NATIONAL FORUM OF APPLIED EDUCATIONAL RESEARCH JOURNAL

VOLUME 21, NUMBER 1, 2007--2008

YOUTH BEHAVIOR AND

BULLYING MANAGEMENT:
IMPLICATIONS FOR PREVENTION AND
INTERVENTION

Carrie Butler
Dianne Reed
Alice Fisher
Megan Gray
Sam Houston State University
ABSTRACT

The purpose of our study was to determine the prevalence and source of bullying in
schools and to propose multi-institutional prevention and intervention strategies for
managing this behavior. The research was based on both qualitative and quantitative
information obtained from a survey administered to junior and senior high school
students in a southeast Texas school district. The self-report survey was designed to
identify specific bullying incidences experienced by the students. Reducing bullying in
schools is an important concern of parents, educators, and law enforcement. The
findings of our study indicated that adolescents may engage in bullying behavior due to
influences encountered in schools, home environments, and interaction with peer groups.
In our study, the implications regarding the reduction of bullying behaviors by
adolescents are discussed in terms of the impact of family involvement and after school
and community programs which include capable adults who will hold individuals
accountable for their actions.

B ullying has become more pervasive and sparks violence in

schools and communities. In the last two decades, research
indicated that behaviors historically considered “rites of
passage” and “a bit of fun” has emerged as threats to school safety,
affecting the psychological and physical health of children (Stockdale,
Hangadumanbo, Duys, Larson, & Sarvela, 2002). According to the
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National Institute of Child Health and Human Development

[NICHHD] (2001), 17 percent of school age children and teenagers
reported being bullied on a regular basis and 19 percent of youths
bully others just as frequently. Annually, 1.6 million youth are bullied,
and 1.7 young people bully others (Snyder, 2001). While it is unclear
whether bullying is at an all-time high or the recent measurement of it
has uncovered cases that have always existed, fear of school and
community violence and the carrying of weapons by juveniles in
response to this threat remains a persistent problem (Stockdale, et al.,
2002). Efforts to investigate the prevalence and nature of bullying are
required so that school personnel, parents, and other community
supervisors can identify the early warning signs of bullying and
intervene to end these destructive behaviors.

The purpose of our study was to determine the prevalence and

source of bullying in the selected schools and to propose multi-
institutional prevention and intervention strategies for managing this
behavior. Bullies must be recognized as delinquents and the
characteristics which influence their deviant behavior must be
identified in order for effective strategies to be designed and
implemented in combating this behavior.

Types of Bullying

Bullying can manifest in various forms; however, most

definitions of bullying reveal a power differential between the victim
and the bully, with the bully assuming a position of authority (Snyder,
2001). While not mutually exclusive, the forms of bullying can be
physical, verbal, and/or emotional. A victim who experiences physical
and verbal bullying, for example, will inevitably suffer emotionally.

Physical bullying for both males and females includes hitting,

pushing, kicking, and spitting (Snyder, 2001). Verbal and emotional
bullying includes spreading rumors, teasing, threatening, isolating
others from peers, and intimidating the victim. Bullying can be similar
 Carrie Butler, Dianne Reed, Alice Fisher & Megan Gray 83

for both males and females; however, females are more likely to
engage in emotional and manipulative types of bullying (Fassler,
2005).

Bullying interferes with learning and prosocial development. It

is associated with other delinquent behaviors, such as destroying
property; stealing, truancy, and drug abuse (Snyder, 2001)). Bullying
behavior also has long-term effects; victims suffer emotional
consequences, while the bully continues down the path toward
criminality. Olweus and Limber (1999) reported that 60 percent of
adolescent male bullies were convicted of crimes as adults. In
addition, 40 percent of these former bullies had at least three or more
convictions by early adulthood.

Bullying impacts both the victim and offender, creating a range

of psychological problems from loneliness, inadequate social
relationships, and isolation. Victims are more likely than the bullies to
experience humiliation, low self-esteem, anxiety, school phobia, and
insecurity (Snyder, 2001; Fassler, 2005).

Bullying Risk Factors

Family and peer risk factors often serve as indicators for future
bullying behaviors. Family risk factors include overly harsh or lenient
discipline, lack of supervision, parental bullying, and lack of parental
affection (National Youth Violence Prevention Resource Center,
2005). Youths who exhibit bullying behaviors are also more likely to
associate with peers who fight, skip school, carry weapons, and
commit other crimes National Institute of Child Health and Human
Development [NICHHD] (2003).

Bullies exhibit both physical and verbal aggressive behavior

while in a school environment, in addition to being less cooperative
and less prosocial (Perren & Alsaker, 2006). Because they are the main
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locality for bullying behavior, schools are the ideal place to prevent
and stop such abuse.

Social Systems Perspectives

Systems theory outlines the body of group deviance literature

into an understandable whole.While much of bullying behavior may
be defined in systemic terms, other questions remain with respect to
effective intervention and prevention of the behavior. Control theories,
a component of micro-objectivist theories (Ward, Carter, & Perrin,
1994), suggest that individuals engage in deviant behavior as a result
of weakening social controls. Social control theory hypothesizes that
when controls such as parents, schools, and other social institutions
fail to hold people accountable for their deviant actions; they are more
likely to engage in delinquency. This theory may provide the most
appropriate framework in which to measure the effects of mediating
systemic influences in after school programs that serve to deter young
people from delinquency. J. F. Longres (1994) defined social control
as:
The processes through which a person’s participation in a
system is limited or constrained. Social control may be
implemented through positive or negative means. Often,
systems of reward are devised to assure compliance with group
expectations (Longres, p. 44)

Social controls that lead to conformance of group expectations

facilitate positive peer socialization (Ward, et al., 1994). These forms
of social control can be identified as police visibility on school
premises, presence of capable adults during after school programs,
accountability of behavior through adult supervision, and parental
reinforcement of negative consequences for deviant conduct.

Social controls that influence youth on a daily basis may either

promote or deter group delinquency, depending on the consistency of
controls. Weak social controls in after school and community
 Carrie Butler, Dianne Reed, Alice Fisher & Megan Gray 85

programs may serve to promote delinquency, allowing students to

coalesce into negative peer groups (Butler & Watkins, 2006).
Similarly, delinquency tolerated in these programs may facilitate gang
activities (Butler & Watkins, 2006). Consistent with the notion that
mediating systemic influences can serve as effective prevention and
intervention methods, social controls that exist in the mediating
systemic level may deter delinquency within those existing
institutions.

A Case Study

Bullying is prevalent in many schools throughout the United

States (Nansel, Overpeck, Pilla, Ruan, Simons-Morton, & Scheidt,
2001). This study focused on a school district in southeast Texas with
reports of bullying in junior and senior high schools (grades 7th
through 12th). School administrators conducted needs assessments on
these campuses to identify the prevalence of bullying and specific
strategies effective in reducing bullying and other delinquent
activities. These schools participated in the Partners of Safe Schools
Initiative (PSSI). Partners of Safe Schools Initiative (PSSI), a coalition
of school districts and community youth agencies in southeast Texas
has reported concerns regarding bullying behavior that contribute to
school and community juvenile crime (Texas Commission on
Alcoholism and Drug Abuse, 2003). The objective of PSSI was to
target funding for prevention and intervention services for at-risk
youth and their families in an effort to reduce bullying and related
juvenile delinquency.

Method
Participants

The population for our study was 1211 students in grades 7-12
that attended the selected junior high and high schools. Thirty-four
percent of the students who attended the schools were economically
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disadvantaged. The ethnicities of the participants for our study were

77.5% Caucasian, 6.7% Hispanic, 1.2% Asian American, 2.3%
American Indian, and 3.4% of the students identified as other. The
male and female participants in our study were 46.7% female and
52.8% male. The findings for our study are based on participants’
responses to specific questions on a self-report survey.
Instrumentation and Procedures
Self-report measures are widely used in the social sciences to
help control for unreported crime to the police. Although self-report
measures run the risk of inflated or deflated responses to items on
bullying and related delinquency, they provide one of the best means
of gaining information from an adolescent population
(Esbensen & Osgood, 1997).

Therefore, to determine the prevalence and source of bullying

in the selected schools and to propose multi-institutional prevention
and intervention strategies for managing this behavior, all students in
grades 7-12 were administered a self-report survey. The survey
consisted of 103 items and the participants were given one class period
to complete the survey. We collaborated with school district personnel
to develop the 103 item survey, which included items from the
National Institute of Child Health and Human Development Survey
[NICHHD] (1998). The participants responded to questions regarding
bullying and other types of delinquent behaviors exhibited on school
premises and in the community. They also responded to questions
concerning school and community interventions, which are designed
to deter delinquent behavior.

Classroom teachers distributed the survey. Although the survey

administration procedure produced a threat to the validity of the
results, teachers read aloud a cover sheet that explained
confidentiality, the importance of honest student responses, and a
guarantee of student anonymity in an effort to promote accurate and
honest responses. The completed surveys were immediately placed in
covered boxes and given to selected school district personnel for safe
 Carrie Butler, Dianne Reed, Alice Fisher & Megan Gray 87

keeping in a locked office. The school district personnel collected a

total of 1211surveys from classroom teachers whose students
participated in the study; the surveys were then submitted to us.

Data Analysis
Violence. On the survey, violence was defined as actions that
harm other people or have the potential to harm other people. Violence
specifically included the variable of physical fighting. The violence
variable was categorized into “yes” or “no” responses. A “yes”
response from students indicated that the students had experienced a
violent incident and a “no” response indicated that the students had not
experienced a violent incident. Within a 12-month period, 454 (38%)
of the participants reported getting into a physical fight.

Victimization. Victimization was included in the survey to

determine how students perceived school safety. Victimization referred
to the mistreating, bullying, and threatening of students by other
students. Threatening remarks and bullying behaviors within the last
12 months included incidences on the way to and from school and on
school property. Victimization variables were categorized into “yes” or
“no” responses. One hundred six of the participants (9%) reported
feeling threatened by others going to and from school, and 353 (29%)
of students felt that they had been bullied at school.

Bivariate analyses indicated that participants who reported

being bullied at school also reported being more likely to use drugs,
such as marijuana, cocaine, heroin, and illegitimately use of
prescription drugs (Table 1). Interestingly, alcohol use was not a
significant variable for bullying victims; victims were more likely to
use the illicit substances. They were also more likely to vandalize
property (destroy property that did not belong to them) and to skip
school (Table 1). Within Table 1, only alcohol use and the stealing of
property were not significant. Although males were significantly more
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likely to be victims of bullying, both male and female bullying victims

were significantly more likely to engage in delinquent activities.

Participants were asked to rank strategies that they perceived to

be most effective in curtailing drug use, vandalism, stealing, fighting,
and skipping school. On a scale of 1 to 6 (1 being least effective to 6
being most effective), participants rank-ordered strategies of talking
to a counselor, harsher consequences for behavior, more consistent
discipline, encouragement by teachers/principals, and after school
activities. The strategies were listed for three categories: drug use,
vandalism/violence/weapons, and truancy. Rankings of 5 and 6 were
identified as effective strategies. For all three categories, students
indicated that harsher consequences for behavior and more consistent
discipline were the most effective strategies to curtail unwanted
behaviors, followed by after school activities (Table 2). Clearly,
students at these schools perceived accountability for their actions and
more involvement in prosocial activities to be important prevention
and intervention strategies. The findings of this study are limited
because they reflect only responses from participants at the selected
schools. However, the implications for bullying are apparent: bullying
behavior should not go unnoticed, and consequences for these actions
should be clear.

Prevention and Intervention

Specific strategies for the prevention and intervention of

bullying behaviors are recommended for school personnel. Seeking
information about the episode(s) and asking the victims what they
recommend to resolve the problem can be effective strategies to
combat bullying (Fassler, 2005). Keeping school personnel comprised
of bullying activities will help gather necessary information about the
incident and assess the emotional state of the victims. Further,
collecting current information on bullying incidents may help to
empower the victims to devise an effective coping strategy. It is also
recommended to encourage victims to avoid physical confrontation
 Carrie Butler, Dianne Reed, Alice Fisher & Megan Gray 89

and to walk with friends as much as possible, because they can act as
guardians against bullying attacks. The victims should be encouraged
not to fight back, but to seek the counsel of a trusted adult.

Strategies for managing delinquent behaviors and enforcing the

rules with regards to bullying are equally important. The bully should
understand that victimizing others will not be tolerated. School
administrators should note that consistency in enforcing the rules will
help to eliminate bullying on school premises. While bullies should be
monitored closely, they should also be praised and reinforced for
following the rules to encourage further positive behavior.
Additionally, parents of the victims and the bullies should be notified
immediately after any incident takes place. Parents should be
encouraged to spend quality time with their children and to use non-
hostile consequences for rule violations.

Implications and Conclusion

Mediating and micro-level systems such as school and family

play important roles in deterring young people from bullying
behaviors and delinquency. However, schools and community
programs may prove to be more successful in having a positive effect
on the delinquent behavior than those actions made on the part of the
adolescent’s family, particularly if parental role models are inattentive,
negative, or nonexistent. Consistent with the literature, a systems
approach of entities working together to achieve the common goal of
reducing antisocial behavior in schools is the best option. This will
require structure, consistency, and cooperation from all systems to be
effective (Goldstein & Huff, 1993). Prevention and intervention efforts
should more closely target peer socialization using multi-systemic
approaches involving mediating and micro-levels, with high levels of
social control. Macro-level systems should aim efforts toward
providing more economic relief to low-socioeconomic communities in
need of providing alternatives to deviance through opportunities for
active involvement in positive activities. Law enforcement agencies
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can help by expanding prevention programs in the schools (i.e., the

Gang Resistance Education and Training program) with at-risk
populations, in conjunction with suppression efforts. Families who
incorporate and reinforce high levels of adult supervision,
accountability for negative behavior, positive moral development, and
extra-familial resources that provide constructive networks for
adolescents will help establish a healthy, individual identity. Families
and schools can work together to develop healthy networks for
individuals and facilitate positive peer socialization.
 Carrie Butler, Dianne Reed, Alice Fisher & Megan Gray 91

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