A Cross-National Analysis of the Effects by Bullying and School Exclusion on Subjective Happiness in 10-Year-Old Children

Abstract

Literature to date has well supported the detrimental consequences of bullying and school exclusion in different countries, with negative outcomes in school adjustment or child psychological adjustment, among others. However, more research is needed to understand the effects on positive indicators of psychological well-being in children as subjective happiness. Cross-national studies are also recommended to examine the differential effects by country. Thus, the aim of this study was to examine bullying and school exclusion, and their effects on child subjective happiness, from a cross-national perspective. Data from the Second Wave of Children’s Worlds: International Survey of Children’s Well-being (ISCWeB) was used, from a sample of 12,623 children aged 10 years old from 15 countries. Participants completed self-report measures of bullying, school exclusion and subjective happiness. Results showed that 20.8% of children suffered harassment and 17.6% felt excluded, twice or more times, at school. Negative effects of bullying and exclusion on subjective happiness were observed in all the sample. Furthermore, differences by country were found in the frequency of bullying and exclusion, as well as in the size of their effects on happiness. These results underline the need to protect child psychological well-being by preventing bullying and school exclusion.

Parenting Styles and Self-Esteem in Adolescent Cybervictims and Cyberaggressors: Self-Esteem as a Mediator Variable

“…The study conducted by Navarro, Ruiz-Oliva, Larrañaga, and Yubero [ 28 ] found that cyberbullying victims informed of the worse levels of subjective well-being than children not involved in cyberbullying. Similar results have been found in subsequent research [ 29 , 30 ].…”

An Overview of Health Issue Tracking among Parents of School-Aged Children

“…The previous study in Samarinda (Susanti et al, 2018) showed that as many as 51.3% of school children tended to have experienced bullying victims at school. This is supported by other studies (Gomez-baya et al, 2022)that the negative effect of bullying at school is that it will affect the level of happiness of children which can have an impact on the pattern of children's lives at home. So, this is in line with this study that parents make the issue of bullying as one of the health information searches.…”

Bullying in Adolescents: Differences between Gender and School Year and Relationship with Academic Performance

“…School bullying, considered a common social phenomenon worldwide, can have serious consequences, ranging from physical symptoms to significant psychiatric symptoms such as depression, anxiety, insomnia, self-harm, etc., also including poor academic performance. Likewise, it is also associated with problems in social relationships and impaired quality of life [ 4 , 21 , 22 , 23 , 24 , 25 ]. Physical, verbal and social abuse is a major health problem for students; those who are victims may have poorer emotional, social, academic and health development, while bullies tend to display delinquent and aggressive behaviors in late adolescence [ 26 , 27 ].…”