, (c) they think that they have nothing to lose in terms of likeability, as they believe that their targets and other classmates would dislike them anyway, regardless of their behavior. The first two hypotheses were examined in Study 1 (1,035 Dutch adolescents, M age = 14.15) and the third hypothesis was examined in Study 2 (601 Dutch adolescents, M age = 12.92). Results from regression analyses showed that those higher in bullying were not more likely to overestimate their likeability. However, they were more likely than others to find being popular more important than being liked. Moreover, those higher in bullying were more likely to endorse the belief that the victimized student or the other classmates would have disliked a bullying protagonist (in vignettes of hypothetical bullying incidents) before any bullying started. These findings suggest that adolescent bullying perpetrators may not be deterred by the costs of bullying in terms of likeability, possibly because they do not value likeability that much (Hypothesis 2), and because they believe they hardly have any likeability to lose (Hypothesis 3).

Emotional responses to bullying among Japanese adolescents: Gender, context, and incidence visibility

ABSTRACTBullying can occur with differing levels of visibility (e.g., public or private) and in various contexts (e.g., face-to-face or online). This study examined 474 Japanese middle-school students’ emotional responses to public versus private bullying scenarios in face-to-face and digital contexts. After reading four hypothetical bullying vignettes, participants described how they would have felt in each. Students felt sadder and more embarrassed for public bullying scenarios. No differences in anger were observed regarding visibility, but students reported feeling angrier in cyberbullying than face-to-face scenarios. As for gender differences, girls were more likely to feel sad and embarrassed than boys; however, no differences were seen in emotional responses based on visibility or context. The results suggest it is important to consider the context and incident visibility as well as different types of bullying when developing educational programs for bullying prevention.

Moral reasoning about school bullying in involved adolescents

The aim of the present study was to investigate how bullying incident participant roles and moral reasoning relate to each other in adolescents. To do so, we examined sociomoral judgments about hypothetical bullying incidents and moral disengagement in adolescents identified as bullies, defenders of the victim and passive bystanders. Six-hundred and twenty-six high school students (13- to 15-years-old) took part in this study and 131 were assigned a specific bullying incident participant role through peer nomination. Findings reveal that defenders of the victim show greater and more uniform moral sensibility than did both bullies and passive bystanders. Sociomoral reasoning helped differentiate between both bully subtypes (bully-leaders and bully-followers) and passive bystander beyond displaying greater moral disengagement than defenders did.

The effect of victims' responses to overt bullying on same-sex peer bystander reactions

This study investigated the impact of victims' responses to overt bullying on peer bystanders' attitudes and reactions. Fifth- and seventh-grade students (N=206; Mage=11.13 and 13.18years, respectively) completed online questionnaires about gender-consistent videotaped hypothetical bullying scenarios in which the victims' responses (angry, sad, confident, ignoring) were experimentally manipulated. Victims' responses significantly influenced bystanders' attitudes towards the victim, perceptions of the victimization, emotional reactions, and behavioral intentions. In general, angry victims elicited more negative reactions, sad victims elicited greater intentions to act, while incidents involving confident victims were perceived as less serious. Several variations depending on the bullying type and students' grade, gender, and personal experiences with bullying were evident. Implications for individual-level and peer-level anti-bullying interventions are discussed.

How teachers respond to school bullying: An examination of self-reported intervention strategy use, moderator effects, and concurrent use of multiple strategies

Teachers' (N = 625; 74% female) use of intervention strategies was examined in a hypothetical bullying episode. Self-reported strategies were best described by a five-factor structure. Teachers preferred authority-based interventions, followed by non-punitive work with bullies and involvement of other adults. They were less likely to work with victims or ignore the incident. About 60% of teachers would apply authority-based interventions toward bullies without working with victims at the same time, while 3% would work with victims without using authority-based interventions toward bullies. Strategy use was moderated by teachers' gender and teaching experience. Implications for bullying prevention and teacher education are discussed.

Parent–child communication and adolescents' problem-solving strategies in hypothetical bullying situations

The current study investigated (1) the types of solutions that students and parents generate in response to hypothetical bullying situations, (2) the effectiveness of the strategies, and (3) the effectiveness of strategies when considering parent–child communication. Two hundred twenty-five junior high school students and their parents were required to read four short scripts involving hypothetical bullying dilemmas and generate as many solutions as possible to solve each situation. Participants also filled out a parent–child communication questionnaire. Results revealed that the most common type of solutions provided by both students and parents were help-seeking strategies. Although students provided significantly more assertive solutions than parents, 41% generated at least one strategy that may worsen the situation. The overall effectiveness rating of solutions for students and parents fell slightly below effective. Finally, parent–child communication was associated with the effectiveness of solutions generated. Educational recommendations and future research steps will be discussed.

Good and evil at school: Bullying and moral evaluation in early adolescence

We investigated how adolescents (sixth-graders, N = 357) morally evaluated hypothetical bullying and defending protagonists and whether these evaluations related to behavior in bullying as nominated by peers. Exploratory factor analysis (EFA) resulted in four factors for the evaluation of the hypothetical bullies: Evil soul, Contempt, Cowardice, and Deviance, and five factors for the evaluation of the hypothetical defender: General admiration, Courage, Cool, Empathic care, and Fair justice. Corresponding scales were constructed. The findings showed that bullying positively correlated with evaluating the hypothetical bullies using Cowardice while victimization positively correlated with evaluating the hypothetical defender in terms of General admiration, Empathic care, and Fair justice. MANOVA for each of the two sets of the evaluative scales indicated that behavioral status (bully, victim, defender, or uninvolved) had a significant effect on the moral evaluation of hypothetical bullies, and no significant effect on the moral evaluation of the hypothetical defender.

Is Cyberbullying Worse than Traditional Bullying? Examining the Differential Roles of Medium, Publicity, and Anonymity for the Perceived Severity of Bullying

Cyberbullying, a modern form of bullying performed using electronic forms of contact (e.g., SMS, MMS, Facebook, YouTube), has been considered as being worse than traditional bullying in its consequences for the victim. This difference was mainly attributed to some specific aspect that are believed to distinguish cyberbullying from traditional bullying: an increased potential for a large audience, an increased potential for anonymous bullying, lower levels of direct feedback, decreased time and space limits, and lower levels of supervision. The present studies investigated the relative importance of medium (traditional vs. cyber), publicity (public vs. private), and bully's anonymity (anonymous vs. not anonymous) for the perceived severity of hypothetical bullying scenarios among a sample of Swiss seventh- and eight-graders (study 1: 49% female, mean age = 13.7; study 2: 49% female, mean age = 14.2). Participants ranked a set of hypothetical bullying scenarios from the most severe one to the least severe one. The scenarios were experimentally manipulated based on the aspect of medium and publicity (study 1), and medium and anonymity (study 2). Results showed that public scenarios were perceived as worse than private ones, and that anonymous scenarios were perceived as worse than not anonymous ones. Cyber scenarios generally were perceived as worse than traditional ones, although effect sizes were found to be small. These results suggest that the role of medium is secondary to the role of publicity and anonymity when it comes to evaluating bullying severity. Therefore, cyberbullying is not a priori perceived as worse than traditional bullying. Implications of the results for cyberbullying prevention and intervention are discussed.