Group level factors in bullying

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Group level factors in bullying
2
Overview

• Brief review of previous work on bullying and
  bullying as a group process.
• Presentation of rationale for planned research
• Presentation of draft materials for planned
  research.

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Bullying

• Bullying is the delivery of an aversive stimulus
  to weaker, less powerful persons (Nesdale
  Scarlett, 2004).
• Research shows that bullying in schools and in
  the workplace is a pervasive, international
  problem.
• It is estimated that 70 of primary school age
  children are bullied in some way (Bullying
  Online, 2006)
• The negative effects are serious and may include
  emotional and academic difficulties, problems
  with relationships, low self-esteem, and
  increased susceptibility to depression (Sharp,
  Thompson, Arora, 2000).

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Previous research

• Much of the previous work has looked at bullying
  at the individual level
• Victims have an exploitable weakness and are
  submissive (Carney Merrell, 2001)
• Bullies lack friendliness and emotional stability
  (Tani, Greenman, Scneider, Fregoso, 2003).
• The root of the problem is the family situation
  bullies may learn maladaptive coping skills from
  their parents (Carney Merrell, 2001), or come
  from families that are fraught with conflict
  (Schwartz, Dodge, Pettit, Bates, 1997).
• A bully has superior social skills (Sutton, Smith
  Swettenham, 2001)

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Previous research

• But bullying frequently occurs between people
  in groups and organizations. It is often a group
  phenomenon.
• Past research has used social identity theory to
  investigate childrens appraisal of bullying
  situations.
• Ojala and Nesdale (2004)
• Gini (2006, in press)
• Jones et al. (under review)

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Planned research

• AIM To replicate and extend previous research
  into bullying and social identity theory.
• To use the tenets of social identity and
  intergroup emotion theory to provide a
  group-level explanation of bullying behaviour.

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Theoretical background
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Hypotheses

• Gender
• That female participants will be more sensitive
  than males to the group-level bullying portrayed
  in the vignette, such that
• a) they will report greater distress and empathy
  for the victim than do males.
• b) they will be more likely than males to want to
  support the victim if present.
• Group norms
• That participants will predict that the group
  will evaluate the bully more positively where his
  or her behaviour is norm-consistent than when it
  is not.

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Hypotheses

• Social Identification
• The report of group-based emotion will be
  moderated by the extent to which individuals
  identify with their group, such that
• a) Reported empathy and distress will be greater
  where children identify more highly with the
  victims group.
• b) Reported group-based pride will be greater
  where participants identify highly with the
  bullys group.
• c) Reported group-based guilt will be greater
  where identification is low with the bullys
  group and the behaviour is not norm-consistent.
• d) Reported group-based shame will be greater
  where identification is low with the bullys
  group and the behaviour is norm consistent.

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Sharing group membership with the bully
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Hypotheses Sharing group membership with the
bully

• a) participants will judge the behaviour of the
  bully more harshly than the behaviour of the
  group as a whole, compared with those who do not
  share group membership with the bully.
• If identification with the bully group is high
• b) participants are more likely to report
  group-based pride.
• c) participants are more likely to want to
  support the bully and their group if present.
• if identification with the bully group is low
• d) participants will experience group-based
  guilt, where they judge the bullying to be
  norm-inconsistent.
• e) participants will experience group-based shame
  where they judge the bullying to be norm-
  consistent.
• f) participants who feel that their ingroup is in
  a strong position relative to the outgroup will
  report anger at the victims treatment.
• g) participants who experience group-based guilt
  and anger are more likely to want to make
  reparations to the victim if present.
• h) participants who experience group-based shame
  are more likely to want to make distance
  themselves from the group if present.

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Sharing group membership with the victim
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Hypotheses sharing group membership with the
victim

• a) participants are more likely to define the
  situation as bullying.
• b) participants will judge that the bully should
  receive more punishment.
• c) participants are more likely to want to help
  the victim if present
• If identification with the victim group is high
• d) participants are more likely to report empathy
  and distress
• e) participants who feel that the group is in a
  strong position relative to the outgroup will
  express anger.
• f) the above reactions will be moderated by the
  extent to which participants identify with the
  victims group.
• If identification with the victim group is low
• g) participants will be indifferent to the plight
  of the victim
• h) participants will do nothing to support the
  victim and their group.
•  

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Points for discussion

• Do you have any comments on the theoretical
  rationale of this study?

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Research design

• Between-subjects, 3 factorial design.
• Factors
• Childrens gender (male versus female)
• The norms of the groups in the vignettes (either
  to be kind or unkind)
• Group membership of the participants (shared with
  the bully, shared with victim, or shared with
  neither bully nor victim)

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Procedure

• Dotestimation task
• Classed as under-estimators and divided
  randomly into one of three groups given group
  norms.
• Read a story involving intergroup bullying
• Respond to it in a questionnaire

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Dot estimation

• Children will be asked to complete a
  dot-estimation tasks, to randomly allocate them
  to one of six groups, three for each gender.
• Groups will be linked to the task and to the
  story children will be given information about
  their groups norms.
• Dolphins a confident group of girls, who enjoy
  going to the cinema together.
• Pandas an energetic group of girls, who enjoy
  spending time together outside school they
  especially like to have sleepovers.
• Tamarins a bright group of girls, who like to
  go horse-riding together at the weekends.
• Falcons a confident group of boys, who enjoy
  skateboarding together at a near-by skate park.
• Eagles an energetic group of boys, who enjoy
  spending time together outside school they
  particularly like to have races on their bikes.
• Kestrels a bright group of boys, who enjoy
  visiting each others houses to play computer
  games.

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The vignette

• Male version
• Lingley Primary School is one of the schools in
  a small town near the English sea-side. It is
  quite a large school, with three classes in each
  year.
• The school has a large playground, where many
  groups of friends enjoy playing together at
  break-times. In Year 6, the boys favourite
  break-time activity is a game of football. There
  are two main friendship groups in Year 6 who play
  football in two different teams. One group call
  themselves the Eagles. The Eagles are an
  energetic group of boys, who enjoy spending time
  together outside school they particularly like
  to have races on their bikes. Although the Eagles
  are sometimes unkind to other children The
  Eagles are always kind to others and, other
  children in the school admire them.

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The vignette

• The other team call themselves the Falcons. The
  Falcons are a confident group of boys, who enjoy
  skateboarding together at a near-by skate park.
  They too are well-liked by other children in the
  school. When it comes to football, the Eagles
  and the Falcons are just as good as each other.
• One break-time, during a game of football, Simon,
  one of the Falcons, was running when he tripped
  and fell over. Pete, who is one of the most
  energetic members of the Eagles, laughed. The
  other Eagles all gathered around him. The Falcons
  all came up to Simon too. Pete pointed at Paul
  and laughed at him. The other Eagles laughed with
  him.
• Call yourself a footballer? Pete sneered,
  youre such a show off.
• Simon hid his face in his hands. Pete and the
  Eagles had really upset him. Pete was about to
  call Paul another name, but the bell rang for the
  end of break-time before he could.

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The vignette

• Female version
• Lingley Primary School is one of the schools in
  a small town near the English sea-side. It is
  quite a large school, with three classes in each
  year. The school has a large playground, where
  many groups of friends enjoy playing together at
  break-times. In Year 6, the girls favourite
  break-time activity is playing on the climbing
  frame. There are two main friendship groups in
  Year 6 who play on the climbing frame. One group
  call themselves the Pandas. The Pandas are an
  energetic group of girls, who enjoy spending
  time together outside school they especially
  like to have sleepovers. Although the Pandas are
  sometimes unkind other children, The Pandas are
  always kind to others and they are admired by
  other children in the school.

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The vignette

• The other group call themselves the Dolphins.
  The Dolphins are a confident group of girls, who
  enjoy going to the cinema together. They, too,
  are well-liked by other children in the school.
  When it comes to using the climbing frame, the
  Pandas and the Dolphins are just as good as each
  other.
• One break-time, whilst the two groups were on
  playing on the climbing frame, Debbie, one of the
  Dolphins, fell off a balancing bar. Jenny, who is
  one of the most energetic members of the Pandas,
  sniggered. The other Pandas gathered around her.
  The Dolphins all came up to the balancing bar,
  too. Jenny pointed at Debbie and laughed at her.
  The other Pandas laughed with her.
• Serves you right, you fell off, Jenny sneered,
  youre such a show-off.
• Debbie hid her face in her hands. Jenny and the
  Pandas had really upset her. Jenny was about to
  call Debbie another name, but the bell rang for
  the end of break-time before she could.

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Points for discussion

• How best could the dot-estimation task and the
  group memberships be linked together?
• Would it be better to have all the children in
  the same group (cf. Doosje et al., 1998) and to
  change the stories?
• Do you have any comments on the vignettes?
• How can I include the continuous nature of
  bullying in the vignettes?
• Should the victim have a group membership?

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Dependent measures

• Finally, children will be asked to complete a
  questionnaire booklet, consistent with the
  vignette they were given, containing the
  following
• Manipulation checks
• Judgements of the bullying incident
• Social identification
• Intergroup emotion measures
• Action tendencies

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Points for discussion

• Please take a look through the questionnaires.
• I would be really grateful for your comments.

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Thank you ?