Daily Reports of Witnessing and Experiencing Peer Harassment in Middle School

Abstract

Two studies examined daily incidents of peer harassment in urban middle schools. Sixth-grade students (M age = 11 years) described their daily personal experiences and witnessed accounts of peer harassment, and rated their negative feelings across a 2-week period. In Study 1 (n = 95), within-subject analyses across 4 days revealed that both personally experienced and witnessed harassment were associated with increases in daily anxiety, whereas witnessing harassment buffered students against increases in humiliation on days when they personally experienced harassment. Evidence for witnessing as a buffer against increases in humiliation and anger was also found in Study 2 (n = 97) that included 5 daily reports. Witnessing harassment also protected students against increases in negative self-perceptions.

Peer Victimization and Adjustment in Young Adulthood: Commentary on the Special Section

“…In their study, social disorder was operationalized as the classroom level of aggression and victimization. Nishina and Juvonen (2005) found that observed victimization buffered against the negative effects of experienced victimization: the negative effects were mitigated for those victimized students who also saw others being harassed in their environment. Huitsing et al (2012) found that victimization was related to maladjustment especially in classrooms where 1) the average level of victimization was low or 2) victimization was highly centralized, in other words targeted at few specific students rather than Ba little bit on everyone^.…”

Polyvictimization in Developmental Context

“…However, many children experience several of these different victimizations (Saunders, 2003). For one thing, the sheer frequency of victimizations in childhood suggests that some of these victimizations should overlap (Nishina & Juvonen, 2005). In addition, most victimizations seem to have common correlates, like family instability or neighborhood disorder.…”

“…Children have a much harder time resisting this self-blame when they experience victimization from multiple sources. Another possibility is that because victimization is so common, children do not see themselves as stigmatized on this dimension, unless they are experiencing multiple sorts of victimization (Nishina & Juvonen, 2005).…”

Sentiment Informed Cyberbullying Detection in Social Media

“…The participants usually write 3 to 4 lines about their experiences Nishina and Bellmore (2010). However, some researchers have tried more longitudinal studies that span several months to years Nishina and Juvonen (2005); Nylund et al (2007). Despite surveys being the most widely adopted method, there are several limitations of this method.…”