LAUSR.org creates dashboard-style pages of related content for over 1.5 million academic articles. Sign Up to like articles & get recommendations!

The Profile of Bullying Perpetrators and Victims and Associated Factors among High School Learners in Tshwane District, South Africa

Photo from wikipedia

Although bullying in South African schools remains a current public health and education discussion, the view has been limited to acts of criminality, and not much has been done to… Click to show full abstract

Although bullying in South African schools remains a current public health and education discussion, the view has been limited to acts of criminality, and not much has been done to identify risk factors for being bullying perpetrators and victims in a school environment. This study used a cross sectional quantitative survey to determine the profile of bullying perpetrators and victims among high school learners in a township in Pretoria. The Illinois Bully Scale was used to screen for bullying perpetration and victimization, whilst the Patient Health Questionnaire-9 and the Beck Anxiety Inventory were used to screen for depression and anxiety symptoms, respectively, among the sample of learners. STATA version 14 was used for data analysis. The sample of 460 consisted of 69% females with a mean age of 15 years. The 73.91% of learners who fitted the categories of bullying consisted of 21.96% victims, 9.57% perpetrators, and 42.39% perpetrator–victims. The Pearson Chi2 test of association found a significant association between being a bullying victim and reported lack of people who loved and cared for the learner. Being a bullying perpetrator was associated with anxiety symptoms of the learner and home alcohol use, while being a perpetrator –victim was associated with lack of family love and care, the school attended, as well as depression and anxiety symptoms. Using multivariate logistic regression, being a perpetrator–victim was associated with depression symptoms, anxiety symptoms, and home use of alcohol whilst being a perpetrator was associated with lack of anxiety symptoms. The study concluded that anxiety, depression, and the home environment are strongly associated with bullying, and most learners fitted the category of being both perpetrators and victims.

Keywords: profile bullying; perpetrators victims; anxiety symptoms; bullying perpetrators; school; anxiety

Journal Title: International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health
Year Published: 2023

Link to full text (if available)


Share on Social Media:                               Sign Up to like & get
recommendations!

Related content

More Information              News              Social Media              Video              Recommended



                Click one of the above tabs to view related content.