Bullying Experiences and Compromised Academic Performance Across Middle School Grades

Abstract

The goal of the study was to examine whether bullying experiences are associated with lower academic performance across middle school among urban students.The ethnically diverse sample was drawn from a longitudinal study of 2,300 sixth graders (44% Latino, 26% African American, 10% Asian, 10% White, and 10% mixed) from 11 public middle schools. Results of multilevel models (MLMs) showed that grade point averages and teacher-rated academic engagement were each predicted by both self-perceptions of victimization and peer nominations of victim reputation, controlling for demographic and school-level differences as well as overall declines in academic performance over time. Further MLM analyses suggested that most of the victimization effect was due to between-subject differences, as opposed to within-subject fluctuations, in victimization over time. The results of the study suggest that peer victimization cannot be ignored when trying to improve educational outcomes in urban middle schools.

Hierarchy, Violence and Bullying Among Students of Public Middle Schools

“…Students at the base of the official hierarchy tend to be either perpetrators or victims of school violence, but especially perpetrators. The studies conducted by Juvonen et al (2011), Mehta et al (2013), and Strøm et al (2013) confirm this study's results, that academic performance is inversely related to school violence. As these students are considered unpopular, they perhaps perceive aggression directed to their equals and to those with a poor performance in physical education to be an opportunity to stand out and become popular.…”

“…The fact that there is a relationship between being perceived by peers to be a victim and considering oneself as such, but there is no relationship between being considered by peers or considering oneself to be an abuser, may suggest that victims are more sensitive to aggression that they experience than abusers are to aggression they practice; perhaps, abusers consider aggression to be just a joke while victims do not. The study conducted by Juvonen et al (2011) also found a low correlation between peer perception and self-reporting of abuser or victim. These results suggest that studies addressing school violence do not only employ the individuals' selfreport since peer perception seems to be more accurate: various students provide their perceptions.…”

“…The performance of students involved with school violence can be harmed, as some studies reveal (Juvonen et al, 2011;Mehta et al, 2013;Strøm et al, 2013). This study's contributions include the discussion of school violence in light of school hierarchies as described by Adorno (1965Adorno ( /1995a, Ahn et al (2010), Garandeau et al (2014a), Levandoski and Cardoso (2013), Li and Wright (2014), and Zwaan et al (2013).…”

“…This last result reveals that, if there is school hierarchy and a relevant criterion is popularity, it may be related to physical performance and attractiveness, but students are also distinguished by their performance in academic subjects, and according to the results, good students tend to be targets of violence. Strøm et al (2013) state that few studies in the field address the relationship between school violence and academic performance and, as Juvonen et al (2011) and Mehta et al (2013), Strøm et al (2013) also report, there is an inverse relationship between these two variables: the greater the violence, the worse the academic performance of students. Adorno (1965Adorno ( /1995b asserts that this distinction between students' performance in academic subjects is part of an official hierarchy.…”

To tell or not to tell: What influences children’s decisions to report bullying to their teachers?

“…Specifically, researchers have documented that victimized children are at risk for psychosocial problems including loneliness, low self-esteem and poor social relationships (Ladd & Troop-Gordon, 2003) as well as suicide, suicidal ideation and nonsuicidal self-injury (Bonanno & Hymel, 2010;Heilbron & Prinstein, 2010;Klomek, Marrocco, Kleinman, Schonfeld, & Gould, 2007). Further, bullied children tend to underperform academically (Juvonen, Wang, & Espinoza, 2011) and exhibit avoidant behaviors, such as developing negative school attitudes (Kochenderfer & Ladd, 1996a, 1996b, truancy, absenteeism and dropping out (Otieno & Choongo, 2010).…”