Psychological Effects of Bullying on Children

One of the biggest problems in today’s society where children are concerned is bullying. What many people do not realize, is that bullying starts early, on the playgrounds of elementary schools. Fifteen percent of absenteeism is caused by bullying. As many as 71% of students say bullying is a problem at their school. Karin Frey and her colleagues did a study on bullying and how it affects schools and the children in them. As the New York Times wrote an article on what we can do to end bullying. There are 24 types of bullying listed in four categories, according to the New York Times. Those four categories are “verbal, rumors and ostracism, cyberbullying, and physical” (Dell’Antonia). These four categories start occurring as early as five years old. Some children seem to think that physical aggression will increase their social status, but as stated by CNN, “there is no evidence that overall aggression increases social status”. Therefore, bullying has no effect on social status, contrary to children’s beliefs. The study done by Developmental Psychology has three goals. The primary goal is to examine interventional affects on bullying and bystander behavior on playgrounds. The first goal of the study was to reduce bullying and decrease the destructive behavior of bystanders. The second goal was to increase prosocial beliefs related to bullying. The third goal was to increase social-emotional skills. The secondary goal was to examine the effects of bullying on grade, gender, and behavior at the beginning of the school year. The first goal, reducing bullying and destructive bystander behavior was evaluated by playground behavior and student’s self-reports. The intervention group was predicted to have decreases in observed playground bullying compared to the control group, or the group who had no intervention. Since people were observing the children on the playground, it was predicted that children standing by would be less encouraging of the bullying

Bibliography: Dell 'Antonia, K. (2011, October 14). What works to end bullying?. New York Times. Retrieved from http://parenting.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/10/14/what-works-to-end-bullying/?scp=4&sq=bullying in schools&st=cse Frey, K. S., Hirschstein, M. K., Snell, J. L., Edstrom, L. V. S., MacKenzie, E. P., & Broderick, C. K. (2004). Reducing playground bullying and supporting beliefs: An experimental trial of the steps to respect program. Developmental Psychology, Retrieved from https://prod.campuscruiser.com/PageServlet?pg=EZProxy&targetLoc=http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?authtype=ip,uid&profile=ehost&defaultdb=pdh&cmp=F22.42-51.3283_241&cx=22.42-51.3283