ORCID

Abstract

The problem of bullying at school is serious and widespread. Each year, towards the end of the school summer holidays, the ‘back to school’ features of the popular print and television media will usually include at least a brief focus on the issue, sometimes reporting the tragedies of young people who have taken their own lives, rather than having to face being bullied (see Marr and Field’s 2001 book Bullycide). It’s also a pervasive issue. Many of us who went to school in the 20th century, and experienced or witnessed bullying at school, will have read a fictional description of bullying that dated from the mid-19th century (i.e. that perpetrated by the character Flashman in Tom Brown’s Schooldays). And when the results of the systematic research into the issue of school bullying that began in the 1970s confirmed the impression that many of us had – that if you hadn’t been bullied yourself at school, then you must at least have known someone who had been – almost no one was surprised. Internationally, according to a study of 35 countries conducted by the World Health Organization in 2004, over one third of young people reported having taken part in the bullying of others at least once in the previous couple of months, and over one third reported having been bullied at least once in the same period. So what is being done, and can we make interventions more effective?

Publication Date

2017-03-01

Publication Title

Psychologist

Volume

30

Issue

3

First Page

40

Last Page

43

ISSN

0952-8229

Embargo Period

2023-09-30

Organisational Unit

School of Psychology

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