NATURE VS NUTURE

Bullying

Bullying is a national epidemic for today's children. Bullying is no longer hitting, pushing, teasing and name-calling. Today there is technology at every young persons disposal. This is another weapon for the bully to use.

27.8% of students age 12-18 reported being bullied at school and only 9% reported being cyber- bullied.

About 1 in 3 students report being bullied during the 2013 school year.

(National Centre for Educational Statistics,2013)

Movies and reality television have glamorized bullying to the masses…

“Heavy exposure to media alters the viewers perception of social reality in a way that matches the media world.”

-Levi and Kilbourne

Many adults still see bullying as “just being a kid” but it has become a serious problem. So serious that it has led many of its victims to contemplate suicide.

Victims of bullying are 2 to 9 times more likely to consider suicide.

The actual reported cases of bullying have been on the rise between 2007 to 2012 in the Indianapolis School system and that alone in one state is an alarming statistic.

How we handle bullying as a society will determine the outcome for the emotional and physical health of our youth…

What are we doing as a society that is perpetuating the cycle of bullying?

Adults continue to tolerate bullying because they believe this is a normal part of child development, they feel students should learn to solve problems on their own…

Teachers and staff members do not intervene for various reasons..

They hope it will go away,they lack the skills to intervene, lack of administrative support is often a big one!!!

Are we helping to Create Bullies as a society?

By tolerating the bullying behavior what are we saying to the “victim”? Victims of bullying get the “implied” message that adults have discounted their worth as individuals.

What are the signs of bullying?

What are we doing to stop the cycle?

There are foundations out there to speak to school age children about bullying

Celebrities have taken a stand to fight against bullying

REFERENCES

Baldry A.C. and Farrington D.P. published in the Journal of Legal and Criminological Psychology (September 1998)

Bandura, Albert; Ross, D; Ross, S.A (1961). "Transmission of aggression through imitation of aggressive models". Journal of Abnormal and Social Psychology 63 (3): 575–582

Donnellan, M. B., Trzesniewski, K. H., Robins, R. W., Moffitt, T. E., & Caspi, A. (2005). Low self-esteem is related to aggression, antisocial behavior, and delinquency. Psychological science, 16(4), 328-335.

Gini, Gianluca, and Tiziana Pozzoli. "Association between bullying and psychosomatic problems: A meta-analysis." Pediatrics 123.3 (2009): 1059-1065.

Graham, S. (2010). What educators need to know about bullying behaviors. Phi Delta Kappan, 92(1), 66-69

Grohol, J. (2012). Bullies More Likely to Have Mental Disorder. Psych Central. Retrieved on December 13, 2014, from http://psychcentral.com/blog/archives/2012/10/22/bullies-more-likely-to-have-mental-disorder

Merrell, K. W., Gueldner, B. A., Ross, S. W., & Isava, D. M. (2008). How effective are school bullying intervention programs? A meta-analysis of intervention research. School Psychology Quarterly, 23(1), 26.

Juvonen, J., Graham, S., & Schuster, M. A. (2003). Bullying among young adolescents: The strong, the weak, and the troubled. Pediatrics, 112(6), 1231-1237.

O'CONNELL, P. A. U. L., Pepler, D., & Craig, W. (1999). Peer involvement in bullying: Insights and challenges for intervention. Journal of adolescence, 22(4), 437-452.Stein, J. A., Dukes, R. L., & Warren, J. I. (2007). Adolescent male bullies, victims, and bully-victims: A comparison of psychosocial and behavioral characteristics. Journal of pediatric psychology, 32(3), 273-282.