Bullying is something that can be found on just about any coming-of-age movie or television show. It is a topic that is often shared one a meme on social media, especially on Facebook. It is also seen in the hallways of schools on posters that say “zero tolerance for bullying.” Bullying is often talked about in broad conversations with some people saying that one should teach their kids to toughen up and face the bully head on. They believe that bullying is not going to stop and bullies must be dealt with. While others say that children need to be taught to not bully others and that suggesting that simply toughening up those who are bullied is putting the problem squarely on the victim. However, bullying is something that is more complicated than the two sides readily admit to. There are programs that could reduce or possibly eliminate bullying in schools. The Olweus Program is one such program that society could look to alleviate the problem of bullying.
The affect that bullying can have on a young person is profound. It can hurt their self-worth, diminish their self-esteem, give them an overall sense of hopelessness. John Halligan’s son Ryan Halligan committed suicide after years of being bullied (Frontline, 2008). His peers picked on his lack of athletic skills and tried to humiliate him repeatedly. A lot of the bullying occurred on-line. The bullying caused him to withdraw from his family which in turn lessened his chances of getting help.
John Halligan admits that there were signs that he missed that could have allowed him to step in to help his son. I believe that this is where the Olweus Bullying Prevention Program could be of great importance. The Olweus Program is designed to prevent bullying in elementary, middle, and high school. It has three stated goals; reduce existing bully/victim problems, prevent new bully/victim problems, and improve peer relations in schools (Limber, 2004). These goals cover more than the “zero tolerance for bullying” policies that some high schools employ by delving in to the problem of bullying rather than just the symptom. The Olweus Program sees committees being formed to coordinate school-wide policies and activities to ensure continuity amongst school districts. A part of the program that I think would be most helpful is involving the community and having regular meetings to keep parents and students abreast of where the program stands on with its goals. The program seeks to educate the community, parents, and students on how they can help with the problem of bullying.
Bullying is an issue that has haunted society for so long. It has been a problem that is often talked about in general terms but not always taken seriously. Although bullying prevention efforts have been underway for such a long time, the task has become more difficult with the prevalence of social media. Therefore, it is important to have programs like the Olweus Prevention Program to reduce and prevent bullying. Schools must dig to the root of bullying to prevent it. Society must continue to educate people on signs of bullying and how they intervene. It will take the whole community to extinguish bullying.
References
Frontline. (2008, January 22). Interviews with John Halligan. Retrieved April 06, 2017, from http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/kidsonline/interviews/halligan.html (Links to an external site.) (Links to an external site.)
Limber, Susan P.. Implementation of the Olweus bullying prevention program in American schools: lessons learned from the field. Bullying in American schools: a social-ecological perspective on prevention and intervention. Espelage, Dorothy L. and Susan M. Swearer, eds. Mahwah, NJ. Lawrence Erlbaum Associates. 2004. 0805845593. Ch. 17. pp. 351-363
Bullying at schools is a serious issue that the community should be involved in devising preventive measures and educational programs. I am not confident if bullying can be eradicated completely as other factors are involved such as individuals’ personality traits, mental health conditions, and parental/ environmental influences. However, programs like the Olweus Program may help reduce cases of bullying if implemented rigorously to all schools. I also would like to add that an intervention program to reduce bystander effects should be devised to educate children at school whom would be the direct witnesses of the bullying perpetration. A research found that bullying often occurs when onlookers/bystanders are present who potentially have multiple roles in the situations (Polanin et al., 2012). Such programs that can be implemented at school and involvement of the community can collectively to reduce or eradicate bullying in effective ways.
On a similar note, bullying outside schools can be effectively reduced by employing similar strategies to increase awareness and initiate changes in behaviors. There are many cases of bullying reported on the news – against minority groups to be specific. It may entail more complicated strategies to change what some people believe to be norms, but there appears to be some changes in perception on certain minority groups such as members of LGBT groups as the federal government has made efforts to protect their human rights.
Reference
Polanin, J. R., Espelage, D. L., & Pigott, T. D. (2012). A meta-analysis of school-based bullying prevention programs’ effects on bystander intervention behavior. School Psychology Review, 41(1), 47-65. Retrieved from http://ezaccess.libraries.psu.edu/login?url=http://search.proquest.com.ezaccess.libraries.psu.edu/docview/1009900328?accountid=13158
I found your post to be interesting on the aspect of talking about to bully someone over his lack of athletic skills i, to me, is the worst of the worst as well. It is quite a common thing and to bully someone whose life is already miserable (or at least significantly harder), is a reality Children can be very cruel to other children and adults as well.
Screen time among children has risen so much these days. Kids are spending more time than ever in front of screens, and it may be inhibiting their ability to recognize emotions, according to new research out of the University of California, Los Angeles.
The study, published in the journal Computers in Human Behavior, found that sixth-graders who went five days without exposure to technology were significantly better at reading human emotions than kids who had regular access to phones, televisions and computers.
Impact of Overuse of Screen Technology: Just like the brain needs to be fed appropriate, sensory experiences to learn things, our social/interpersonal interactions help us learn how to communicate with other people. The best way to do that is by having relationships with other people so that we can practice and grow in our understanding of our own feelings and others’ feelings.
When children and teens are on technology for more than 2 hours a day, researchers have found that they may develop a stimulus addiction and have increased: aggression, insensitivity.
Another study, which was funded by the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development, was presented at the biannual conference of the Society for Research in Child Development and the European Conference of Developmental Psychology
When this study was started, the focus in the aggression literature was on the environmental antecedents/risk factors of aggression, with little on psychological and personality factors. This study attempts to delve into some of the latter issues while revisiting the environmental factors previously described in the literature.
The seven-year study showed that two characteristics strongly predicted the development of aggression (assessed by physical violence and externalizing behaviors): 1) physical punishment/ aggression by parents against the children and 2) inhibited temperament of the child. Further analyses in progress indicate that a negative self-representation may also predict later aggression and violence.
The most powerful predictor was parents’ physical punishment and violence, which also related to exposure to victimization and violent fantasies. Inhibited temperament was the only personality characteristic that predicted aggression, which suggests possible connections with the isolated, alienated children and adolescents who have committed school attacks. The important factors for predicting aggression seemed to be fearfulness in general and apprehension/lack of confidence about school, not simple shyness. Inhibited children may react to problems with peers and schools by making negative attributions against others and thus becoming more likely to act aggressively against others.
Cheers,
Guillermo Villasenor
References:
Pathways to Aggression through Inhibited Temperament and Parental Violence” – Research conducted by Malcolm Watson, Brandeis University and Kurt Fischer, Harvard Graduate School of Education
The American Academy of Pediatrics; Policy Statement—Media Education, Council on Communications and Media Pediatrics, Official Journal of The American Academy of Pediatrics
Pediatrics Volume 126, Number 5, November 2010The Brain Compatible Parenting System© Gloria DaGaetano, 2011, http://www.GloriaDeGaetano.com, http://www.thepci.orgAtchley, R. A., Strayer, D. L., & Atchley, P. (2012). Creativity in the wild: Improving
Creative reasoning through immersion in natural settings. PLoS ONE, 7(12).
Berman, M. G., Jonides, J., & Kaplan, S. (2008). The cognitive benefits of interacting
with nature. Psychological Science, 19, 1207–1212.