Bullies, victims, and meanies: the role of child and classmate social and emotional competencies

Abstract

This study used a personal oriented approach to identify distinct combinations of children’s experiences of bullying and victimisation in the Irish primary school context. The study investigated the social and emotional characteristics that predicted those profiles at individual and classroom levels. The sample of 2,062 participants was drawn from the Irish national cohort study Children’s School Lives. We analysed teacher reports of individual children’s strengths and difficulties and neglect, and child reports of experiences of bullying, victimisation, and care from classmates. Latent profile analysis revealed five main profiles of bullying and victimisation in Irish primary schools. Approximately 40% of the children were distributed in the atypical profiles (i.e., bullies, meanies, victims, and bully-victims) with the other 60% of children reporting very low levels of bullying and victimisation. Multilevel modelling predicted the profile membership from a set of social and emotional predictors from individual and classroom levels. At the individual level, being a bully was predicted by higher child neglect, hyperactivity, conduct problems, and peer problems; being a meanie was predicted by hyperactivity, peer problems, and less caring classmates; being a victim was predicted by child neglect, conduct problems, and less caring classmates; and being a bully-victim was predicted by conduct problems and less caring classmates. At the classroom level, being a victim was predicted by being in a classroom comprised of younger children, and in classrooms where children were less caring on average. Theoretical and psycho-educational implications are discussed.

Predicting Students’ Aggressive Behavior from the Perspective of Bullying Victims and Students’ Demographic Characteristics

“…The phenomenon of bullying in Indonesia is an important issue, in addition to the trend which is still high, the concept of strengthening character education in Indonesia also does not agree with this phenomenon (Fitriyah et al, 2022). Some studies indicated that bullying had been studied extensively (Soori, Rezapour, & Khodakarim, 2014;Han et al, 2017;Sari & Yendi, 2019;D'Urso et al, 2022, Borowiec et al, 2021. We had observed that the victims of bullying were dominantly teenagers than adults.…”

Victimization and cybervictimization: The role of school factors

“…However, it is essential to consider that the phenomenon of victimization and its effects on peer relationships may also be cyclical. For instance, D'Urso et al (2022) found that caring peers in classrooms played a vital protective role in whether a child was victimized. This suggests that positive peer relationships can break the cycle of victimization and foster a supportive environment for adolescents prone to victimization; likely, a similar effect could be possible also in cybervictimization.…”

Big Buddy: Exploring Child Reactions and Parental Perceptions towards a Simulated Embodied Moderating System for Social Virtual Reality

“…Our VR game and provocative scenario are based on [60], and measures of emotional reactions in studies with children were taken using SAM scales [37]. Furthermore, there is a class of interventions proven to work in schools and to reduce cyberbullying in social media [17,23,48,54], from which we base our interventions. Additionally, the presence of visible authority figures and parental involvement can affect the effectiveness of interventions [9,14,21,32,58].…”

“…It was shown that children paired with a mentor experienced less peer victimisation. Within classrooms, having classmates who showed more peer support and who were older in general than children in other classrooms, reduced the risk of being a victim of bullying [23]. Indeed, it was shown that peers act as a group to influence the development of individual children [22].…”