Why do some countries, regions and schools have more bullying than others? What socio-economic, socio-political and other larger contextual factors predict school bullying? These open questions inspired this study with 53.316 5th- and 9th-grade students (5% of the national student population in these grades), from 1,000 schools in Colombia. Students completed a national test of citizenship competencies, which included questions about bullying and about families, neighborhoods and their own socio-emotional competencies. We combined these data with community violence and socio-economic conditions of all Colombian municipalities, which allowed us to conduct multilevel analyses to identify municipality- and school-level variables predicting school bullying. Most variance was found at the school level. Higher levels of school bullying were related to more males in the schools, lower levels of empathy, more authoritarian and violent families, higher levels of community violence, better socio-economic conditions, hostile attributional biases and more beliefs supporting aggression. These results might reflect student, classroom and school contributions because student-level variables were aggregated at the school level. Although in small portions, violence from the decades-old-armed conflict among guerrillas, paramilitaries and governmental forces predicted school bullying at the municipal level for 5th graders. For 9th graders, inequality in land ownership predicted school bullying. Neither poverty, nor population density or homicide rates contributed to explaining bullying. These results may help us advance toward understanding how the larger context relates to school bullying, and what socio-emotional competencies may help us prevent the negative effects of a violent and unequal environment.
There is considerable debate over whether cyberbullying is just another form of bullying, or whether it is a problem distinct enough to require specific intervention. One way to explore this issue is to analyze whether programs designed to prevent traditional bullying help prevent cyberbullying, and whether programs designed to prevent cyberbullying prevent traditional bullying. The main goal of the current study was to analyze the spillover effects of the cyberbullying prevention program Media Heroes (Medienhelden) on traditional bullying. Media Heroes promotes empathy, knowledge of risks and consequences, and strategies that allow bystanders to defend victims from cyberbullying. Mixed ANOVAs were conducted comparing pretest and post-test (6 months after intervention) measures of 722 students (ages 11-17) assigned to a long (15 sessions) intervention, a short (1 day) intervention, and a control group. In addition to confirming the previously reported effects on cyberbullying, Media Heroes was found to reduce traditional bullying. Effects were larger for the long-version of the program than for the short 1-day version. No effects were found on victimization by either cyberbullying or traditional bullying. Strategies to complement traditional and cyberbullying prevention efforts are discussed. Aggr. Behav. 42:157-165, 2016. © 2016 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.
En este artículo se analizan los mecanismos mediante los cuales la violencia en el contexto en el que crecen los niños(as), sea esta violencia política o común, puede llevar al aprendizaje de distintos tipos de comportamientos agresivos. Estos comportamientos agresivos, a su vez, pueden contribuir a la reproducción de la violencia en el contexto, formando así el ciclo de la violencia. En este artículo se analizan en particular dos trayectorias de este ciclo de la violencia, una relacionada con la agresión reactiva y otra con la agresión instrumental. Se muestra que la agresión reactiva -que surge como respuesta defensiva ante una agresión percibida o real-tiene dinámicas sociales, cognitivas y emocionales distintas a la agresión instrumental -que se usa como instrumento para conseguir un objetivo sin ninguna provocación previa. La agresión reactiva y la agresión instrumental también tienen orígenes distintos y predicen futuros comportamientos violentos diferentes. Diferenciar estos dos tipos de trayectorias permite proponer distintos tipos de intervenciones para romper el ciclo de la violencia. De esta manera se puede disminuir la reproducción de la violencia en los niños aún si la violencia política y la violencia común continúan presentes en nuestro contexto.
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