In the article, “The Myths of Bullying” by John Cloud, bullying is described as an exaggerated epidemic. Cloud presents details of high-profile cases including; the school shooting at Chardon High School and a suicide at Rutgers University. The aforementioned school tragedies suggest that the widespread international attention that these cases have obtained have “cemented in public opinion” (Cloud, 2012) the idea that bullying has taken on a persistent upward trend in the United States. Furthermore, he attests that the drastic measures immediately implemented to prevent bullying in school districts have also contributed to the overwhelming fear among parents and students alike, that bullying is an absolute growing epidemic.
Research findings contradict the idea that bullying is a “spreading plague” or on the rise each year (Cloud, 2012). According to the U.S. Department of Justice, “37 percent of students” reported that they
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Some researchers have postulated that in order to help alleviate the issues surrounding bullying, it would be ideal to target those indirectly involved. In other words, friends or classmates who may witness any form of bullying should be encouraged to intervene, specifically, these “bystanders” should “understand that saying something about what [they] see isn’t always tattling” (Cloud, 2012). In an article written by, Slide and Johnson (2014) an ideal anti-bullying policy is one which id personalized, such that it includes what the children and young people of the school feel is bullying behavior, and also emphasizes that it is the responsibility of everyone “the whole school community” to report any instance of bullying to an appropriate adult or educator (Slide and Johnson,
Bullying has become a major problem facing the United States today. The American Psychological Association reports that roughly 40% to 80% of children are involved in bullying on some level during their time in school. (APA, 2014) The magnitude of the problem can be observed in the statistics. In the United States, a total of 4,080,879 children between the ages of five and 18 have been the victims of bullying compared to 3,892,199 who have reported that they have engaged in bullying someone else. Additionally, 851,755 said that they have been both the victim and the bully. That's a whopping 8,824,833 people in the United States that have been involved in bullying behavior on one level or another. (High, B., 2000 Census)
Bullying has been around for decades and yet it is still a reoccurring problem, and it is only getting worse. The National Center for Educational Statistics, in 2009, said nearly 1 in 3 students between the ages of 12 and 18 reported being bullied in school. Eight years earlier, only 14 percent of that population said they had experienced bullying(Ollove,2014). There are two types of bullying the direct form and indirect form, in the direct form the victim receives physical harm example kicking pushing shoving. In the indirect form the victim receives emotional or mental harm by name-calling, rejection, gossip, threats, or insults(Green,2007). It doesn’t matter which way the victim was bullied it still causes
Bullying is a growing concern in a society where status and exercising power over another human being are increasingly important in developing one’s social circles. Dan Olweus (Norwegian researcher and founder of the Olweus Bullying Prevention Program) defines it as an “aggressive behaviour that is intentional and that involves an imbalance of power. Most often, it is repeated over time” (Violencepreventionworks.org). School victimization is an especially delicate matter that has only really been in the public eye for the past half century, as more and more researchers and psychologists pointed out its short- and long-term negative effects on targeted individuals. It has since been widely investigated and numerous programs have been developed in an effort to address and prevent the many forms of bullying that exist today. The negative effects of such an abusive behaviour are various and can greatly differ from individual to individual. However, there are three main consequences that can be associated with school bullying, which are: school avoidance, depression/anxiety and even suicidal attempts.
Neimen, Samantha, Brandon Robers, and Simon Robers. “Bullying: A State of Affairs.” Journal of Law & Education (n.d.):n. pag. Print.
Educators attempt to provide safe, nurturing environments where students can thrive. Any disturbance to this climate can have negative affects on students’ educational performances. Bullying is one such disruption. Unfortunately, physical and verbal abuse are nothing new in the school setting, however, the rise of technology in our country has created a new setting for bullies to target their victims. Cyberbulling, or the use of any number of technological means to harm or harass another, has become an increasingly prevalent occurrence, specifically among school-aged children (Campfield, 2006).
In a CNN study by Chuck Hadad he states “That bullying is pervasive even though the schools have anti-bullying programs from kindergarten through 12th grade, assemblies throughout the year, and a peer-to-peer program where older students talk to younger students about the dangers of bullying” (Hadad). Robert Faris, a sociologist found that bullies and victims are generally the same person. Whe...
The psychoanalytic perspective (Erikson’s psychosocial stages), Sigmund Freud Ego or psychological defense mechanism, and behaviorism and social learning theory, are important to understanding adolescent bullying. In the psychoanalytic approach, development is discontinuous and as such occurs in stages where “people move through a series of stages in which they confront conflicts between biological drives and social expectations, and how these conflicts are resolved depends on the person’s ability to learn, to cope with others and cope with stress” (Berk 2010, p.15). According to Sigmund Freud from this theory, individuals use a mechanism called psychological defense mechanisms which when they feel an overpowering anxiety, the ego employs to protect themselves against unwanted, scary feelings or weaknesses within their psyche or consciousness. The use of these defense mechanisms can be useful sometimes and also hurtful at other times to us and others, which emanates as aggressive behavior e.g. bullying [2]. Erikson’s psychosocial stages of development are important for understanding bully behavior. According to Erikson, a “basic psychological conflict which is resolved along a scale from positive to negative determines a healthy or maladaptive outcomes of each stage” [Berk 2010, p.16], in other words as the child grows and goes through each of the psychosocial stages, he or she negotiates new cognitive and emotional experiences which enables him or her to pass through the stage with either a positive or negative outcome. The effects and results of a negative outcome from the stages can be used to describe aggressive behavior such as bullying [Berk 2010, p.16]. According to the behaviorism and learning theory, they believed that b...
Everyone has been bullied or encountered someone being bullied at some point of their life. Whether it would be physically or verbally both can be exceedingly traumatizing and can have a long-term psychological influence on children’s development. Majority people may define bullying in a more physical term; nevertheless that’s not always the case. The act of bullying can occur in several ways and in reality affect the individual in the same way. Bullying is generally defined as repeated, negative, and harmful actions focused at target throughout a course of time, exhibiting a sense of power difference between the bully and the victim (Olweus, 1993; Limber & Mihalic, 1999 as cited from Douglas J. Boyle, 2005). A survey was conducted in the United States estimating that over six million children, about 30% in grade six through ten have experienced frequent bullying in a school environment (Nansel, 2001 as cited from Douglas J. Boyle, 2005). Many people might debate that bullying is something that every child goes through and is simply a part of growing up, although there are several damaging consequences that happens to the child’s brain. Bullying causes the child to feel upset, isolated, frightened, anxious, and depressed. They feel like they reason they are being picked on is because there is something wrong with them and may even lose their confidence feel unsafe going to school (Frenette, 2013 as cited from Douglas J. Boyle, 2005) Anthropologically, sociologically, or psychologically, bullying can be analyzed through different perspectives and several questions can be asked based on the topic:
Bullying is an issue that is a problem in society today. Bullying is any kind of unwanted behavior to an individual on repeated occasions which is a display of power over someone. Bullying is mainly common among students in school, and unfortunately, it happens in other places like at home between parents and children, and on rare occasions, among adults. When people began to identify bullying for what it is, it was only known as a physical aggression towards others, but over the course of time, bullying has moved from just physical bullying to verbal bullying, and power abuse in the workplace between co-workers in different ranks. In a book called Welfare Brat: A Memoir, Mary was bullied in school by boys on the streets, and unfortunately, she was verbally bullied by her mom. Bullying among children in the society is caused by different reasons, and affects its victims negatively.
Bullying is something that is not something new and is actually something that society continues to face. Over the years, bullying has been looked at as being so ordinary in schools that it is continuously overlooked as an emanate threat to students and has been lowered to a belief that bullying is a part of the developmental stage that most young children will experience then overcome (Allebeck, 2005, p. 129). Not everyone gets over the extreme hurt that can come as an effect from bullying, for both the bully and the victim. Because of this, we now see bullying affecting places such as the workplace, social events and even the home. The issue of bullying is not only experienced in schools, but the school environment is one of the best places
Bullying has always been present within the United States. Although the issue has been around for a long time, it continues to grow and become more of problem. It is said that about 160,000 children within the United States are refusing to go to school because of bullying. Another statistic is that within American schools alone, there are an estimated 2.1 billion bullies and 2.7 billion victims (Dan Olewus, MBNBD). The numbers presented here are outrageous and although there are organizations to stop bullying, obviously there needs to be a new set of solutions. Any type of bullying presents problems to children, “Suicide, depression, anxiety, substance abuse, trouble with the law, poor performance in school and work, and lack of involvement in socially accepted activities are some of the difficulties resulting from bullying (Austin, Reynolds, Barnes, Shirley). Of course, there is more than just a single type of bullying. Feeding ground for bullies can range anywhere from text-message or cyberbullying to physical bullying in schools. Also, bullies can begin to strike at a young age and could also be; teenage, middle-age, or even the elderly. Even though there are these many versions of problematic bullies, the largest bullying problems take place within the school setting: a place that is supposed to be safe for children rather than harmful. Although it seems impossible to completely get rid of bullying, these are a few suggested solutions; making the school informed on bullying issues, schools implementing rules on bullying, and having students positively use electronics to stop bullying.
“Researchers have conducted that at least 25% of all children will be affected by bullying at some point during their school years, and many of these children miss significant numbers of school days each year owing to fear of being bullied” (Bray, M., Kehle, T., Sassu, K. (2003). Bullying has become a major problem for our students and our schools. Children are missing educational time and are losing self-confidence because they are afraid or intimidated by other students. We, as teachers, need to reduce bullying in our schools and prevent bullying from being a reoccurring issue in the lives of our students in order for them to learn, grow and develop. Our goal as teachers should be “to reduce as much as possible-ideally to eliminate completely- existing bully/victim problems in and out of the school setting and to prevent the development of new problems” (Olweus, D. (1993).
There are several theories that you can relate to gangs, crimes and bullying and harassment. Social control theory explains and examines how people’s relationship, values, beliefs and norm will and can encourage the to break rules and regulations. Vanessa R. Panfil the author of Gay gang –and crime –involved men’s experiences with homophobic bullying and harassment in schools, explains that the “homophobic language and harassment in American schools is pervasive” (Panfil, 2013). Researchers have found that there are several sexual minorities who fight back against bullying and harassment, because they want to be accepted for whom they are no matter their age, race, or sexuality. Panfil “utilize in-depth interviews with 53 gay gang-
Bullying does not have a standard definition. Bullying can be anything from calling someone else names, beating them up just for the fun of it, to texting or messaging them on the internet or any mobile device. Any person can be the victim of bullying, not just children. Bullying causes many issues, physically, emotionally, and mentally, not only for the victim, but for their entire families as well. Bullies have many different reasons as to why they start bullying someone else. The actions done to the victim leaves them with only a few options on how to stop being bullied. How they handle it is always different.
“"I was sitting at my desk in my cubicle, and suddenly she was standing over me screaming, 'What the hell is this crap? And why is it so late?' I tried to say I thought I'd done exactly what she asked for, but she cut me off and yelled about how incompetent I was"” (pg. 118-142).