Bullying in schools: Rates, correlates and impact on mental health

This chapter provides an overview of the international research on bullying in schools with a particular focus on the negative mental health effects. We recognize 3 main groups of students: students who bully others, students who are bullied by others, and students who do both. We begin by defining bullying as it occurs in schools and note challenges in defining bullying, especially given the emergence of cyber bullying (which itself has implications for schools). Next, we review the research literature for each of the above 3 student groups in terms of the rates of these behaviours, the factors that predict whether a student engages in these behaviours, and the effects of these behaviours with a focus on mental health. Along the way, we comment on the methodological limitations of the research to date. Next, theoretical frameworks for bullying in school, and in particular, the links between bullying and mental health are described and it is noted that this is an area for further development in the literature. We then review prevention and early intervention programs which are designed to promote mental health and reduce bullying. In the concluding section, we summarize the issues confronting the bullying in schools research literature and highlight some areas where future research is likely to be particularly illuminating.