Copyright Malvin Porter, Jr. 2010 - acumen - The University of ...

Other research suggests that children who receive adult support are better able to cope
with bullying. Conners-Burrow and colleagues (2009) found that support from parents and
teachers buffers the level of depression for four groups of children involved in bullying (victim,
bully, bully/victims, or not involved children). Children who were not involved in bullying
reported less depression and more social support than children involved in bullying.
Bully/victims were the most at-risk group. For all groups except victims, when parental support
was low, support from teachers was associated with fewer symptoms of depression. Flashpohler
and colleagues (2009) found that peer and teacher support might mitigate the impact of bullying
on the quality of life of victims. These studies support the value of promoting social support
from parents, peers and teachers in bullying prevention programs and school climate initiatives.
These results further highlight the positive contributions of bystanders in support of school-wide
bullying prevention/school climate strategies.
Other research has found that effective educational interventions teach children to
enhance cognitive and social performance by understanding others’ perspectives, which can be
correlated with their social adjustment (Rubin, Provenzano, & Luria, 1974). It is argued that
developing the ability to understand reciprocal perspective-taking skills are related to the
development of conventional moral thought (Selman, 1971). Social perspective-taking of
aggressive children has been found to be lower than that of more socially competent peers
(Chandler, 1973). Perspective taking can be viewed in terms of empathy, which has been related
to both altruistic and antisocial behavior (Marcus, 1980). Empathic children identify with the
distress of another person, while sympathetic children can accurately read another’s distress
without being emotionally overwhelmed with the pain of the other (Eisenberg & Fabes, 1990).
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