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The persistent and pervasive impact of bullying in childhood and adolescence

ncbi.nlm.nih.gov

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Re: The persistent and pervasive impact of bullying in childhood and adolescence

#171

Post by thegrimmest »

mcguire wrote: post #168
thegrimmest wrote: post #127

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm simply pointing to a body of research that shows we have this area of development in common with our ape relations, and that the strategies juvenile apes use to resolve conflict largely apply to children too. With regards to sexual assault - we surely should teach vulnerable people the necessary skills to avoid violence. It (used to be) common sense not to drink in the company of strangers, especially if you are…

You might wish to examine the statistics on the relationships between rapists and their victims.

And you might want to examine those on alcohol consumption and sexual assault.

Re: The persistent and pervasive impact of bullying in childhood and adolescence

#172

Post by Cupertino95014 »

AtlasBarfed wrote: post #126
Cupertino95014 wrote: post #90

I completely agree about the problem, and some of this thread has the answer: fight back. Being adults, we naturally focus on what the adults can do. Of course if someone in authority sees bad behavior, they should stop it. The problem is all the bad behavior they don't see. The bullies just learn to do it when no adults are watching. Teaching the kid how to fight back is a great solution and several answers have sai…

The advocacy of violence implies the ability to succeed in doing it. Perhaps you don't recall the vast difference in size and strength in adolescence. Couple that with GROUPS of bullies, what do you advocate? Well, the modern solution to war is more firepower, and that is the firearm. So essentially, the end state of advocating violence is school shootings.

So now it's groups of bullies, not just one? That wasn't part of the problem statement.

Also firearms: that wasn't part of it until you brought it up, either.

Re: The persistent and pervasive impact of bullying in childhood and adolescence

#173

Post by anonym29 »

thegrimmest wrote: post #94
anonym29 wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Rough play is voluntary, being a victim of bullying isn't. I say this as someone who engaged in rough play, got bullied, and was a bully, at different times.

Learning how to respond to antisocial behaviour by a peer, and being able to resolve conflict independently, are two very important skills that it's critical to learn. Being seen as someone who needs adult help to resolve peer conflict is socially disastrous for young people. We do children no favours by intervening in this developmental process.

There seems to be a disconnect between what you think bullying is and how it actually manifests. Between adults, the behavior would be classified as unprovoked assault & battery. Someone punching you in the back of your head while you weren't looking, without a word being said between either of you, because the other person's peer group dared them to is not a failure of the victim's conflict resolution skills.

To be clear, as a victim, I was subject to unprovoled physical battery like this more time than I can count between the start of middle school and my second year of high school. As a bully, in my senior year, I never engaged in any kind of physical violence, just name calling and verbally provoking someone prone to emotional outbursts.

Re: The persistent and pervasive impact of bullying in childhood and adolescence

#174

Post by oblib »

thegrimmest wrote: post #111
david-gpu wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> We do children no favours by intervening in this developmental process. Will you do the same when your child is being bullied? How do you think that may affect them and their relationship with you? How do you think a child feels when they realize that the adults around them do not have their back? What does it do to their sense of safety and their self-esteem? I have lived through this and have my personal take on…

Like with most things, I think the right move for an adult is to help the child solve the problem themselves, rather than do it for them. As other posts have mentioned, learning when and how to apply violence is a critical skill. We (particularly children) do not live in a post-violence society. Children should of course not feel abandoned by those closest to them, but being overprotective can have its own negative c…

I got pretty good at avoiding fights with bullies and dumbasses. And I never started a fight. I always made an effort to avoid fighting.

But I did become a "fan" of boxing at a very early age and studied how boxers fought. How they setup opponents, threw punches, and especially how they avoided getting hit. Most kids don't do that so it's pretty easy to gain an advantage. And bullies tend to leave kids alone who they know will fight back.

I grew up in some pretty rough neighborhoods so I was motivated to learn.

Re: The persistent and pervasive impact of bullying in childhood and adolescence

#175

Post by tablespoon »

2devnull wrote: post #2

“ studies suggest that public health interventions could aim at preventing children from becoming the target of bullying behaviours from an early age.” Sounds almost like victim blaming. If true, if there’s something about the bullied that causes them to be bullied, perhaps bullying is actually a form of social correction. Not that nature should be our guide, but often harsh social behavior is functional from an evol…

> “ studies suggest that public health interventions could aim at preventing children from becoming the target of bullying behaviours from an early age.”

> Sounds almost like victim blaming. If true, if there’s something about the bullied that causes them to be bullied, perhaps bullying is actually a form of social correction. Not that nature should be our guide, but often harsh social behavior is functional from an evolutionary standpoint. That said,

A distinction needs to be made between post-facto "victim blaming" and prevention that involves potential victims. Conflating the two leads one to oppose good measures out of an allegiance to an unrealistically perfect, ideologically-motivated fantasy (that social problems can and should be solved only by authorities applying pressure to the "guilty" people").

Re: The persistent and pervasive impact of bullying in childhood and adolescence

#176

Post by 2devnull »

lukas099 wrote: post #32
2devnull wrote: post #2

“ studies suggest that public health interventions could aim at preventing children from becoming the target of bullying behaviours from an early age.” Sounds almost like victim blaming. If true, if there’s something about the bullied that causes them to be bullied, perhaps bullying is actually a form of social correction. Not that nature should be our guide, but often harsh social behavior is functional from an evol…

> Sounds almost like victim blaming. I disagree. They are not suggesting that the interventions specifically target the victims.

I didn’t do a close read. My comment was in response to this:

“ research has identified some factors that predispose children to be targeted by bullying behaviours. These studies suggest that public health interventions could aim at preventing children from becoming the target of bullying behaviours from an early age.”

To be clear I said nature shouldn’t be our guide. Nature often means that life is nasty brutish and short. I even quoted the famous Auden poem as support. Sheesh!

Re: The persistent and pervasive impact of bullying in childhood and adolescence

#177

Post by 2devnull »

themitigating wrote: post #65
2devnull wrote: post #2

“ studies suggest that public health interventions could aim at preventing children from becoming the target of bullying behaviours from an early age.” Sounds almost like victim blaming. If true, if there’s something about the bullied that causes them to be bullied, perhaps bullying is actually a form of social correction. Not that nature should be our guide, but often harsh social behavior is functional from an evol…

Who determines what is socially correct?

The bullies. From an evolutionary perspective it would ultimately come down to those who get to choose their mate.

Re: The persistent and pervasive impact of bullying in childhood and adolescence

#178

Post by agumonkey »

thegrimmest wrote: post #76
ilaksh wrote: post #28

It's actually a different problem than most people realize. What happens is that you have criminal assault and abuse being tolerated by adults and then blaming the victims. To try to understand, take the behavior of the "bullies" and imagine it is being done by adults. It really comes down to a lack of responsibility and accountability for managing the behavior of children in schools. Instead of dealing with children…

It seems to be very hard to distinguish between bullying and rough play. Rough play is a developmental requirement (particularly for young boys) across the hominoid clade (and likely wider). Being denied it also has real and lifelong consequences. For further reading, Frans de Waal has done a lot of work in this area. Educational policy informed by this research usually looks not to intervene in physical conflict bet…

Depends, if it becomes chronic rough play you know something might be wrong. If you're close enough and can see that it's asymmetrical and the victim is always the same, someone should intervene.

Re: The persistent and pervasive impact of bullying in childhood and adolescence

#179

Post by agumonkey »

ilaksh wrote: post #28

It's actually a different problem than most people realize. What happens is that you have criminal assault and abuse being tolerated by adults and then blaming the victims. To try to understand, take the behavior of the "bullies" and imagine it is being done by adults. It really comes down to a lack of responsibility and accountability for managing the behavior of children in schools. Instead of dealing with children…

What's usually blamed on bullying victims ? Is that a lack of assertiveness ?

In society there's often a reflex to blame girls from trying to hitch hike, like stepping in risky activities.. but for bullying it seems completely passive and unwarranted.

Re: The persistent and pervasive impact of bullying in childhood and adolescence

#180

Post by s1artibartfast »

anonym29 wrote: post #173
thegrimmest wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Learning how to respond to antisocial behaviour by a peer, and being able to resolve conflict independently, are two very important skills that it's critical to learn. Being seen as someone who needs adult help to resolve peer conflict is socially disastrous for young people. We do children no favours by intervening in this developmental process.

There seems to be a disconnect between what you think bullying is and how it actually manifests. Between adults, the behavior would be classified as unprovoked assault & battery. Someone punching you in the back of your head while you weren't looking, without a word being said between either of you, because the other person's peer group dared them to is not a failure of the victim's conflict resolution skills. To be…

I think this post speaks to the problem of broadly discussing "bullying".

As you point out unprovoked battery and name calling fall under the same terminology, but the appropriate responses are obviously not the same.

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