BULLIES Definition
Bullying 1 is an act of repeated aggressive behavior in order to intentionally hurt another person, physically or mentally. Bullying 1 is characterized by an individual behaving in a certain way to gain power over another person (Besag, 1989). Behaviors may include name calling, verbal or written abuse, exclusion from activities, exclusion from social situations, physical abuse, or coercion (Carey, 2003; Whitted & Dupper, 2005). Bullies may behave this way to be perceived as popular or tough or to get attention. They may bully out of jealousy or be acting out because they themselves are bullied (Crothers & Levinson, 2004).
USA National Center for Education Statistics suggests that bullying can be broken into two categories: Direct bullying, and indirect bullying which is also known as social aggression.[1]
Ross states that direct bullying involves a great deal of physical aggression 1 such as shoving and poking, throwing things, slapping, choking, punching and kicking, beating, stabbing, pulling hair, scratching, biting, scraping and pinching.[8]
He also suggests that social aggression or indirect bullying is characterized by threatening the victim into social isolation 0. This isolation is achieved through a wide variety of techniques, including spreading gossip, refusing to socialize with the victim, bullying other people who wish to socialize with the victim, and criticizing the victim’s manner of dress and other socially-significant markers (including the victim’s race, religion, disability, etc). Ross (1998)[8] outlines other forms of indirect bullying which are more subtle and more likely to be verbal, such as name calling, the silent treatment, arguing others into submission, manipulation, gossip/ false gossip, lies, rumors/ false rumors, staring, giggling, laughing at the victim, saying certain words that trigger a reaction from a past event, and mocking. Children’s charity Act Against Bullying was set up in 2003 to help children who were victims of this type of bullying by researching and publishing coping skills.
ScienceDaily (Nov. 7, 2008) — Unusually aggressive youth may actually enjoy inflicting pain on others, research using brain scans at the University of Chicago shows.
Scans of the aggressive youth’s brains showed that an area that is associated with rewards was highlighted when the youth watched a video clip of someone inflicting pain on another person. Youth without the unusually aggressive behavior did not have that response, the study showed.
“This is the first time that fMRI scans have been used to study situations that could otherwise provoke empathy,” said Jean Decety, Professor in Psychology and Psychiatry at the University of Chicago. “This work will help us better understand ways to work with juveniles inclined to aggression and violence.”
Decety is an internationally recognized expert on empathy and social neuroscience. The new research shows that some aggressive youths’ natural empathetic impulse may be disrupted in ways that increase aggression.
In the study, researchers compared eight 16- to 18-year-old boys with aggressive conduct disorder to a control group of adolescent boys with no unusual signs of aggression. The boys with the conduct disorder had exhibited disruptive behavior such as starting a fight, using a weapon and stealing after confronting a victim.
The youth were tested with fMRI while looking at video clips in which people endured pain accidentally, such as when a heavy bowl was dropped on their hands, and intentionally, such as when a person stepped on another’s foot.
“The aggressive youth activated the neural circuits underpinning pain processing to the same extent, and in some cases, even more so than the control participants without conduct disorder,” Decety said.
“Aggressive adolescents showed a specific and very strong activation of the amygdala and ventral striatum (an area that responds to feeling rewarded) when watching pain inflicted on others, which suggested that they enjoyed watching pain,” he said. Unlike the control group, the youth with conduct disorder did not activate the area of the brain involved in self-regulation (the medial prefrontal cortex and the temporoparietal junction).
The control group acted similarly to youth in a study released earlier this year, in which Decety and his colleagues used fMRI scans to show 7- to 12-year-olds are naturally empathetic toward people in pain.
The scans showed that when the children saw animations of someone hurt accidentally, the same portion of the brain that registered pain when they are hurt also was highlighted upon seeing someone else hurt. When they saw someone intentionally hurt, the portion of the brain associated with understanding social interaction and moral reasoning was highlighted.
The National Science Foundation supported the work.
When youth with aggressive conduct disorder watch an individual intentionally hurting another (like closing a piano lead), regions of the brain that process painful information are activated, as well as the amygdala and ventral striatum (part of the neural circuit involved in reward processing. These adolescents seem to enjoy seeing people in pain. (Credit: Photo by Jean Decety, University of Chicago)
Reference
* Passive-aggressive behavior 0
* Cyber-bullying 0
* Emotional detachment
* Narcissistic personality disorder
Journal reference:
1. Benjamin Lahey, Kalina Michaslska and Yuko Akitsuki. Atypical Empathetic Responses in Adolescents with Aggressive Conduct Disorder: A functional MRI Investigation. Biological Psychology, (in press)
Adapted from materials provided by University of Chicago.