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Omobolanle Adebisi

English 101 MX

Fall 2021

Bullying and Suicide Among Teenagers

In public health, a trend has existed that has affected children worldwide. Bullying is a rampant phenomenon, and over the years, it has evolved to involve a variety of acts meant to inflict pain or torment on someone. Victims and perpetrators of bullying have been associated with behavioral, emotional, and social problems, with suicide emerging as the act many turn to after being bullied. Suicide is the third largest cause of mortality among children and adolescents in the United States and worldwide, with bullying being the main reason many resorts to suicide. According to Kim and Bennett (133), bullying is hostile conduct by those in a dominating position against others to cause mental, physical, or both types of pain. This behavior is prevalent at every level of childhood and adolescence, leading to anxiety, loneliness, isolation, and unhappiness in school and life, which may lead to suicide unless dealt with early in advance. There have been efforts to help to stop bullying in schools, with many schools and institutions instituting zero-tolerance policies on bullying. However, bullying is still prevalent in schools, and with the advancement of technology, bullying has now moved online, a phenomenon defined as cyberbullying. The analysis of examples of bullying, reasons why bullying is common among teenagers, the effects of bullying, and the steps that can be taken to stop bullying will be discussed.

Examples of Bullying

Among teenagers, bullying exists in many forms. Bullying can be categorized into six forms. The first form is physical bullying, a type of bullying where the aggressor does acts meant to inflict physical pain on the victim. This includes punching, kicking, slapping, and shoving. Physical bullying is rampant around the world and is the most seen in schools. The second form is verbal bullying, where the aggressors use statements, name-calling, and words to exercise power over their victims. This includes being mean with their words and using insults to exercise control over their victims. Verbal bullying is usually very hard to detect because it happens in the absence of adults. When victims report it, incidents are not taken seriously, with victims told to "ignore it" (Wolke & Suzet, 881).

The third form of bullying among teenagers is relational aggression, where the aggressors try to hurt the victim by hurting their social standing by using rumors, manipulations, and breaches of confidence. Basically, what happens is that a group uses the tools mentioned to cause a social rift between the society and the victim, leading to isolation and exclusion of the victim. This phenomenon is very common but not limited to teenage girls. The fourth form of bullying is cyberbullying, which is very common among teenagers. With access to the internet and a device such as a smartphone, the aggressor can insult, threaten and even use embarrassing photographs to embarrass the victim further. Due to the eternal nature of the content on the internet and the anonymity on the internet, many victims feel helpless after being cyberbullied (Wolke & Suzet, 881).

Sexual bullying is another form of bullying, where the perpetrator performs harmful and humiliating actions targeting a person sexually. This may include spanking, sexual name-calling, crude comments about a person's sexuality, and uninvited touching. Sexual bullying may open the door to sexual assault. Prejudicial bullying is the sixth type of bullying, in which someone is bullied because of their ethnicity, religion, or sexual orientation. This may encompass all other forms of bullying, but the target here is based on the bias of the aggressor towards the victim. Minorities and teenagers in the LGBTQ community are usually victims of this form of bullying (Wolke & Suzet, 881).

Why Bullying and Suicide are Prominent Among Teenagers

As earlier stated, suicide is a significant cause of mortality among teenagers, with the major cause of suicide arising from bullying. It is essential to understand why bullying is pervasive in schools. The first thing that needs to be understood is that the dynamics surrounding bullying are very complex. The primary cause of bullying is the cycle of bullying that happens in schools, where children who were bullied at one time become the aggressors.

Research by Jansen et al. (5) also associated families' socioeconomic backgrounds as influencing bullying among teenagers. Factors such as parental educational level may affect bullying. According to Jansen et al., children of low-educated parents watch far more television than children of high-educated parents. They are thus exposed to far more violence from television shows. Another factor that Jansen et al. identified is single parenthood, where parents do not have enough time for their children, impacting the child's form of interactions. The study also determined that children who came from families where the providers were unemployed were more likely to engage in bullying than children who were provided for fully. The research by Jansen et al. tried to identify the deep-rooted causes of bullying.

Effects of Bullying

Suicide has emerged as the main effect of bullying. The high number of suicides among those who have been bullied shows the correlation of bullying on teenagers’ lives. However, there are other effects associated with bullying. Children aged 6 to 17 years are at a higher risk of somatic disorders such as colds or psychosomatic difficulties like headaches and sleeping problems, according to Wolke and Suzet (879), and are also more prone to start smoking. The research also determined that victims are more likely to develop anxiety and depression disorders. Bullies also face adverse effects, as they are strongly associated with delinquent behavior and may have a poor adjustment to society, such as difficulty making and keeping friends. Bullies were also likely to have a hard time in adulthood due to the difficulty in interaction, eventually turning to drugs and substance abuse.

Wolke and Suzet (882) show that bullying affects both the aggressor and the victim, and in the long term, even after the teenagers have grown, they will still feel the effects of bullying. Some of these effects, such as anxiety, depression, and drug and substance abuse, may last till adulthood, and this reasons enough for seeking a solution to end bullying in school.

Stopping Bullying among Teenagers

Everyone in the society has a role to play to prevent bullying. The first step should be to inform teenagers about bullying and what acts constitute bullying. Many students may be aware of bullying but unaware that some of the actions they are taking part in are actually instances of bullying. Information that teenagers should also be mindful of is that bullying is not harmless and that there are long-term effects of bullying. Another action that can help stop bullying is taking every case of bullying seriously and punishing the aggressor. In many cases, the only bullies who are punished are physical abusers, but in cases where the other forms of bullying are reported, they are rarely taken seriously. In many cases, the victim is blamed, and more torment follows, which is why these cases are seldom reported. There must be ways to protect the victim while the aggressor receives punishment and the sources of their bullying tendencies.

As research from Jansen et al. determined, socioeconomic factors contribute to bullying; therefore, part of fixing the bullying problem is dealing with these socioeconomic problems. Programs that can help reduce the society, such as civil education programs and poverty elimination problems, may also help reduce cases of bullying.

Works Cited

Jansen, Pauline W., et al. "Prevalence of bullying and victimization among children in early elementary school: Do family and school neighborhood socioeconomic status matter?" BMC public health 12.1 (2012): 1-10.

Kim, Young Shin, and Bennett Leventhal. "Bullying and suicide. A review." International journal of adolescent medicine and health 20.2 (2008): 133-154.

Wolke, Dieter, and Suzet Tanya Lereya. "Long-term effects of bullying." Archives of disease in childhood 100.9 (2015): 879-885.