Positive Youth Development and Being Bullied in Early Adolescence: A Sociocultural Analysis of National Cohort Data

Abstract

In the current study, we investigated the developmental dynamics between positive youth development, being bullied in adolescence, gender, and sociocultural risk factors. Participants were 3,509 males (49%) and 3,656 females (51%) studied longitudinally across the ages of 9, 13, and 17 years in the Growing Up in Ireland study. Using structural equation modeling, we discovered that being bullied in early adolescence was most strongly predicted by having fewer close friends, higher family poverty, and living in neighborhoods with higher levels of disorder. However, the social disadvantage of a young person’s school did not impact being bullied. More positive reports of connection and caring in early adolescence were negatively predicted by neighborhood disorder and family poverty, and being female had positive association with relationships with teachers. Developing confidence, competence, and character in late adolescence was notably related to having fewer experiences of family trauma and transitions in childhood and to having higher levels of rapport with parents in early adolescence. The results highlight the importance of studying relationships and psychological development in sociocultural context.

Emerging Evidence of Positive Youth Constructs and Purpose Development: Results From a Qualitative Approach

“…Focusing on specific numerical cut-offs may neglect the important features of a youth’s context. Thus far, researchers have adapted the 5Cs model to Irish (D’Urso, Symonds, & Pace, 2020) Icelandic (Gestsdóttir, Geldhof, Lerner, & Lerner, 2017), Lithuanian (Erentaitė & Raižienė, 2015), and Finnish (Ansala & Uusiautti, 2016) youth with great success. Given the similar Western European demographics and cultural context that the Scottish youth in this study represent, we believe this approach is similarly applicable to other Western democracies with homogeneous populations as long as flexible, qualitative measures are employed.…”

Research on the governance of campus bullying and prevention mechanism of students' mental health problem

“…As the first school in a person's life, family, to a certain extent, bears the heavy responsibility. Hence, parents have become the first teacher in people's life (Haines‐Saah et al, 2018; Urso et al, 2021). The disharmony of family education is bound to be the root cause of campus bullying.…”

Bullies, victims, and meanies: the role of child and classmate social and emotional competencies

“…Being socially disadvantaged can also make children the object of discrimination in a culture that constructs social hierarchies based on wealth (Hosang & Bhui, 2018;Kingston & Webster, 2015). However, in an Irish national study no associations were found between parental economic wealth and the prevalence of victimisation in adolescence (D'Urso et al, 2020). Unexpectedly, attending lower income schools had a small negative impact on victimisation which was interpreted by the authors as demonstrating solidarity and close peer ties in those communities (D'Urso et al, 2020).…”

“…However, in an Irish national study no associations were found between parental economic wealth and the prevalence of victimisation in adolescence (D'Urso et al, 2020). Unexpectedly, attending lower income schools had a small negative impact on victimisation which was interpreted by the authors as demonstrating solidarity and close peer ties in those communities (D'Urso et al, 2020). Possibly, other types of disadvantages (e.g., lack of care from parents, being a member of a minority group) might be more important for bullying and victimisation than family economic wealth.…”

“…However, there is some evidence that this gender difference declines throughout childhood (Smith et al, 2019). Studies conducted in the Irish school context have highlighted how being male is a risk factor for bullying (Minton, 2014), but not for being victimised (D'Urso et al, 2020). In another Irish study, Cook and colleagues (2010) observed an association between being male and being a bully, a victim, and a bully-victim; although the gender difference in victimisation was small.…”