Description
Bullying is a form of aggression characterized by an imbalance of power between perpetrator and target. This power differential is often of a social nature. Children and adolescents who bully others are generally popular among classmates; the literature suggests that a high peer status both facilitates and results from engagement in bullying behaviors. Furthermore, young bullies are more likely to pursue their actions when their behavior is reinforced by peers. Victims on the other hand tend to be in a more fragile social position and are more likely to remain victimized and experience internalizing problems when undefended by classmates. In order to understand the risk factors and consequences of bullying and victimization, the classroom context must be taken into account. After a brief presentation of the practical implications of bullies’ high status among peers for anti-bullying intervention and for the measurement of bullying, a set of three empirical studies will be presented in this talk. They address the following questions: The peer status of aggressive children has been shown to be sensitive to the social context, but which classroom characteristics have an effect on the associations between children’s aggression and their levels of likeability and perceived popularity? Do within-classroom discrepancies in popularity or a high degree of status hierarchy in a classroom deter or promote bullying behaviors? And what is the direction of effects between classroom degree of status hierarchy and prevalence of bullying? When victimization decreases in a classroom, does it affect the levels of likeability and received defending of children who remain victimized?| Period | 23 Jun 2015 |
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| Held at | Radboud University Nijmegen, Netherlands |
Keywords
- BULLYING