Bullying and Victimization Among Native and Immigrant Adolescents in Norway

Abstract

This study compares levels of bullying others, victimization, and aggressiveness in native Norwegian and immigrant adolescents living in Norway and shows how bullying is related to proactive and reactive aggressiveness. The sample consists of 2,938 native Norwegians (1,521 girls, 1,417 boys) and 189 immigrant adolescents (97 girls, 92 boys) in school grades 8, 9, and 10. Data were collected via self-assessments. Structural equation models were conducted separately for girls and boys in both groups. The levels of victimization, reactive and proactive aggressiveness were the same for both native Norwegians and immigrant adolescents but there was a significant difference in the levels of bullying others. Compared with the native Norwegians, immigrant adolescents were found to be at higher risk of bullying others. Structural models revealed significantly stronger relations between affiliation-related proactive aggressiveness and bullying others in immigrant boys compared with the other groups. This indicates that the wish for affiliation is an important mechanism of bullying others in immigrant boys. We also suggest further research and the practical importance of the findings for prevention of targeting immigrant adolescents.

School climate and exposure to bullying: a multilevel study

“…Several studies have shown associations between lower socioeconomic status and involvement in bullying (see Tippett & Wolke, 2014, for a meta-analysis). With regard to migration background and exposure to bullying, findings from earlier studies are inconsistent (e.g., Fandrem, Strohmeier, & Roland, 2009;Hjern et al, 2013;Peguero, 2008;Wolke et al, 2001).…”

Peer Victimization and Ethnic-Cultural Peer Victimization: Self-Esteem and School Relations between Different Cultural Groups of Students in Andalusia, Spain // Victimización étnico-cultural entre iguales: autoestima y relaciones en la escuela entre...

“…(Seals y Young, 2003) o Canadá (McKenney, Pepler, Craig, y Connolly, 2006). Por otra parte, muchos estudios realizados en Europa no muestran diferencias significativas entre los grupos étnico-culturales en cuanto a la victimización (Durkin et al, 2012;Fandrem, Strohmeier, y Roland, 2009;Monks, Ortega-Ruiz, y Rodríguez-Hidalgo, 2008;Strohmeier, Kärnä, y Salmivalli, 2011). Algunos trabajos, menos numerosos, sí han encontrado dichas diferencias significativas" (Wolke, Woods, Stanford, y Schulz, 2001) y también a la hora de actuar como el agresor victimizado (Strohmeier, Spiel, y Gradinger, 2008).…”

“…Sin embargo, entre los diez tipos de victimización personal estudiados en la presente investigación, sólo dos fueron diferentes entre los grupos. Estos resultados están de acuerdo con otros estudios europeos recientes (Fandrem et al, 2009;Monks et al, 2008) y también con algunas investigaciones de los EE.UU. (McKenney et al, 2006;Seals y Young, 2003).…”

Bullies and Victims in Primary Schools

“…Researchers in the past decades also concentrated on the role of ethnicity in bullying and victimization (e.g., Fandrem et al, 2009;McKenney et al, 2006;Vitoroulis and Vaillancourt, 2014), but this association has received little attention in the Hungarian context. Majority and minority students might have different likelihoods to be bullies or victims, and this association might be moderated by the ethnic composition of the class (Tolsma et al, 2013;Vervoort et al, 2010).…”

“…Prejudice might be expressed in the form of aggressive behavior towards minority students. Ethnic bullying is a special form of harassment and describes cases when students are bullied based on their ethnicity (Fandrem et al, 2009;Monks, Ortega-Ruiz and Rodríguez-Hidalgo, 2008;Verkuyten and Thijs, 2002).…”