Cause Of Bullying

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As of the year 2014, around 3.2 million students are bullied every year (“11 Facts,” 2014). The increasing weight of the issue of bullying is beginning to have lasting psychological effects on children who both experience bullying and are bullies themselves. In order to fully comprehend this issue, it is imperative that the root of this controversy is assessed by looking into what the socio-psychological causes that result in the display of bullying behaviors are. Then we can begin to evaluate the real depth that these negative actions have on those who experience bullying. This can further, not only the possible ways in which bullying can be prevented but also how both the perpetrators and victims can ultimately be helped. In order to first…show more content…
He found that most children believed that bullying was a result of their peers trying to deviate from societal norms and rules that are dictated by society. Besides this, children also thought bullying was done by someone who may be unstable and desires to get a rise out of peers and teachers or was a way that children could feel they are of an elevated social status within the school environment (Thornberg, 2010). These findings showcase that many children’s social representation of bullying has to with social hierarchies and the need to achieve status within a group. This could be due to our innate need to feel superior and compare ourselves to other, proposing the question that the true cause of bullying may be more deeply woven into our biology than we perceived. This research also highlights that children are very aware of the concept of bullying even at a young age and are already beginning to formulate hypotheses about the nature of morality as it relates to human…show more content…
Tracy Vaillancourt (2013), a counseling psychologist and chair of the Children’s Mental Health and Violence Prevention organization, and her colleagues compiled studies of the lifelong effects of bullying victims as is pertains to biology and neurology. Their research concluded that many people who have experienced bullying continually relive these experiences, even long after the initial abuse, because the social-emotional pain that occurred is neurologically similar to physical pain. They termed this “social pain” and described it as occurring when someone is subjected to rejection by peer groups, ostracization, or bullying. They also found that bullying can have extreme repercussions to one’s biological processes, such as the production of less cortisol that mimics people diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder, the way their genes can change and represent themselves, and the shortening of their telomeres. This can have implications not only on a person’s mental wellbeing, but also on their physical health, academic success, and overall longevity (Vaillancourt, Hymel, & McDougall, 2013). The idea that there are still some social barriers regarding preventing bullying that needs to be addressed past the point of just reporting on the serious long-term

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