Children aren't born evil: the psychology of bullying

1. What is Bullying?

Bullying refers to a series of intentional, repetitive, direct and indirect forms of aggression, targeting one or more peers with relatively less "power." By less "power" we mean less physical strength or intellectual ability (perceived or real) and/or differences in numbers.

Typical forms of traditional bullying behavior include harmful physical actions, damage to personal property, verbal abuse, and social exclusion. Forms of cyberbullying include threats, intimidation, harassment, stalking, defamation, social exclusion, identity fraud, invasion of privacy, manipulation, blackmail, and disclosure of secrets (Paul et al., 2012; Olweus, 1997).

2. Who Are the Bullies?

In short, bullies are young children who have frequent aggressive responses toward peers and adults. They favor the use of violence to achieve an end. They are impulsive and show little empathy for their victims.

We generally hear that the bully is aggressive to mask their inner insecurity and anxiety, but this is wrong — it's usually precisely the opposite. While there is a bully profile that is also a victim in other contexts, this is not the most common profile.

There are 5 especially important factors that influenced or influence a child's behavior toward bullying (Olweus, 1997):

• The emotional attitude of the primary caregiver(s) toward the child during the first years of life (usually the mother): a negative emotional attitude, characterized by a lack of love and involvement, increases the risk of the child later becoming aggressive and hostile toward others.

• A permissive attitude toward the child's aggressive behavior: if the primary caregiver is frequently permissive and "tolerant," without setting clear limits for aggressive behavior toward peers, siblings, and adults, the child's level of aggression tends to increase.

• Use of power-based parenting methods: such as physical punishment, yelling, and violent emotional outbursts. Children frequently exposed to these methods of problem-solving are prone to becoming more aggressive than the average child.

• The child's temperament: a child with an active and "hot-headed" temperament is more likely to become an aggressive young person than a child with a calmer temperament. However, the effect of this factor is less powerful than the first two conditions mentioned above.

• Supervision (or lack thereof) of activities outside of school.

It's important to highlight that the family's socioeconomic level is not related to bullies. However, victims and bully-victims are more likely to come from families with socioeconomic difficulties (Tippett & Wolke, 2014).

3. The Reasons Behind Bullying

Bullying is a behavior, which means that like all behaviors, it serves a function. Bullying behavior provides (Olweus, 1997):

• A sense of control and dominance;

• Popularity and higher social status;

• Social influence;

• Direct reward from the behavior: attention, money...

4. The Future of Bullies

Although at younger ages bullying provides immediate advantages like popularity, as school progresses their social status becomes increasingly lower, reaching its lowest point around age 16 — though they never become as unpopular as their victims.

Bullies later have a higher probability of engaging in criminal behavior and substance use. Indeed, in a study conducted in Norway, 60% of young people considered bullies between the 6th and 9th grade had been arrested at least once by age 24, and between 35 to 45% had been arrested 3 times; in comparison, in a group of non-bully youth, only 10% had been arrested once (Olweus, 1997).

5. What Can We Do?

Bullying is not a children's problem, nor a family's problem — it's a problem for all of society. Schools play an important role. At home, it's possible to adopt measures and strategies that help manage the child's aggressive behavior, and a psychologist can help with that. But the main intervention will be at school, because the school environment must be one that promotes support and appropriate behaviors in all students. This is done by identifying behaviors that are valued by the school community and that can be applied to all students in all situations. What is valued is directly communicated and taught to students, so that they know what actions are expected of them. Additionally, these actions are systematically recognized and reinforced at any time, just as undesired behavior is discouraged in a consistent way (McKevitt & Braaksma, 2007). In fact, we shouldn't just expect children to behave well — we should first demonstrate what "behaving well" looks like and then recognize and validate it when the child does it.