Bullying is a Relationship Problem:
Implications for Assessment and
Intervention
Wendy Craig, Ph.D.,
Department of Psychology,
Queen’s University, Kingston, Ontario, Canada
wendy.craig@queensu.ca
Research funded by: National Centres of Excellence, Canadian
Institutes of Health Research, National Crime Prevention
Strategy, Ontario Mental Health Foundation
Estimated Annual Economic Costs of
Relationship Violence
• Over $ 9.1 billion
–
–
–
–
–
Child Abuse
Youth Violence
Partner Violence
Sexual Violence
Workplace Violence $ 970
$ 468 million
$ 6.6 billion
$ 1.1 billion
$ 33 million
million
• Includes: direct medical, lost earnings and
opportunity cost (time, employment and workers
productivity), psychological costs, legal services,
incarceration
Bullying is a Relationship Problem that
Requires Relationship Solutions
Relationship dynamics in bullying are destructive:
• Child who bullies learns how to use power and
aggression to control and distress another.
• Child who is victimized learns about loss of
power in relationships and becomes trapped in
a relationship in which he/she is being abused.
Girls’ and Boys’ Victimization Trajectories
Late Elementary School
Individual & Relationship Risk Factors
for Victimization
Individual Risk Factors
• Anxiety
Relationship Risk Factors
• Conflict with friends
• Time with friends
Individual and Relationship Risk Factors for
Victimization in High School
Individual
• Anxiety
• Eating problems (girls)
• Depression (girls)
Relationship
• Conflict and trust with parents
• Parental monitoring
• Conflict with friends
• Susceptibility to peer pressure
High School
Relationship Risk Factors for Victimization
Girls
• Conflict with parents
• Trust with parents
• Conflict with friends
• Susceptibility to peer pressure
Boys
• Parental monitoring and trust
• Conflict with friends
Girls’ and Boys’
Bullying Trajectories
Pepler, Jiang, Craig, & Connolly, In Press, Developmental Psychology
Individual & Relationship Risk Factors for
Bullying in both Late Elementary & High School
Individual Risk Factors
• Moral disengagement
• Physical aggression
• Relational aggression
Relationship Risk Factors
• Parental trust
• Parental monitoring
• Parental conflict
• Peer bullying
• Conflict with peers
• Susceptibility to peer pressure
Assessing Children at Risk for Involvement in
Bullying and/or Victimization
Duration
Frequency
Severity
Pervasiveness
Implications for Intervention:
Address Heterogeneity
• Different trajectories require different types and
intensity of intervention.
• For both high victimization and high bullying
groups, relationship problems tend to increase
from early to middle adolescence.
• Intensive and ongoing support starting in
elementary school for this small high risk group
may prevent their chronic pathway of victimization
or bullying
Interventions for Children at Risk for
Bullying and/or Victimization:
Determining Intensity
Level 2: Selective
10-15%
Level 1:
Universal
75-80%
Level 3:Indicated
5-10%
Implications from the Educator Lens
• Educating and connecting with parents.
– Communication with parents before a problem begins.
– Policy and expectations
– Learn about their current family experiences.
– Scaffolding and social architecture.
• Assessment and identify early signs of potential involvement
in bullying.
– Regular check ins with child and with parents
– Behaviour rating system
– Reporting system
• Prevention and Intervention
– Collaborate and support on solutions.
• Advocate by sustaining the connection.
– Regular check-ins with positives
Principle 2: Bullying Requires a
Developmental Approach
• Bullying changes with the developing capacities and
concerns of children and adolescents.
• Bullying starts in preschool and continues into the school
years and beyond.
• Form of bullying diversifies with age along with salient
developmental issues.
• In many cases, bullying is the result of children learning
about power and about relationships.
– All children must learn about their power and how to use
power positively.
– Almost all children experiment with the use of power and
learn that it is hurtful to use power and aggression in
bullying.
– Children learn about how to use power through direct
experiences and observations.
Developmental Trajectory of
Power and Aggression
Elder
Abuse
Child
Abuse
Marital
Abuse
Gang/ Delinquency
Dating
Aggression Aggression
BULLYING
Sexual
Harassment
Workplace
Harassment
Frequent Victims
(once a month or more)
100
90
80
70
60
50
40
30
20
10
0
physically bullied
verbally bullied
socially bullied
electronically bullied
Gr 4
Gr 5
Gr 6
Gr 7
Gr 8
Gr 9 Gr 10 Gr 11 Gr 12
Intervention Implications:
Developmental Perspective
• Early experiences and development lay foundation for all
future learning, behaviour, and health.
• Early intervention is more effective than later.
• Start early, before the problem begins and have regular
check-ins.
• Developmentally tailor interventions
– Different forms of aggression need to be targeted at
different ages
• Assess and identify those at highest risk for involvement.
• Those involved early will experience the most problems
and require the most intensive interventions.
Principle 3: Bullying Requires a
Systemic Approach
• Successful interventions are comprehensive
and systemic.
• Not one solution fits all.
• Peers are central to bullying dynamics and
solutions.
• Adults support and model for children’s
healthy relationships.
• Bullying is a community problem.
The Peer Stage for Bullying
Peers Can Be Part of the Problem
• Peers involved in majority of episodes (>85%)
• 1/3rd of peers say they would join in bullying
• Peers present in bullying fulfill multiple roles
• Peers’ joining exacerbates aggression and arousal
Peers Can Be Part of the Solution
• Many children (41%) report that they “try to help”
• Peers can be supportive to victimized children:
– intervene more frequently than teachers on
playground
Peer Solutions to Bullying
When peers were bystanders in bullying episodes:
• They spent 25% of their time helping the victim.
• They intervened in 19% of bullying episodes.
• Majority of peer interventions (57%) were effective
in stopping bullying within 10 seconds.
• Peers tended to intervene prosocially with victimized
child and aggressively with bullying child.
• Intervention was more likely from same-sex peers
and from popular status children.
Intervention Implications: Peers
• Engaging the majority will positively change the
minority who are involved in bullying.
• Creating positive peer groups for students.
• Having close friends and belonging to a peer group
is protective of victimization.
• Educating peers about their role.
• Involving peers in the solutions and empowering
them to address the issue.
• Supporting peers in their efforts.
• Creating and supporting relationship solutions.
The Role of Adults
• Playground supervisors intervened in 4% of bullying
incidents.
• Classroom teachers intervened in 14% of bullying incidents.
• Only 46% of children who are victimized report having
talked to their teacher about the problem.
• Children who do talk to an adult are less likely to be bullied
in the following school year.
• Children involved in bullying have poor relationships with
their teachers, including little or no mutual warmth, caring,
or positive feelings generally.
• Strong, positive attachments between children and teachers
are protective factors that reduce the risk of aggression
problems.
• Warm, secure attachments between teachers and students
can foster social and academic success.
Craig & Pepler, & ,Atlas, 2000
Adult Leadership is the Foundation
for Systems Change
• Leadership by the school principal
generates support and action.
• Leadership by teachers is critical in
program delivery and support of healthy
relationships.
• Other adults are also important in
promoting healthy relationships.
Intervention Implications:
Role of Adults
• Adults are essential for children’s healthy relationships and are
responsible for:
– creating positive environments that promote capacity and
competencies for healthy relationships.
– minimizing contexts for negative peer interactions.
• Children involved in bullying have poor relationships with their
teachers, including little or no mutual warmth, caring, or
positive feelings generally.
• Strong, positive attachments between children and teachers are
protective and foster social and academic success.
• Adults can construct social experiences in ways that:
– protect and support children’s developing relationship
capacity
– minimize the likelihood of bullying.
• All adults are models for children and must lead by example
and refrain from using power aggressively.
School Climate
• Schools that create a caring and nurturing climate can have a
positive and enduring influence on children.
• Students’ academic achievement is affected by school climate:
– high expectations of success, orderly school environment,
high morale, positive treatment of students, active
engagement of students, and positive social relations in
school.
• Punitive climate versus a restorative climate
– In punitive individual attributions of blame, high social
control and low social support to community members and
children who are victimized
– In restorative climates violation of relationships, not rules,
increasing support to wrongdoers rather than punishing
and isolating them, considers wider social context, and
solutions extend to community.
Intervention Implications: School Climate
• Positive relationships
– Examination of relationships among all people in
the school community.
– Relationships with students must be warm and
caring.
– Relationships among all staff must be respectful.
– Conflicts resolutions should preserve the dignity
and self-worth of all involved.
– The adult relationships serve as models to
students.
• Collaborative decision making
– Engaging students.
• Success experiences
– Develop competence and experience success
academically and interpersonally.
What Works in Bullying Prevention?
A Review of Bullying Prevention
• The majority of programs were successful at reducing
bullying and victimization at school.
• Some programs have negative results
– THE PROBLEM WAS INCREASED
• Having a program is better than not having one.
• The same program did not have similar effects in all
schools.
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–
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Programmatic and moment-to moment
Implementation
Significance of adult leadership
Student involvement and leadership
• Safe schools are the responsibility of community
partnerships among ministries, administrators, teachers,
trustees, support staff, students, parents, police and
community partners (i.e., schools not alone)
Craig, Pepler, Murphy, McCauig Edge, in press
Characteristics of Top 5 Successful Programs
•
Three levels of intervention:
– universal programs for the entire population;
– indicated programs for students in the early stages
of involvement in bullying or victimization;
– selected programs for those who have serious
problems with bullying and/or victimization.
• To prevent bullying, addressed children’s:
– thinking and attitudes
– interactions with others
– emotional and behavioural skills
• Parent involvement
• Community collaboration.
Craig, Pepler, Murphy, McCauig Edge, in press
Principles For Choosing a Program
• Evidence based (i.e., draws from the current scientific
understanding of bullying).
• Program has been scientifically evaluated, with evidence of
positive results
• Program content is based on the current theoretical
understanding of bullying problems (i.e., developmental and
systemic).
– Promotes relationship competence and capacity
– Recognizes cultural diversity
– Involves partnerships
• The program is feasible (i.e., it can be implemented in the
school).
– Ensures sustainability and long term change
Bullying Prevention Does Not Come in a Box
• Not just a single program but there are characteristics.
• Awareness of potential problems.
• Catch problem EARLY; ongoing support.
• Moment-to-moment scaffolding – connections between adults and
students.
• Communication among adults, between children and adults,
between home and school, etc.
• Support for the most vulnerable children and youth.
• Match supports and services to the needs and strengths of
individuals.
• Establish quality standards and monitor service delivery regularly.
Successful Bullying Prevention is about
• Understanding that bullying is a relationship problem
that undermines healthy development.
• Focusing on promoting positive relationships.
• Assessing and having ongoing evaluations.
– Formal and informal
• Developing partnerships.
– Required in all settings where children live, learn,
work, and play.
• Having adult leadership.
– Youth understand the complexity of their lives, but
adults are responsible for socialization.
• Sustainability.
– Occurs with structure and support in moment to
moment interactions.
Why Promoting Relationships
and Eliminating Violence?
• Healthy development depends on healthy relationships.
• Developing the capacity for healthy relationships is
essential.
• Relationship problems affect children’s development and
have a long-term impact on families, communities, and
society.
• Relationship problems can transfer to the next
generation.
• Knowledge of the processes within relationships that
shape development is crucial for prevention and
intervention to promote healthy development.
Preventing and Intervening in Bullying
By Bridging Research and Practice
www.prevnet.ca