Aggression and Bullying

Question 1

Definition of Aggression

Answer 1

“injurious and destructive behaviour that is socially defined as aggressive on the basis of a variety of factors, some of which reside in the evaluator rather than in the performer” (Bandura, 1973, p.8)

Question 2

Types of Aggression

Answer 2

o Hostile and instrumental aggression
o Angry and non-angry aggression
o Aggression – behaviour
o Hostility – attitudinal
o Anger – emotional arousal
o Assertiveness

Question 3

Theories of Aggression

Answer 3

o Trait theory
 A) consistency
 B) stability
o Drive theory
 A) Freud
• Hydraulic model
• Catharsis model
o Ethological theory
 A) agonistic interactions
o Social cognitive theory

Question 4

• Information Processing Model of aggression (Dodge & Crick, 1994)

Answer 4

o A) encode social cues
o B) interpret social cues
o C) formulate social goals
o D) generate problem solving strategies
o E) evaluate the likely effectiveness of strategies and select a response
o F) enact a response

Question 5

Acquisition of Aggression

Answer 5

o Patterson’s model
 Negative reinforcement
 Coercive
o Child rearing practices and aggression
 Inconsistency in parental discipline
o Positive reinforcement

Question 6

Modelling influence on aggression

Answer 6

o Laboratory findings vs. field studies – self-selection issue
o Performance acquisition issue

Question 7

The role of the victim

Answer 7

o Children who cry when victimised are often targets
o Pain cues are gratifying to those who are highly aggressive

Question 8

• Egan & Perry (1998) showed how children’s self-doubts contribute to their victimisation

Answer 8

o 2 measures 6 months apart
o Measured
 Global self-worth
 Self-perceived peer social competence
 Assertive self-efficacy
 Aggressive self-efficacy
 Peer assessments (via nomination inventories)
o Results
 Self-regard, especially self-perceived social competence within the peer group contributes to victimisation in two ways:
• 1) a belief in not being able to interact effectively with one’s peers leads to an increase in victimisation over time irrespective of any behavioural problems
• 2) confidence in being able to interact with one’s peers protects behaviourally at-risk children from being victimised.
 Low self-regard and abusive treatments are mutually reinforcing

Question 9

• Types of Peer victimisation

Answer 9

o Physical
o Verbal
o Relational
o Cyber

Question 10

• Early views of peer victimisation assumed…

Answer 10

that victimisation automatically leads to adverse results.
 This was found to oversimplified

Question 11

• Behavioural reactions to victimisation

Answer 11

o Passive victim (submissive, anxious)
o Provocative victim (attention seeking, argumentative)

Question 12

• Peer factors in victimisation

Answer 12

o Status in peer group (disliked/rejected kids targeted)
o Minority status
 Ethnicity, sexuality
o Few friends
o Poor quality friendships

Question 13

• Family factors in victimisation

Answer 13

o Overprotection
o Enmeshed relationships
o Poor parent-child communication patterns

Question 14

• School factors in victimisation

Answer 14

o Bullying not taken seriously
o Bystanders and victims do not feel supported when they report bullying
o No clear procedures for handling bullying

Question 15

• Psychological outcomes of peer victimisation

Answer 15

o Depression
o Anxiety
o Low self-esteem
o Acting out
o School refusal and loneliness
o Suicide ideation

Question 16

• Factors influencing depressive victimisation outcomes

Answer 16

o Barchia and Bussey examined the social cognitive processes that mediate the link between peer victimisation and depression.
o Children who are victimised more, ruminated more and this led to greater depression

Question 17

• Attenuating factors in adjustment to peer victimisation

Answer 17

o Coping skills
 Revenge, denial – less adjustment
 Problem solve and seek support – better adjustment

Question 18

• Coping self-efficacy

Answer 18

o Perceived capability to mobilise the motivation, cognitive resources, and courses of action needed to exercise control over negative events

Question 19

• Two cognitive domains in peer victimisation

Answer 19

o Self-efficacy for avoiding self-blame
 Keep from thinking, it only happens to me
o Victim role disengagement
 Stop from taking personally, don’t allow negative comments to define them.

Question 20

• Two behavioural domains

Answer 20

o Self-efficacy for proactive behaviour
 Ask friends for advice
o Self-efficacy for avoiding aggressive behaviour
 Avoid revenge and escalation, stay calm and reduce emotional arousal.

Question 21

• Relationship of Coping self-efficacy to psychological outcomes

Answer 21

o The greater the level of victimisation the less able children were to use coping self-efficacy strategies
o The more that coping self-efficacy strategies were used, there was less evidence of anxiety, depression and acting out.
o Overall, the use of the cognitive self-efficacy strategies reduced children’s anxiety and depression and use of the behavioural self-efficacy strategy of avoiding aggressive led to less acting out

Question 22

Sex differences in Aggression

Answer 22

o Physical aggression
 Boys more likely than girls
o Verbal aggression
 Boys more likely than girls
o Relational aggression
 Boys and girls equally likely
o Direct/indirect aggression
o Crick et al (1996)
o Electronic/cyber aggression
 Less frequent that other types of bullying
 More depression associated with cyber bullying than with other forms of bullying

Question 23

Definition of bullying

Answer 23

o A student is being bullied or victimised when he is exposed, repeatedly and over time, to negative actions on the part of one or more other students. There needs to be an imbalance in power between the bully and bullied.

Question 24

• Participant roles in bullying

Answer 24

o Bully
o Reinforcer of bully
o Assistant of bully
o Defender of victim/interveners
o Outsider

Question 25

• Deficit explanations of aggressors and bullies

Answer 25

o Argued that highly aggressive children and bullies are ‘oafs’ who suffer from cognitive deficits and have a limited awareness of the effects on others of their aggressive interactions

Question 26

• Counter deficit model explanation of bullies

Answer 26

o Rather than lacking awareness of the effect of their aggressive behaviours on others, it is suggested that they lack empathy and perspective taking skills to appreciate how their victims feel.

Question 27

• An alternative model: Social cognitive model - Moral disengagement

Answer 27

o Selective activation and disengagement of internal control permits different types of conduct with the same moral standards
o Self-sanctions
 Can be disengaged from detrimental conduct by re-construing the conduct, obscuring personal causal agency, misrepresenting or disregarding the injurious consequences of one’s actions, and vilifying the recipients of maltreatment by blaming and devaluing them.
o Mechanisms to morally disengage (you know the definition of all of these)
o Bullies and aggressive children score higher on moral disengagement than all other kids.

Question 28

• Peer identified bullies reported more _________ and _______when taking the perspective of a hypothetical bully

Answer 28

o Indifference, pride - Menesini (2003)

Question 29

• Peer identified bullies did not show deficits in ___ tasks nor did they perform more poorly in ____ ___ ____. Bullies reported high levels of ________

Answer 29

o ToM, identifying others’ emotions, moral disengagement - Gini (2006)

Question 30

• Paciello (2008) Peer evaluations of aggression at 14 years predicted ______ ______ and _______ _______ at 20. Violence at 20 was also predicted from ________ ________ measured 6 yrs earlier.

Answer 30

o physical violence, verbal aggression, moral disengagement - Paciello (2008)

Question 31

• Moral disengagement and cyber bullying

Answer 31

o Reason for the weaker linkage between cyber bullying and moral disengagement than between traditional bullying and moral disengagement may be due to the measure of moral disengagement
o Study found that those that had both self-efficacy to cyber bully and moral disengagement were predicted to engage in more cyber bullying.
o Moral disengagement strategies are needed to reduce cyber bullying and bullying more generally.

Question 32

• Research implications for intervention in bullying

Answer 32

o Moral disengagement
 Implement a whole school approach
 Focus on the unacceptability of all forms of bullying
 Targeted intervention
o Outcome expectations
 Support bystanders to censure all forms of bullying
 Finding alternative ways for bullies to gain peer acceptance.

Question 33

• KiVa

Answer 33

o Professionally developed
o Internet based resources
o Stronger role to bystanders