Fast Facts About Bullying
Understanding Bullying
According to stopbullying.gov, bullying is defined as unwanted, aggressive behavior among school-aged children that involves a real or perceived power imbalance. This behavior is repeated or has the potential to be repeated over time. It’s important to recognize that both children who are bullied and those who bully others can experience serious and long-lasting negative consequences.
For behavior to be classified as bullying, it must be aggressive and include the following key characteristics:
- Power Imbalance: Children who bully use their power—which can include physical strength, access to embarrassing information, social popularity, or other means—to control or harm others. It’s important to note that power imbalances can shift over time and in different situations, even among the same individuals.
- Repetition: Bullying behaviors occur more than once or have the potential to occur repeatedly.
Bullying encompasses a range of actions, such as making threats, spreading rumors, physical or verbal attacks, and intentionally excluding someone from a group.
Types of Bullying
Bullying can manifest in several ways:
- Verbal Bullying: This involves using words to hurt or humiliate someone, including teasing, name-calling, making inappropriate sexual comments, taunting, or threatening harm.
- Social Bullying: Also known as relational bullying, this aims to damage someone’s reputation or relationships by actions like intentionally excluding them, telling others not to be their friend, spreading rumors, or publicly embarrassing them.
- Physical Bullying: This involves harming someone’s body or possessions through actions such as hitting, kicking, pinching, spitting, tripping, pushing, taking or breaking their belongings, or making mean or rude hand gestures.
Where and When Bullying Occurs
Bullying can happen at any time, during or after school hours. While the majority of reported bullying incidents occur within the school building, a significant number also take place in other locations such as the playground, on the school bus, while traveling to or from school, in the neighborhood, or online (cyberbullying).
Where and When Bullying Happens
Bullying can occur during or after school hours. While most reported bullying happens in the school building, a significant percentage also happens in places like on the playground or the bus. It can also happen travelling to or from school, in the youth’s neighborhood, or on the Internet.