Consequences of school bullying and violence

1
Consequences of school bullying and violence

• Christina Salmivalli
• University of Turku, Finland

2

• It is evident that children exposed to systematic
  victimization by their peers suffer from
  adjustment problems
• Victimization is concurrently associated with
  depression, anxiety, low global and social
  self-concept, suicidal ideation, school avoidance
  (Card, 2003 Hawker Boulton, 2000)
• Strongest effect sizes for internalizing
  problems, BUT victimization is also associated
  with externalizing problems
• Victimization is even related to health problems
  (Rigby, 2001)
• Several interpersonal correlates such as
  rejection, low number of friends and low
  friendship quality
• The bullies, and especially bully-victims, suffer
  from adjustment problems as well

3

• Are the associations between victimization and
  maladjustment only concurrent, or does
  victimization longitudinally predict adjustment
  problems?

4

• OVERALL
• Studies investigating the consequences of
  victimization while controlling for intitial
  levels in the variables of interest are still
  surprisingly rare

5

• Many of the concurrent correlates of
  victimization seem to be both antecedents and
  consequences of it
• A vicious cycle by which children get trapped in
  the role of continued victimization
• HOWEVER
• Internalizing problems, such as depression, seem
  to increase as a result of victimization rather
  than precede it
• Low self-esteem, on the other hand, is clearly an
  antecedent of victimization, whereas evidence of
  longitudinal changes in (global) self-esteem
  resulting from victimization is more mixed

(e.g., Card, 2003)
6
Prospective relations between victimization,
rejection, friendlessness and childrens self-
and peer-perceptions

• Christina Salmivalli
• University of Turku, Finland

(unpublished data)
7
Grade 5/6
Grade 6/7
.41
self(1)
self(3)
-.14
.44
chronic vic (1-2)
vic(3)
.29
-.21
chronic rej (1-2)
.63
-.25
rej(3)
-.17
.23
chronic fri (1-2)
-.13
fri3
.14
peer(1)
peer(3)
.31
Figure 2. The final model (chi-square (23)30.16,
p.14 CFI.99 RMSEA.04).
8

• In the short term, victimization seems to
  influence childrens generalized perception of
  peers, rather than their view of themselves
• A negative self-perception is clearly a risk
  factor for victimization (but also for other peer
  relationship adversities, such as rejection and
  friendlessness)

9
What about the long run?

• Follow-up studies examining the long-term
  consequences of victimization are, to date,
  almost nonexistent
• As an exception, Olweus (1994) followed up 87 men
  who had been assessed in grade 9 (and, most of
  them, also in grade 6) up to 23 years of age.
• The former victims were relatively well-adjusted
  in many respects. However, they had a lower
  self-esteem and they suffered from depression
  more often than their non-victimized age-mates.

10
Long-term influences of victimization a
follow-up from adolescence to young adulthood

• Christina Salmivalli
• University of Turku, Finland

(unpublished data)
11
Participants of the study

• 274 young adults (145 male and 129 female), who
  had been involved in a research on school
  bullying in grade 8 (1996), were approached by
  mailed questionnaires eight years later (2004)
• measures of depression, self-perception,
  perception of other people, and interpersonal
  goals
• 52.4 of men and 78.3 of women responded
• overall response rate 64.6

12
1996
2004
same-sex noms
opp-sex noms
self-rep
depression
vic
self
others
Victimization in grade 8 (1996) assessed with -
two self-report items my classmates make fun of
me people pick on me -peer-nominations from
same-sex and opposite-sex classmates Depression
BDI, a .91 Self-perception Rosenberg SE items,
with the instruction to report the way you feel
about yourself when interacting with people of
your own age, a .86 Perception of other
people 13 items describing positive and negative
qualities of other people (age-mates), such as
"they can really be relied on", "they are
hostile", or "they really care about what
happens to me" a.88
13
1996
2004
opp-sex noms
same-sex noms
self-rep
.15
depression
-.17
vic
self
-.22
others
14
1996
2004
opp-sex noms
same-sex noms
self-rep
depression
-.14
vic
self
.18
others
.35
.16
happiness and satisfaction
Happiness and satisfaction scale I am a
happy person I like being the way I am I
wish I were different I am unhappy I am
cheerful I am a lucky person, a.72
15
1996
2004
opp-sex noms
same-sex noms
self-rep
.13
depression
vic
.33
self
-.20
others
.16
.15
happiness and satisfaction
16
1996
2004
opp-sex noms
same-sex noms
self-rep
.16
depression
vic
.32
self
-.16
others
.16
.44
happiness and satisfaction
?2(5)9.09, p.11, CFI.97, RMSEA.07
Perceived popularity 11 items (e.g., I am not
very popular I have many friends).
perceived popularity
.60
.16
Perceived family support 6 items (e.g., Nobody
cares for me at home my parents like me)
perceived family support
17

• Victimization in adolescence (grade 8, age 14-15)
  was predictive of young adults (age 22-23)
  depression and their perception of other people
• These influences were significant even
  controlling for scores on happiness and
  satisfaction measure in grade 8
• Unlike victimization, perceived popularity and/or
  perceived family support did not predict variance
  in any of the outcome variables eight years later

18
Consequences for the group?

• Bukowski and Sippola (2001) "victimization not
  only damages the individual, but damages the
  group itself as well as the individuals who
  constitute the group
• How does victimization damage the group?

19
Experienced and observed victimization and school
satisfaction

• With multilevel modeling, it is possible to
  disentangle the variance in school satisfaction
  between individual students, from variance
  between different school classes

operationalization of school satisfaction MARK
THE FACE THAT BEST DESCRIBES YOU WHEN AT SCHOOL
. .
. .
. .
. .
. .
. .
. .
____ ____ _____ _____
_____ _____ _____
x
20
A study with 48 classrooms (grades 4 to 6)- some
initial findings

• Classrooms differ from each other in the overall
  degree of victimization
• differences in experienced victimization are
  between individual children, rather than between
  classrooms significant differences in observed
  victimization can be detected between
  classrooms, however
• there are also significant differences between
  classrooms in school satisfaction
• At the individual level, experienced
  victimization is related to lowered level of
  school satisfaction
• At the classroom level, the overall degree of
  victimization in the classroom is related to
  lowered level of school satisfaction

21
experienced victimization
observed victimization
1.00
.72
BETWEEN-LEVEL (explaining variation between
classrooms)
degree of victimization in the classroom
-.31
shool enjoyment / satisfaction
WITHIN-LEVEL (explaining variation between
students)
-.06 (n.s.)
-.14
observed victimization
experienced victimization
.16
.61
1.00
1.00
experienced victimization
observed victimization
gender
22
Research on consequences of victimization some
future challenges

• More prospective studies controlling for
  adjustment variables at time 1 are needed, to
  avoid confounding antecedents of victimization
  from their consequences
• Need to identify mechanisms of influence
• Need to identify moderators
• protective factors ?
• Group-level consequences (as well as antecedents)
  of victimization/aggression are not yet
  well-known
• And what about group-level protective factors?