Bullying

Effective Strategies for Long-term Change

Tiny Arora, Sonia Sharp, David Thompson

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2005
• ISBN:
  9781134580194
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Education
• Subtopic: Education General

Bullying: Effective Strategies for Long Term Improvement tackles the sensitive issue of bullying in schools and offers practical guidance on how to deal successfully with the issue in the long term.
The authors examine how bullying begins, the impact of bullying on the victimised child, and how the extent of bullying in schools can be reliably measured and assessed. They go on to explain how to set up anti-bullying initiatives which will maintain their effectiveness over the years. The complexity of the bullying process is emphasised throughout, but care is taken to outline clearly the actions that can be taken which will substantially reduce bullying in the long term.
The book is an outcome of over 10 years research into bullying. The authors draw on their own major studies and international research to provide real workable solutions to the problem of bullying, which are illustrated by case study examples throughout. The book is essential reading for school managers, teachers, student teachers and researchers determined to tackle the issues of bullying head on.

Part I
Understanding bullying

Chapter 1
The emergence of bullying

The uncertainties for teachers and parents

When teachers and parents are working with and caring for young children, controlling their behaviour is a central concern. From the youngest ages, some children disturb their carers by appearing to want to behave aggressively whenever they feel like it, or when their desires are thwarted. Frequently this tendency leaks into their relationships with other children. Everyone’s instinct is to intervene quickly and stop this expression of aggression. Some carers would go further and remove toys such as toy guns and knives. They think such toys encourage aggressive games and initiation of the aggression the children see almost every day on the media. Others reject this approach and claim that children have to learn how to react appropriately to aggression from other children and to be assertive with others in the correct context. Consequently, they would claim that a blanket ban on the expression of aggression is unnecessary, very difficult to achieve, and may possibly be harmful by giving the message that when children want to be aggressive they have to do so outside adults’ view.

By the time children reach primary school age they have learnt some of these lessons. These include both the positive ones of expressing and dealing with aggression appropriately and the negative ones of maintaining the freedom to behave aggressively as the mood takes you by keeping aggression out of the way of adults, as teachers and parents have a predictable tendency to interfere and stop you. The general problem does not go away, it just goes underground.

For carers and teachers of young children, therefore, questions needing urgent and flexible answers are: ‘When do I stop the expression of aggression quickly and when do I attempt to modify the behaviour to teach the children a better way of asserting themselves without hitting or threatening others?’ For the answers to come at the speed that classroom activity requires, the carers have to recognise what is happening and know what to do almost instinctively. Teachers and carers have to be able to distinguish between habitual aggression and one-off incidents. When children repeat behaviour patterns, this tends to indicate that the pattern is being incorporated into the child’s habitual way of dealing with different situations, as a part of the emerging personality. When teachers or parents realise this they usually begin to take definite steps to stop the child acting in this way. However, as children’s activities become habitual, the behaviour also typically changes in ways that make the expression of the feeling easier but maintain the significance of the behaviour. This occurs through cutting down the length and intensity of the activity, substituting verbal aggression for actual physical aggression, and incorporating the aggressive behaviour into other more neutral behaviours to hide it from the adult attention. Such modified and covert aggression can be just as damaging to the victim as the initial raw expression of anger, but is often seen by the carers as being of less significance.

Some carers may respond according to the extent of the obvious hurt of the child who is the target of the aggression. The greater the hurt, the quicker the aggressive behaviour is stopped. They also recognise the norms, established by the school headteacher and expected by parents, governing teacher behaviour. These tend to be blanket bans on aggression, which may have the unintended consequence that children never learn better ways of dealing with their own or other people’s aggressive impulses.

The emergence of bullying

The behaviours associated with bullying can be seen from a very early age. However, these can be termed bullying only when children have reached a certain level of awareness and understanding. Many of the ways of reducing bullying depend on the children being aware that what they are doing is called bullying, and that it is not an acceptable way to behave because of its consequences for the victims and the other children in the group. Some researchers suggest that bullying can be conceptualised as ‘a special form of aggression, which is social in its nature’ (Bjørkqvist, Ekman and Lagerspetz 1982: 23). This means that the relationship between bullying and aggression needs to be examined. Bullying is mostly a proactive form of aggressive behaviour, with concepts such as intention, motivation, punishment and reward all relevant factors in this complex process. It not only hurts the victim, but also restricts the development and life-chances of the bully by providing a simple and often effective way of attaining a limited social status in a dependent group of classmates (Arsenio and Lemerise 2001). The study of dominance provides us with further clues about the motivation and rewards which are associated with bullying. Finally, research into how children learn prosocial and moral behaviour is a pertinent one for considering how to avoid creating situations in which bullying is rife. This is exemplified by the research of Warden and Christie (1997) and Christie and Warden (1997).

The early emergence of bullying behaviours

Imagine two young babies sitting next to each other, a girl and a boy. The boy has a rattle and is shaking it vigorously, with obvious delight. The girl watches him intently for a few seconds, then snatches the rattle from her companion, who starts to whimper. The perpetrator smiles, waves the rattle and hits the unfortunate victim, who by now is crying piteously. An adult intervenes and says to the girl: ‘you bully!’. It will not surprise the audience to see that she looks unconcerned and continues to shriek with pleasure.

Not many people would agree that bullying had taken place on this occasion – yet someone forcefully took a possession, hurt another child, showed pleasure at the child’s reaction and unconcern when told off. In older children, all of these behaviours would be typical of a bullying situation. People would argue though that in this case, the baby did not know that she should not take the rattle, did not realise that her actions were the cause of distress, had no intention to hurt and was not aware of the other’s feelings. So the emergence of bullying is related to the way children learn to express themselves and learn to empathise with each other as members of the same social group. The above behaviour could be called bullying only if there is an intention to hurt or upset, if the perpetrator has an awareness of cause and effect, an understanding of social norms and rules and an ability to empathise with others’ feelings. In short, a certain level of development of thought, as well as social and emotional development, is required to bully. These developments happen quite early in life for most children. By the time they have reached the age of 4 (i.e. the age at which they normally enter school in the UK), they show some of the behaviours commonly associated with bullying, as well as the awareness specified above. Hatch (1987) found that children aged 4 to 6 achieved social power in three main ways: self-promotion, putdowns and dominating others through ordering, threats and physical intimidation. It is not certain to what extent the children understood any hurt they caused, but at this age they were aware of the rules of ‘no aggression’, and the effects of put-downs, threats and violence. The possible lack of awareness of hurt caused to others could be a vital factor in the understanding of bullying and in interventions to reduce bullying (Pikas 1989; Sullivan 2000).

Bullying and its relationship to aggression

Bullying is clearly a form of aggression. The study of aggression, which has a much longer history than that of bullying, gives us insights into the bullying process. Some caution is necessary, though; Tedeschi (1984) notes how, near the end of the most bloody century in the history of mankind, there had been little progress in the study of aggression.

Temperamental predispositions towards aggressive behaviour

Whilst there is significant evidence to support genetic predisposition towards features such as emotionality, sensation-seeking and impulsivity, there is little evidence to suggest any genetic tendencies or temperamental factors that make a child more likely to be aggressive or violent (Turner 1994). Studies looking for genetic and hormonal influences on aggression and violence indicate that the complex interactions between genetic factors, such as impulsivity and emotionality, and environmental factors, such as parenting style, go on to give a personality basis for the expression of aggression. Torgerson (1995) describes a series of longitudinal studies of children in Finland carried out by Lea Pulkinnen, the first following the children through from age 8 to 20 years. The following two studies concentrated on pre-school children. She concluded that all children have the potential for antisocial and prosocial behaviour. Environmental factors such as parenting style are strong influencers on the eventual outcomes for the child, with the child’s own temperament contributing to different types of social interaction difficulties. Turner highlights four key environmental influencers that affect aggressive behaviour: parental attitudes; parental discipline; role models and television violence. The implications of these studies are that for all children and young people we must do our utmost to ensure positive environmental experiences, and most especially for those children with a predisposition towards impulsivity and sensation-seeking. So, all in all, the evidence for aggressive behaviour weighs more heavily towards nurture rather than nature.

Early aggression in schools

One question that is relevant here is whether children who are aggressive in the beginning of their school career have also been aggressive in their pre-school years, and whether children who act aggressively early in life continue to do so at older ages. If we can learn the age at which aggressive patterns of behaviour become stabilised we can provide clues to the timing of preventive work. Loeber and Stouthamer-Loeber (1998) suggest that there has been little research about when and how aggression begins in schools. However, there is evidence of continuity from one Canadian study (Haapasalo and Tremblay 1994), which found that a substantial proportion of boys (8.3 per cent) fought habitually both in the earliest year of their schooling as well as at ages 10, 11 and 12. A further proportion of boys (9.15 per cent) developed aggressive behaviour after their first year in school and continued to be fighters when they were in the 10–12 age range. Similarly, Eron et al. (1987) carried out a 22-year longitudinal study of 8-year-old boys in the USA, who had been identified by their peers as aggressive. They found that aggressive behaviour at age 8 was a significant predictor of aggression at later points in their lives. In adulthood, a high proportion had delinquent records and were aggressive towards their wives and children. Longitudinal data analysed by Farrington (1991) in the UK take this even further by showing how men who were known bullies at the age of 8 tend to have children who become bullies. For none of the above studies, however, is it known whether these children were already aggressive before they came to school. These research findings to date support the idea that if boys show aggressive behaviour early in their school career, they are likely to continue to do this later on during their school career and even afterwards. Bowers et al. (1994), in a small-scale study, found that children who persistently bully often come from families who used aggressive methods to manage difficult situations.

Reactive and proactive aggression

Roland’s (1998) analysis of the relationship between aggression and bullying is a useful one, as it concerns itself with the two main theoretical frameworks developed to explain aggression. Dodge (1991) summarises these as reactive and proactive aggression. Roland points out that it is of great importance, for ethical, theoretical and practical reasons, whether we understand bullying as being proactive (that is, spontaneous or unprovoked, a ‘natural’ expression of the child’s emerging personality) or reactive aggression (that is, aggression in response to something else happening). Each type of aggression has a different set of associated factors, with regard to motivation, reward and feelings engendered on the part of those who bully, as well as indicating a different set of social conditions which permit bullying to happen.

The theoretical view we take also influences the extent to which we see bullying as learned behaviour, which may be susceptible to change, or based in ‘aggressive instincts’, which will be more difficult to change because they are a part of the emerging emotional makeup of the young personality. Aggression as a reactive behaviour was first described by Freud (1920), who believed that aggression was the result of frustration. Dollard et al. (1939), from the background of behavioural theories, developed this concept into the frustration-aggression theory. They proposed that frustration experienced by an individual would continue to build up noxious aggressive energy, which must be released in the form of aggressive behaviour. Such a theory conceptualises aggression as reactive – i.e., it only happens when the individual experiences a feeling of anger against the target or against a substitute, caused by something the target person has done. Aggressive behaviour is then directed towards these targets. It does not assume that the aggressor must have a motive for the aggression, other than to express the feelings of anger. Some evidence that this type of aggression might be involved in bullying is noted in Mykletun’s (1979) findings (quoted by Roland 1998): secondary school pupils who bullied reported that they were more likely to be ‘irritated by stressful circumstances’ than pupils who were victims or who were neutral. So it is possible that there is some relationship between negative feelings and bullying, although one cannot be sure whether this relationship is causal. Roland (1998) draws attention to the fact that Heinemann (1973), who was the first to theorise about bullying (calling it ‘mobbing’), saw this purely as reactive aggression, whilst Olweus (1978), an early influential author on the subject of bullying, has taken the opposite view, regarding it as a personality-based, proactive type of aggression.

Heinemann (1973) describes how a group of pupils could become increasingly irritated by one pupil, which would disturb the equilibrium within the group. As a result, the group turns suddenly on this pupil. After the attack, the group quickly returns to normal, having restored the balance within the group. The main emotions felt by the mobbing group would be likely to be anger, followed by relief. A similar example would be the teasing and taunting of a child who is particularly irritating to one or more children. It is difficult, though, to think of many instances of bullying which might be considered examples of reactive aggression.

The model of proactive aggression explains a wider range of bullying behaviour. It assumes that there is usually a specific motive. The behaviour does not necessarily result from feelings of anger or hostility but is intended to gain some reward, although the rewards may be primarily emotional ones. Such a type of aggression does not need a precipitating event for it to occur. Rather, it is behaviour which is learnt through imitation, reinforcement and modelling, although it may be prompted originally by temperamental elements of the young child’s physiological make-up. It would help the aggressor to achieve his or her objectives (Bandura 1973) – for example, taking money with threats. In this case, the usual objective and motivation are to gain money and the associated feelings of power and control. The behaviour could have been learnt from peers, siblings, parents, or other significant influences on the child, including fictional characters in books, computer software or television programmes.

Olweus (1978), whose empirical base is much more extensive than that of Heinemann (1973), develops the idea that there are certain personality characteristics, often influenced by home experiences, which create a tendency for children to become bullies or victims. Thus, some children have learnt how to use aggression proactively in order to dominate others or to gain material rewards from them. Their main emotions are likely to be excitement, followed by satisfaction at achieving their objectives.

Bullying as impression management, coercion and/or punishment

The issue of motivation in bullying and the rewards gained is an important one. Proactive aggression can have many rewards – for example, in the case of demanding money with threats, the ulterior motives could be obtaining the money, impressing friends, gaining status, satisfaction at seeing the victim suffer, simple amusement, or a combination of any of these. Out of these, impressing friends or gaining status often appears to be an overriding motive (Thompson and Arora 1991).

The study of aggression in a social context can help to clarify these aspects of bullying. It shows how some bullying behaviours differ from others in terms of the motivation of the bully as well as the extent to which a victim could avoid being harmed (Tedeschi 1984). Tedeschi concentrates on the actual events during an aggressive interaction – in particular, threats, coercion and punishment. He sees threats as a communication from one person to another indicating that that person will receive a punishment in the future. The word ‘punishment’ is used here to mean any type of negative consequence – it does not imply any wrongdoing on the part of the victim. Threats can be either contingent (punishment will happen as a result of a certain behaviour) or non-contingent (the reasons for the punishment are not clear). Threats can also be explicit or implicit. The most obvious contingent use of threats is to compel compliance from a victim. An act of bullying which is compatible with this is the earlier-mentioned ‘demanding money with threats’, which clearly has a punishment attached to non-compliance. As has been seen, it also has a gain for the bully if compliance is achieved. The threat here is contingent, in that punishment is promised for non-compliance. In other instances of bullying, the threat may be non-contingent – for example, when a child is informed by the bully t...

Table of contents

• Cover Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Tables
• Preface: Series Introduction
• Introduction: An Overview
• Part I: Understanding Bullying
• Part II: Towards Effective Intervention
• Appendix: Measuring Bullying with the Life in School Checklist
• References