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Anti-bullying initiatives have become standard at schools
across the country, but a new UT Arlington study finds that students attending
those schools may be more likely to be a victim of bullying than children at
schools without such programs.
The findings run counter to the common perception that
bullying prevention programs can help protect kids from repeated harassment or
physical and emotional attacks.
“One possible reason for this is that the students who are
victimizing their peers have learned the language from these anti-bullying
campaigns and programs,” said Seokjin Jeong, an assistant professor of criminology
and criminal justice at UT Arlington and lead author of the study, which was
published in the Journal of Criminology.