Abstract

Background: Bullying is a extensive marvel could happen at everywhere. Bullying establish a complex problem in school kids lives. It is a problem that distresses all students, either bullies or victims, and those who joined interpersonal violence. Aim: Assessment the effects of bullying on self-esteem of preparatory school students among rural area in El sinbellawein city. Design: A descriptive cross sectional design was carrying out. Setting: This study was conducted at Abd Ellatif Osman preparatory School, Elsinbellawein city. Subjects: A purposeful sample of 192 children exposed to bullying were recruited for this study. Tools: three tools were used in this study: Socio demographic data sheet, bullying victim scale, and self-esteem Scale. The study finding showed that the a statistically significant negative correlation between studied students' total bullying score and self- esteem score. the prevalence of bullying among study sample lived with married parents and in low socioeconomic status conditioning and more in males than females students. Conclusion: negative correlation between studied students' total bullying score and self- esteem score. Recommendation: Educational program for parents of children and their teachers to decrease aggressive and bullying behavior among students in schools.

1. Introduction

¹ hypothesizes bullying in schools as undesirable, recurrent actions dedicated by at least one student in contradiction of other students. These activities might be either verbal or physical in nature or may likewise include indirect activities like controlling friendships or excepting other students purposively from various activities. As denoted to by ², the British lawful definition, bullying is long-standing violence, physical or mental, led by an individual or group and coordinated against a person, who can't protection himself in the actual situation, with a knowing wish to offended, weaken or disconcert that person. Bullying is unnamed occurs at either school time or outside and exposing millions people without regaring to geographical barriers. Technology as communication led to increase in cyber bullying and could done by posting negative massage or pictures against other party ³.

Bullying performances among school children signify a problematic worldwide not only due to their increased prevalence but also because of their bad short- and long-term consequences knowledgeable by those unswervingly complicated. Bullying or peer victimization is defined as a special form of aggressive with an inequity of authority, whereby a more influential student frequently and deliberately causes injury to a feebler pupil. Two hundred million children and youth were victimized by peers. More than one out of every three/five students (20-29%) are elaborated in bullying at least once per year. 23 % of public schools reported that bullying occurred among students on a daily or weekly basis.

In Egypt, according to National Center for Social and Criminal Research, 69% of students reported being bullied or experiencing aggression from other students. Also in a more recent Egyptian statistics 70 % of children were ages (13-15 years) had bullied. high precentage does not mean children in Egypt are hostile ⁴. Bullying tends to increase in basic years, early adolescent middle school years, and reduced during later adolescent high school years ⁵. About 15% of Swedish school children were involved victims or bullies, greater number are involved if assistants to bully or defenders of victim are included. High prevalence of bullying increasing in somatic complaints, depression, anxiety, school refusal in child had bullied ⁶.

Precisely, victims of bullying are additional vulnerable to psychological complaints and unfortunate school performance, however bullies are more probable to account externalizing difficulties ⁷. Few crucial factors are poor self-discipline, low self-esteem, psychological trouble and family interruption ⁸.

Students could had less willing to report social bullying than other forms behavior and might perceive the certain types of social bullying as social exclusion ⁹. Chronic exclusion impacts children’s classroom bullying participation and causes students to become increasingly disengaged from classroom activities. ¹⁰. Conventional wisdom, result of maladaptive development, social learning, and psychological disturbances ¹¹.

Self-esteem is obviously important to everyone in different ways, self-esteem is a person’s general personal perception of his or her own worth. One of the effects of bullying on the child's self-esteem is refusal or self-criticism. Children who are constantly belittled about something eventually come to believe that it's true. Second effect is confidence loss. Bullied children had feeling they were not decent at something, and failing in every work. Separation could relate to psychological issues such anxiety and depression ¹². According to Freire, Tavares, 2011, found the estimation if relations are based on violence, they would be associated with low self-esteem of those involved.

Bullying is negatively affect one’s physical, social, and emotional well-being. Precisely, victims of bullying are additional vulnerable to psychological complaints and unfortunate school performance, however bullies are more probable to account externalizing difficulties ¹³. Crucial factors are poor self-discipline, low self-esteem, psychological trouble and family interruption ⁸.

Families play important roles in bullying prevention as awareness or social marketing campaigns which encourage all youth and adults such as doctors, police officers, and storekeepers to intervene as soon as they realize bullying and to become actively involved in school and community based prevention activities, Also, the family should understand how to behave with their children and controlling their bullying. ¹⁴

School bullying is an issue behavior among adolescents. It was also found to impact school results, pro-social skills, and the psychological well-being of both bullies and their victims ¹⁵. Peers become particularly important sources of bullying behavior throughout preparatory school ¹⁶. Bullied Children were evaluation assessment of the possible emotional wellbeing and social consequence. Referral to community-based mental health services might needed; school-based clinical staff (e.g., school psychologists) could be well positioned to provide supports bullying child ³. Good behavior game given an effective at addressing a wide range of behavioral problems and mental health concerns and improving academic performance in both the short and long term ¹⁷. Unstructured time also is very important context for increasing supervision ¹⁸.

Assessment of impact school bullying on students' self-esteem in preparatory school

1-What is the percentage level of school bullying in students at preparatory school?

2- Is there a relation between school bullying level and self-esteem level among students at preparatory school?

3- What are the common predectors of school bullying level and self-esteem level among students at preparatory school?

2. Subjects and Methods

A descriptive cross-sectional design in study to achieve its aim.

The study was conducted in Abd Ellatif Osman preparatory school at Elsinbellwein city in Dakahlia Governerate. Their capacity is 200 students.

The participating students (n = 192) were second and third preparatory enrolled in one of the two classrooms with a total enrollment of 200 students. Was selected from the previously mentioned settings. The Sample size was calculated according to following parameters: prevalence of bullying of 30% ¹⁹. 14,600 students; 50 school in rural area ²⁰. The inclusion criteria were at age 12 to 15 years & both sexes. The exclusion criteria were free from any physical disease & psychiatric disease.

Tool (I): Socio demographic data and personnel characteristics of children was developed by the researcher such as age, gender, socioeconomic status, and parent marital status.

Tool (II): the bullying victims scale ²¹ was developed to measure bullying victims. The tool consisted of 28 phrases divided between four types of bullying: physical bullying, verbal bullying, racial bullying and sexual bullying.The response choices used as 4-point likert scale from No (1), low(2), moderate(3) and sever(4).

Total score it was divided into:

Bullying mean score 1—1.74 (no bullying)

Bullying mean score 1.75—2.49 (low bullying)

Bullying mean score 2.5—3.24 (moderate bullying)

Bullying mean score 3.25—4 (high bullying).

Tool (III): The self-esteem scale: this tool was developed by )Rozinburg, 1965) to measure self-esteem of the children. lt is composed of 10 statements. The response options used 4-point likert scale ranged from very agree, agree, not agree and very not agree.

Self-esteem score: <15 low self-esteem

15-25 average self –esteem

>25 high self esteem.

Tools were translated into Arabic language using the translation and back translation technique to ensure their original validity.

Validity of these tools (tool II-III) were tested for their content by a jury of five experts from academic staff at the faculty of nursing, Zagazig university (psychiatric and mental health nursing), who revised the tools for clarity, applicability, relevance, comprehensiveness, understanding and ease for implementation. Their recommendations and suggestions were taken into consideration.

Reliability of these tools (tool II-III) were tested by Cronbach’s alpha test in SPSS V.20. They show good level of reliability as follow: Bullying score (α =0.959), Self- esteem score (α = 0.95).

Before performing the main study, a pilot study was conducted on 10 % (19 children) of total sample to evaluate the clarity and relevance of the tools, as well as to estimate the needed time for data collection. The researchers asked participants to fill in the questionnaires and to note any questions that were unclear or difficult to answer. No changes were required on the tools. These children were included in the main study sample.

After securing official permissions, the researchers met with the school directors, explained to them the aim of the study and its procedures, and asked for their permission and cooperation for data collection. Then, they met with the children individually, an informed consent was also obtained. Children answered the questionnaires after explanation or reading to them. Questionnaires were answered anonymously and took about 20-30 minutes to be completed. The number of children interviewed per day ranged from 4 children (3 days per week). Data collection took about four months to be completed from the beginning of September to the end of December 2017.

The researchers obtained an official permission by submitting an official letter from the faculty of nursing to the director of the selected school to get his permission for data collection. Students voluntary participation was confirmed. Clear description on how to complete the questionnaires was given. Confidentiality of the collected information was confirmed that it would be used only for the purpose of the scientific research. Participants were informed that they have the right to withdraw from sharing in the study at whatever time without feeling any negative concerns.

Analyzed data using SPSS 20.0. Quantitative data expressed as M ± SD & (range), and qualitative data as absolute frequencies (n) & relative frequencies (%). Categorical variables comparing by Chi-square. Pearson's correlation coefficient for assess relationship between variables factors, (+)direct correlation & (-) inverse correlation, values near to 1 indicate strong correlation & values near 0 indicate weak correlation, P ≥ 0.05.

3. Results

Table 1 shows mean age of studied students was 13.19 years with range 12-15 years old, 39.6% of them males and 60.4% were females and 59.4% of study sample under age 14 years,. Regarding Parent marital status, 75.0% have married parent and the rest quarter (25%) of student divided between divorced and widowed parent equally by (12% &12%) respectively. The majority of the study sample have low socioeconomic status (48.4%).

Figure 1 mentioned levels of bullying types of studied student, concerning physical bullying, one third (33.3%) of student have low physical bullying and 7.8% have moderate physical bullying. Low verbal bullying was recorded among 26.6% of student while moderate verbal bullying were 19.3% of students. Less than one third (26.6%) of student had low racial bullying and 14.60% of student had moderate racial bullying. Low sexual bullying were recorded among 13% of student and moderate sexual bullying were 5.70% of total student.

Figure 2 demonstrated that 63.5% of student not exposed to bullying at all and 36.5% of them exposed to bullying divided between mild and moderate bullying and 35.4% of students had low self-esteem and 4.7% of them had high self-esteem.

Table 2: Regarding age of students, 58.33% of study sample with 14 years not exposed to physical bullying, 35.09% of student less than 14 years have low physical bulling while only 5.56% of study sample of 15 years have moderate physical bulling. Concerning Age; 60.53% of male student have low physical bulling and 15.52% of female have low physical bulling. With high statistically significant difference between male students and physical bullying. About parent marital status, 66.67% of student of divorced parent have no physical bullying and 5.56% of student lived with their married parent have moderate physical bullying. A regard socioeconomic status; 78.95% of study sample live in high socioeconomic level have no physical bullying and 7.53% of study sample with low socioeconomic level have moderate physical bullying.

Table 3 shows that more than half 66.67% of 15 years old student not exposed to verbal bullying, 16.67% of them exposed to low verbal bullying and the same percentage exposed to moderate verbal bullying. 44.74% of male students exposed to low verbal bullying , and 35.53% has moderate bullying 14.66% of female students exposed to and 14.66% and 8.62% respectively ,the difference statistically significant (p=0.0001) between male students and verbal bullying. 58.33% of students belonged to widowed family had not exposed to verbal bullying and 41.44% of them exposed to verbal bullying divided between low and moderate. Concerning socioeconomic status, 73.68% of study sample live in high socioeconomic level have no physical bullying and 16.25% of study sample with low socioeconomic level have moderate physical bullying.

Table 4 presents the relationship between Socio- demographic characteristics of studied students and their Racial bullying level. It is evident that 30.00% of the study sample at 14 years old, 43.42% of male student, 37.5% of divorced parental marital status and 30.11% of low socioeconomic status are exposed to low racial bullying. While 72.22% of the study sample have 15 years old, 78.45% of female student, 66.67% of widowed parental marital status and 78.956% of high socioeconomic status are not exposed to racial bullying

Table 5 show relation between Socio- demographic characteristics of studied students and their sexual bullying level. As regard Age of the study sample, 82.46% of student under 14 years old, not exposed to sexual bullying, also 88.89% of student at 15 years, not exposed to sexual bullying. Also, 89.66% of female students, 83.33% of student lived with widowed marital status situation, 89.47% of high socioeconomic status was not have sexual bullying.

Table 6 Concerning Age of the student sample, 62.28% of students under 14 years not exposed to bullying, 32.46% of them exposed to low bullying but 5.26% of them have moderate bullying. Regarding sex, more than half of the male student (59.21%) exposed to low bullying with P value 0.0001, otherwise 12.07% of female student expose low bullying. As regard parent marital status, 62.5% of married parent student not exposed to bullying and 4.86% of them exposed to moderate bullying. 25% of divorced parent student exposed to low bulling and 12.5% of them exposed to moderate bullying. 78.95% of high self-esteem students was not exposed to any bulling and 5% only of middle self-esteem students exposed to bullying.

Table 7 demonstrated relationship between Socio- demographic characteristics of studied students and their self-esteem Level. Regarding age of the student, 60.53% of the study sample less than 14 years old have average self-esteem, and 34.21% of them have low self-esteem. Concerning sex of the study sample, 58.62% of female student have average self-esteem. Also, 61.84% of male students have average self-esteem. As regard parent marital status, 76.32% of married parent students have average self-esteem, and 76.32% of divorced parent student have average self-esteem. Considering socioeconomic status, 62.5% of middle socioeconomic status student have average self-esteem, 5.00 % of middle socioeconomic status students have high self-esteem.

Table 8 shows relationship between types of bullying and self-esteem. Low physical bullying was recorded among 64.06% of students having average self-esteem, while 7.96% of students have no physical bullying and high self-esteem. Concerning verbal bullying, slightly less than three quarter of study sample (70.27%) have moderate verbal bullying and average self-esteem. Nearly two third of the study sample (64.71%) had low racial bullying and average self-esteem. Moderate Sexual bullying were recorded among 63.64% of student have average self-esteem. Regarding total bullying, 7.38% of students have no bullying and high self-esteem, 72.73% have moderate bullying and average self-esteem.

Table 9 demonstrates a statistically significant negative correlation between studied students' total bullying score and self-esteem score. Meaning that increase bullying score associated with decrease self -esteem score p<0.05.

4. Discussion

Bullying, as a form of violence in schools is a worldwide general healthcare challenge and there is proof that it is occurring on in many areas of the world. School bullying is a global disaster with many countries experiencing more bullying and school violence than others depending on facilitating factors. school violence and bullying, over than one billion children are in school going age. The research found out that physical, psychological and sexual violence and bullying are prevalent nationwide in schools across the world. The school bullying may be carried out either by students, teachers or non-teaching staff working in the school. Globally, girls are prone to likely to experience sexual bullying while boys, on the other side, get more bullied physically. Statistics indicated that children from minority cultures, ethnic groups, poor families, refugees or newcomers are more likely to be bullied as compared to their counterparts. Bullying in school can take place in numerous location such as; washrooms play fields, in classes, to and from school and changing rooms among other isolated locations throughout the school setting ²².

The current study results revealed that student's mean age was 13.19± 0.98 years the greatest percentage of students were females and the lowest percentage of them were males. This result was supported by ²³ in their study in their study effect of self-esteem on the relationship between Depression and bullying among Teenagers in Malaysia who stated that females study sample were more than males. This result was in agreement with of ²⁴ about "Adolescents' perception of bullying who is the victim? who is the bully? what can be done to stop bullying?. Adolescent “which revealed that females’ students were more than males. this indicated that female was more than male in the preparatory school.

According to the present study findings, the most common children exposed to bullying who lived with their married parent. This occurrence could be due to in the following: the parents may be aggressive in the treating with their children on any and simple things and punished the children excessively, on the other hand, the parent may be spoiled, neglect nurturing their children and leaves their children make what they want to do without any sergeant or revision to their wrong behaviors and correct it. It was incongruent with ²⁴ in his study” Bullying behaviors and attachment styles. Electronic Theses & Dissertations “who stated that divorce is most common contributor of child bullying in schools and in this case many children from broken homes are likely to bully others. Many parents never take children into consideration when separating to the extent that they never explain anything to their children. With piled up emotions, anger and guilt, the children are likely to take out their anger on other students in their school. The stronger characters will bully while the weaker characters from a broken home might seek refuge in people who will bully them due to their emotional weakness.

Similarly, the study made by ²⁵ found that bullying was present more common among students lived with widowed parent this was indicated that orphans taken in by relatives or well-wishers after their parent’s death also experience school bullying to a greater extent. Some of the people who take these young ones in treat them badly. These children suffer either as bullies or victims with most of them being victims due to broken self-esteem and confidence.

Similarly, ²⁶ supported the above two contradicted results in his study” Holding parents responsible for their child's bullying.” indicated that children coming from single parent family weather divorced or widowed were more likely to be bullying victims, this occurs due to children from single parents develop low self-esteem especially when they are challenged by children with both parents, the esteem issues the defenselessness make them victims of school bullying. Moreover, ²⁷ stated that, Unfavorable families status as living with single parent, violence, and physical punishment are related to school bullying.

Concerning socioeconomic status, the current study revealed that the majority of the study sample exposed to bullying who lived in low socioeconomic status but the minority who lived in high socioeconomic status. This finding could be due to whereby low socioeconomic status itself is a cause for bullying victimization.

In accordance with the previous finding, ²⁸ in their study about Socioeconomic status and bullying: A meta- analysis” who stated that Victimization of bullying was positively related to low socioeconomic status, and negatively associated with high socioeconomic status. Bully-victim status was related to low, but not to high socioeconomic status. However, ²⁹ in their study “Prevalence of bullying and victimization among children in early elementary school: Do family and school neighborhood socioeconomic status matter?” in the same point added that children from low social economic classes are highly likely to be victims of bullying.

Regarding the prevalence of the most common type of bullying, The current study result mentioned that the most common type of bullying the student exposed at that study sample was verbal bullying. These finding may be attributed to the fact that the students in the school at this age afraid of punishment from teachers so that disappear the aggressive behavior toward their peers by verbal bullying because it is not seen by their teachers and easy denied it if they confronted with wrong behavior. This in agreement with study made by ³⁰ Bullying: prevalence, implications and gender differences “who stated that the type of bullying most frequently used at this stage of life was verbal type, especially name-calling and spreading rumors. On the same line ³¹ in their study “Prevalence and characteristics of school age bullying victims” said that Cruel, derogatory nicknames may explain increase the prevalence of verbal bullying more than other types. This result was supported by ³² in his study types of bullying in the senior high schools in Ghana” who reported that verbal bullying seen as the most common types of bullying used by both boys and girls.

According to gender relation to bullying behavior totally. The present study revealed that boys outnumber girls in all types of bullying behaviors and the greatest percentage of students exposed to bullying were males than females. The explanation of this finding was male students were more prone to be bullies and bully-victims. On the same line, ³³ in their study about " The involvement of girls and boys with bullying found boys are always coined with the term “playful, impulsive, and aggressive”, which lead them more likely to be bullies compared to females.

These result in agreement with ²⁷ about studying “Predictors of bullying and victimization in childhood and adolescence: a meta-analytic investigation”. Who stated that Male students in were more prone to be bullies and bully-victims than female students. This is congruent with ³⁴ in their study about “Bullying-victimization problems and aggressive tendencies in Spanish secondary school students: The role of gender stereotypical traits. “found that Boys are victims more often in all types of bullying than girls.

Nevertheless, this results disagreed with, ³⁰ in their study about "Bullying: prevalence, implications and gender difference” found that both boys and girls were exposed to bullying equally. Also this result matched with what found by ³⁵ in study about “Developmental trajectories of victimization: Identifying risk and protective factors.” who stated that boys was exposed to bullying equal as girls.

On contrast, ³⁶ in their study about “Why do young adolescents bully? Experience in Malaysian schools. Comprehensive Psychiatry, emphasized that gender-based bullying was also found. On the other hand ³⁷ in their study “A psychosocial profile of adolescent offenders and victims in school: An analysis of gender differences “physical aggression and insults can be considered a more evident profile for boys. but more indirect(verbal and racial) forms of aggression seem to be more frequent among girls.

Regarding the prevalence of bullying, the present study revealed that prevalence bullying among study sample was slightly less than half of the students. In my opinion, the cause was due to increase crime and aggressive behavior in the community without any punishment, mentioned this aggressive roles in social media and imitation of the children and adolescents to that destructive behavior related to increase opening to internet and technology. This was the same percentage found by ³¹ in their study about“. Prevalence and characteristics of school age bullying victims.

The current study mentioned that exposure of the students to bulling experience decreased with increase age of the study sample. This finding demonstrated that with increase age, increase the child ability to understand situations and be able to defend about themselves from other children or other persons. This result was in agreement with ³⁸ in his study about” An analysis of gender differences in bullying among the mid-school youth using the 4-Factor Personal Experience Checklist (PECK)” confirmed that as the child growth older, the engagement to bullying and the experience of victimization decrease.Similar findings have also been reached with another study of ³⁹ about "Adolescents' perception of bullying who is the victim? who is the bully? what can be done to stop bullying?. Adolescent “who found that bullying is more prevalent among students ranging from 11 to 13 years old, while prevalence from later childhood is reported comparatively rarely.

As regard physical bullying, the current study finding that the majority of the study sample exposed to physical bullying were less than fourteen years old, and the minority were at fifteen years old. This result congruent with ⁴⁰ in their study” Bullying in adolescence: Psychiatric problems in victims and bullies as measured by the youth self-report and the depression self-rating scale “who stated that physical bullying declines with age

The present study demonstrates there was a statistically significant negative correlation between studied students' total bullying score and self- esteem score. Meaning that increase bullying score associated with decrease self-esteem score. This supported with ⁴¹ Findings in their study” The Interplay between Bullying, Self-Esteem, and Empathy in a Sample of Albanian 12 - 16 Year Old Adolescents “showed that There was negative correlation between self - esteem and victimization of bullying. Similarly, ⁴² found that victims of bullying exhibit statistically lower levels of self-esteem than the remaining students. The study contradicted with, ⁴³ in their study “ Cyber victimization and adolescent self-esteem: The role of communication with parents. “reported that statistically significant positive correlation between studied students' total bullying score and self- esteem score by meaning that increase bullying score associated with increase self-esteem score. ^{44, 45}

The study here mentioned that there were statistically significant difference between bullying behavior and the gender of study sample. The study contrast with, ³⁰ in their study about "Bullying: prevalence, implications and gender differences." in the same point added that there was no difference was found regarding bullying victimization in relation to gender. Additionally, In the study by ²³ The involvement of girls and boys with bullying: An analysis of gender differences. International Journal of Environmental Research of Public Health,” there was no statistical significance between gender and being a victim or bullying.

The current study demonstrated that there were no statistically significant difference between self-esteem and gender of the study sample. In congruent with study by ²³ in their study in their study Effect of self-esteem on the relationship between Depression and bullying among Teenagers in Malaysia” who suggested there were no statistically significant difference between self-esteem and gender among teenagers.

5. Conclusion

It was concluded that, there were statistically significant relation between physical, verbal, racial, sexual bullying and gender. The most common type of bullying occurred during preparatory school was verbal bullying. Male more exposed to bullying than females. Decrease self-esteem of the students with increase bullying. Decrease bullying victims with increase age.

6. Recommendation

The anti-bullying program that suggest providing controlled exercise sessions to enable children to positively channel their negative tendencies and develop their self-estem in an atmosphere of pleasant competition. Furthermore, class and racial disparities will be taken into consideration in designing anti bullying strategies, since the bullying trends were due to discrepancies in identity and ethics.

References