Studies Reveal Why Kids Get Bullied and Rejected

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People act like bullies for all reasons; all are worth consideration and striving towards understanding, in my opinion. As I said before, if one supposes that all bully behavior is the result of intentional acts, then the stereotype of predator might have some validity; however, that only covers a small area of such behaviors and does not address the issue to my satisfaction.


M.

I hope you will be able to learn something. I'm rather uninterested in what makes them tick. There doesn't appear to be much to learn there. My consideration will remain with their victims.

Fair enough; my concern with those responsible for the behavior is that without addressing those issues, the issue of bullying will continue unabated since the focus is on what I consider to be a symptom (the individual bullied) of a larger problem (the bully themselves). So long as the bullying behavior continues, it seems to me that there will always be those who have been bullied - until the cause is removed, then others will continue to suffer. Treating bullies in the same manner they've treated others isn't the best course of action in my opinion and experience, though I will acknowledge that small subset for whom that sort of fighting fire-with-fire approach works for.


M.

I haven't seen bullies be mistreated anywhere by anyone. Maybe you have some data on that to the contrary.
And yet we know we can't change people from their innate or inherent ways. Not everyone who is abused, for example, grows up to become an abuser. People are born the way they are. Some change but most don't. It isn't worthy of much more thought or speculation than that. You can't fix what can't be changed.

For what it is worth, and maybe I am speaking out of context because I have not totally been keeping up with this thread....but
alot ....(the majority, but not all)....of my bullies were black and hispanic...mostly on the poor side...I was a caucasian minority for a large duration of my elementary school and jr. high career....so maybe there was an essence of lashing out at the one white kid that was open and vulnerable and available for them to pick on...as a result of the subtle..or not so subtle racism they might have had to endure throughout their lives...just a theory...

I don't think the problem is in "why" people get targeted for bullying. People will find reasons to bully others no matter how trivial. It seems that humans perform all kinds of mental gymnastics just to justify their hate and victimizing of other people. This article is yet another example.

I find it rather interesting that bullies target aspies due to characteristics we were born with and often have no control over. Then these "experts" have the nerve to suggest we must change or else.

Yet when you suggest that all children should be taught to be more tolerant of differences, something that is a learned behavior that can be changed, well, that's just "crazy talk".

When parents don't raise their children properly there isn't a lot that can be changed that way on the part of the school system but I wish it were a subject they would specifically teach and address nonetheless. It would at least put pressure on the bully to not further or continue their ways.

We can do research to try and isolate environmental factors that lead to prevalence of bullying behavior, but I'm not sure it's possible to know what it is that causes people to become bullies, or if there is anything you can do to prevent certain people from having predatory impulses. I think the attitude of bystanders and the general culture of the environment is the piece people overlook.

The problem shouldn't be treated as something involving only the bully and the victim. That's too simplistic of an approach. Everyone, from teachers to students to parents, is culpable for the problem. If the majority actively stood up to the bullies when they choose to victimize someone they wouldn't be nearly so brazen and would at least learn to lay low. By doing nothing, or worse yet treating incidents of bullying as entertainment spectacles, the kids standing by empower the bullies.

Well said. I don't see it as curative, but until the cause is understood it will be an unending series of victims with little hope in sight.


M.

The cause is parenting, for the most part, and some genetic component as well pertaining to the sociopath in select cases.

That makes as much sense as calling everyone who exceeds the speed limit on a single occassion a "criminal". The word looses all meaning if it just means, every motorist ever. If the word "bully" and "child" are interchangible, it defeats the purpose of the word bully.


Refusing to associate with someone and responding negatively to them when they try to intrude ought to be disinguished from a consistent pattern of seeking to impose aggression on others.


Speaking from my own experience, entering the workforce is not necessarily an end to bullying. Workplace bullying is a serious and suprisingly common problem. This is yet another ground where true bullies are likely to be distinguishable from children just acting like children. A true bully is very likely to continue the behaviors in the workplace. Children who engage in normal childhood responses to other children they dislike are far less likely to engage in campaigns of bullying in the workplace.


Being universally rejected, to the person effected is not necessarily any better than having a few friends that include you and being physically bullied by someone. In fact I was much happier when I had at least one friend, despite daily physical bullying than I was when I did not have any person who would behave in a friendly matter toward me. If you have a blame centric mentality where what you care about is "whose fault is this" rather than a solution orientated mentality where identifying harm and minimizing is the core goal, then I suppose rights would matter more than well-being. But I happen to be more interested in how peoples' lives can be improved, than in who we ought to point fingers at and call blame-worthy.



A perspective that entirely ignores the well being of people. Your view appears to be that the misery and mental health of someone is irrelevant so long as no one violates their rights. My perspective is that children ought to be empowered to be happy and healthy and if this means teaching them how to gain the acceptance of peers and to interact in a healthy way with peers, then teaching them such is in their interests and more important to the average concerned parent than systematically improving everyone else's children....not to mention more achievable.


There are actually two kinds of bullying. There is non-provoked bullying that is entirely aggressive and indicates a significant problem or character defect on the part of the bully. Then there is "functional bullying". This behavior is directed at someone who refuses or fails to uphold social standards or is otherwise disruptive to others. It is a form of social pressure that encourages people to not be disruptive to others. Most people will respond to the latter kind by amending their behavior. Unfortunately, people like us (for instance those with an ASD) are not able to respond in the typical manner and the bullying intensifies beyond mildly unpleasant discouragement of behavior. Put bluntly, "functional bullyuing" is a social control mechanism.


Being subject to every single peer choosing to not socialize with you, is extremely detrimental to the health and wellbeing of a child. I am not arguing about the morality of the behavior. Doing so will not make a single miserable and depressed child one jot happier or healthier. Blaming people might give you a short term feeling of satisfaction, but it is not necessarily going to help anyone in a practical sense and other than focussing on blame, what relevance is the distinction when both are extremely harmful to those on the receiving end?

As you can see if you read the article, the study did not focus on why people bully, but rather on why some people are persistently rejected and/or targeted for bullying. The study is about the people being harmed because of these things (and considers possible practical steps that might be taken to make their lives better), and because universal rejection is in fact more harmful than mild bullying by a single person, the study looked at rejection alongside explicit bullying.

This is very true.

Rejection in the form of being told you cannot join in play but should rather "get lost" could just be rejection by one view but is bullying by another view. Being nasty to someone you do not like, only when they attempt to impose themselves on you is bullying to some people, but defending a right to be left alone in the view of others. Children are not the greatest social negotiators and are still learning social behavior. Angry stroppy responses to someone a child does not want around are not necessarily easily distinguished from intentional bullying (doing something intending to upset rather than simply making it clear you do not want someone around). If one child calls another a name is it bullying if the other does not respond, or mutual bullying if the two both call each other names? What is the distinguishing feature between one child bullying another who responds in an upset angry and defensive manner, and two kids being mutually nasty to each other?

I notice some posters in this thread are discussing bullying as though there are children who are bullies and children who are not, yet some others wish to propose that any child that engages in bullying behavior is a bully. That would make nearly every single child a bully and next to no one not a bully. I do believe that there is a difference between bullies, and children who sometimes engage in bullying behavior. A bully has a problem (or simply is a problem) that needs to be addressed by focusing on them. A person who constantly provokes negative reactions from others, has a problem that needs to be addressed for their own sake.

Taking an example someone in this thread offered, I was bullied using the fact of my weight, including by children who were significantly fatter than me. It was not the fat, but my behavior that caused peers to reject me and dislike me. Even if they had left me alone I still would not have had what I needed to be healthy and content and to develop necessary social skills. Identifying innate aspects of a person that result in consistently negative feedback is in their interests, given the implausibilty of changing everyone else in the word. In an ideal world no one would bully anyone. We do not live in an ideal world. No matter how much we encourage people to be nice, species typical behavior is unlikely to ever be eliminated and so we need to not only address bullies who will find someone to pick on regardless, but also assist those who provoke bullying or at best rejection in peers who ordinarily do not engage in such behavior.


I think there is some conflation going on in this thread; a failure to distinguish between normal children who are not bullies but who bully someone who is annoying and disruptive to them, only when that person imposes on them. A person who bullies others without provocation definately has a problem or is becomming a problem. The issue may be an environment where their behavior is not sufficiently discouraged, or it might be a problem of "acting out" or a character defect. This is not what the study was looking at, but rather it was looking at people who persistently provoke negative reactions no matter the usual behavior of the people responding negatively and regardless of environment.

The fact is, the children who are being made miserable and children who even if not bullied would still have the burden of not having any friends and being rejected need assistance to form healthy relationships because they need to have healthy relationships. Even if no one bullies them, not being able to form healthy relationships prevents their happiness, and places their health at significant risk. Simply stopping the bullying will not improve the situation of these people significantly in many cases because they still will not have any friends, and still will be unhappy and at risk of mental and emotional unwellness.

As others have said, children do have a right to not socialize with someone they do not like, but when every child makes this choice about one particular person, even if no one picks on the person, that rejection is a significiant problem for that person and their well-being. Being completely alone without a friend in the world, but not being physically harrassed is less healthy than having friends and occassionally being tripped up by the school bully when walking down the hallway. This study is about identifying ways to improve the lives of people who would still be unhappy and face significant health risks even if no one actively bullied them, because they are challenged in or completely unable to form healthy relationships with their peers.


I find it odd that people would be so averse to attempts to identify the behaviors and practical steps that can help prevent a child not only from being bullied, but from being alone and friendless.
Even if the bullying stops, a child without friends is very much at risk in terms of their health and attempts to help such children better integrate are in the child's interests.

I do not think it is acceptable for people to create malicious software and try to download it to my computer and I support attempts to prevent such behavior, but there is no way I am hooking up to the internet without anti virus protection. In an ideal world no one would bully anyone, everyone would include others even if they were perceived as disruptive and I would not need an anti-virus or fire wall on my computer. But I would be foolish and self-defeating if I got angry at experts who sought ways to help me protect my computer in this world. I feel the same way in respect of empowering people to form healthy relationships and to not provoke negative reactions (including rejection without bullying) in their peers.

Source?


M.

You have a brain. Use it.

Yes, I do, and I am. I asked you what source you have for your statements - whether it is personal opinion or if you have a study or other research indicating that is the case?


M.

It isn't rocket science here. We all give our opinions. I haven't seen you produce any data but I'm not trying to intimidate you about it. So why don't you back off.

Thank you for your answer.


M.