Public attitudes about different types of anti-bullying laws: Results from a national survey

Abstract

State anti-bullying laws have been enacted across the United States to address bullying both by and of youths. Although these statutes can provide critical protection to youth, there is debate about whether such laws should enumerate protected classes of youth. Weight-based bullying is an increasingly prevalent form of harassment and it has been overlooked in policy initiatives. Enumeration in existing laws might help protect overweight victims. As no research has examined this issue, we conducted a national survey of American adults (N=1155) to assess public opinion about enactment of anti-bullying laws that vary according to whether or not they enumerate distinguishing characteristics. Our results demonstrated substantial public agreement (ranging from 2/3 to 3/4 of participants) with enactment of state and federal anti-bullying laws that enumerate distinguishing characteristics, including physical appearance and weight, which are currently absent in most statutes. Our evidence can inform policy and legal approaches to protect youth effectively from bullying.

Policy Actions to Address Weight‐Based Bullying and Eating Disorders in Schools: Views of Teachers and School Administrators

“…This suggests that while participants may view the roles of school staff, parents, and teachers as playing a larger role than the government, there is nonetheless strong support for government measures that would engage broader policymakers and legislators on specific initiatives to help protect students from weight‐related bullying on a broader scale. These findings also support recent studies documenting high levels of support among parents and the general public adding provisions to existing state antibullying laws to protect against weight‐related bullying …”

“…These findings also support recent studies documenting high levels of support among parents and the general public adding provisions to existing state antibullying laws to protect against weight-related bullying. 33,50,51 For future work, the findings of our study highlight the importance of extending this research to larger samples of educators to better understand patterns of policy support across sample characteristics, such as different racial and ethnic groups. It would be additionally informative to examine policy support among educators in communities and states with high levels of childhood obesity where issues of bullying, BMI reporting, and disordered eating may be heightened among youth.…”

“…31 These challenges have led to increasing calls for broader remedies to prevent and reduce eating disorders and weight-related bullying more systematically in schools through policy actions that can impact large populations of youth. Proposals for new policy actions include addressing these topics in school-based health curriculum, implementing school-based screening for eating disorders, requiring training for teachers and sports coaches on prevention and early identification of eating disorders and weight-related bullying, 24,27 modifying elementary physical education to be more supportive of overweight students, 32 improving school-based antibullying policies and state antibullying laws to protect students from being bullied about their weight, 26,33 and introducing new legal measures to combat unfair treatment of overweight students. 34 In a national study, we found considerable support for these types of school-based policy actions among both the American general public and health professionals who specialize in eating disorders.…”

Experiences of weight teasing in adolescence and weight-related outcomes in adulthood: A 15-year longitudinal study

“…While most anti-bullying efforts occur in schools, weight-based victimization is often absent in anti-bullying policy initiatives. 37 Furthermore, fewer initiatives address the family environment where weight teasing may be expressed in a manner that parents do not recognize as potentially harmful. Health professionals working with youth and families may have unique opportunities to assess youth for experiences of weight-based teasing, educate parents about the damaging health consequences of teasing, and offer families resources to support children and help them cope with weight-based teasing using healthy strategies.…”

Improving anti‐bullying laws and policies to protect youth from weight‐based victimization: parental support for action

“…Weight‐based victimization in youth is associated with adverse psychological and physical health outcomes, some of which may reinforce risk factors contributing to obesity . Despite national prevalence estimates that overweight and obesity affect at least a third of American youth and adolescents , the issue of body weight has remained a frequently absent form of bullying in policy‐level decisions to address youth bullying . While policy change alone is insufficient to eliminate bullying, it is an important part of comprehensive approaches to address this problem on a broad scale.…”