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HOW SUCCESSFUL ARE ANTI-BULLYING PROGRAMS
FOR SCHOOLS?
Ken Rigby
University of South Australia
Paper presented at the
The Role of Schools in Crime Prevention Conference
convened by the Australian Institute of Criminology in conjunction with
the Department of Education, Employment and Training, Victoria, and Crime
Prevention Victoria and held in Melbourne, 30 September – 1 October 2002
Over the last ten years there has been a considerable growth in community concern about bullying
in schools. Numerous schools in Australia and overseas have developed and implemented anti-
bullying programs. There has, however, been relatively little attention paid to evaluating their
success.
One approach to examining whether schools have been successful in their efforts to reduce bullying
has been to compare recent results from social surveys of students with survey results from several
years ago.
It has been claimed that the comparisons show no change in the incidence of reported bullying.
This is, however, a seriously flawed approach. There has, without doubt, been a large increase in
awareness of bullying. Some years ago many more people thought of bullying as exclusively
physical in nature. Now it is widely recognised that most bullying is verbal, and a good deal of
bullying is indirect, as in deliberately excluding people. People see bullying now where they did not
see it earlier.
It is also the case that comparing survey results on bullying is generally futile, as surveys in this
area typically ask different questions and provide non-comparable answers.
So to answer the question about whether anti-bullying programs are successful we must examine
carefully designed experimental studies in which the incidence of bullying has been reliably
measured before and after a program has been implemented. A limited number of such studies have
been done. Last year I was asked by the Commonwealth Attorney General’s Department to identify
and evaluate such studies. (Rigby, 2002).
Copies of the report can be accessed through the web (see reference) You can also phone a free
number 1800 703 777 to order a hard copy.
I was able to find a number of studies conducted between 1985 and 2001which shed some light on
the effectiveness of anti-bullying programs in reducing bullying among children between the ages
of 5 and 12 years.
Each of the studies involved measurements of the incidence of children’s aggressive or bullying
behaviour at school - or kindergarten - before and after an intervention.
Mostly, estimates were based upon self-reports of students; in some cases peer-nominations were
used; in others, teachers or researchers made systematic observations of children’s behaviour.
Some evaluations involved a substantial number of schools, as many as 42; others involved as few
as one. In some of the studies, control schools were used, a desirable procedure since pre-testing
itself can raise awareness of bullying and result in an apparent increase.
The programs themselves could be classified as those that made use of one particular kind of
procedure and those that involved multiple procedures. There were two in the first category.
In Sheffield, England in the early 1990s Helen Cowie et al persuaded a number of teachers in to
employ so-called ‘co-operative teaching methods’ in 16 classes in 2 primary schools, having first
assessed the incidence of bullying at the schools. A small reduction in reported bullying was
subsequently reported, though in general the researchers were disappointed in the outcome.
In Chicago, USA, in the late 1990s McMahon et al introduced into the curriculum for 5 classes of
kindergarten children, lessons designed to help them manage their anger better, to act assertively
rather than aggressively and to behave more empathically. Subsequent behavioural observations
by the researchers indicated a significant reduction in aggressive behaviour, though this was not
supported by teacher assessments.
Other programs used multiple procedures. These typically included
• Educational programs aimed in the first place at improving teacher awareness and
understanding of the phenomena of bullying.
• The development of school anti-bullying policies strongly supported by the school community
including students and parents
• The introduction of relevant curriculum material so as to raise awareness of bullying among
students and promote the acquisition of pro-social values and skills to assist in countering
bullying, for example, tolerance for differences, assertiveness to discourage bullies and pro-
active behaviour on the part of bystanders.
• Procedures for dealing with actual cases of bullying
There were notable differences in recommended procedures for dealing with bullying. Some
programs emphasised the need for rules and sanctions to be applied to those who bullied others.
Some programs emphasised so-called problem-solving approaches, such as mediation, the Method
of Shared Concern and the No Blame Approach.
How successful were these programs? Of the nine programs using multiple procedures included in
my examination, there were eight evaluations that provided clear evidence of a reduction in
bullying following the intervention.
The largest was an average of 50% reduction in reported bullying by Dan Olweus in the Bergen
area of Norway in the 1980s. However, for the most part the reductions were modest in size. For
example, in England in the 1990s a large scale study by Peter Smith and others reported an average
reduction of 17% among primary school children.
It was also evident that generally reductions tended to occur more often among young students
than among older students
Secondly the reductions occurred more in the numbers of students being bullied than the number of
students bullying others.
Finally, reductions were much greater in schools where the programmes had been carried out most
thoroughly. This was true in each of the 3 studies in which measures were taken of the extent to
which the programmes had actually been implemented. In some highly conscientious schools
reductions of up to 80% were reported.
It is hard to be certain about which kind of program was more successful because programs
contained common elements. But it is worth comparing the effectiveness of programs that
emphasised the use of rules and sanctions - following the line promoted by Dan Olweus, with
those which emphasised an alternative problem-solving approach in dealing with cases of
bullying.
Interventions using a Rules and Consequences approach
Norway Bergen Olweus Very positive
Rogaland Roland Negative
Canada Toronto Pepler et al No change
Belgium Flanders Stevens et al Positive
Switzerland Berne Alsaker et al Positive
Interventions using problem solving approaches
England Sheffield Smith et al Positive
London &
Liverpool
Pitt & Smith Positive
Spain Sevill Ortega & Lera Positive
Finland Turku & Helsinki Salmivalli Positive
Australia New South Wales Petersen & Rigby Positive
The interventions employing the Olweus model emphasising rules and consequences, had rather
mixed outcomes. In Norway quite large reductions in both being bullied and bullying others were
reported in the Bergen area.
Further south around Rogaland the same intervention produced negative outcomes. Among boys
reporting being bullied by peers actually increased! For both sexes, more children in Rogaland were
reported as bullying others.
In Canada the outcomes of an intervention based on the Olweus model failed to produce
consistently positive results. In Belgium there was a small but significant reduction in younger
children being bullied, compared with the control schools. In Switzerland, there was again
evidence of a reduction in kindergarten children being bullied by their peers, especially in physical
bullying.
If we turn to programs incorporating problem-solving approaches, they appear to have fared rather
better, with positive results (reductions in children being bullied) being reported in England, Spain,
Finland and Australia, though in none of these places were the reductions on average large.
I should add that since the publication of the Attorney General’s report, there is news of a
successful intervention in Western Australia, headed by Donna Cross – the so-called Friendly
Schools Project - and another in Donegal, Ireland by Mona O’Moore et al. Both of these have
concentrated on promoting more positive relations between children rather than on seeking to stop
bullying by punitive means.
What are the Implications?
First, I think the results are, on the whole, encouraging. Nearly all the programs showed some
significant results. In schools where programs had been very thoroughly implemented, the
reductions were sometimes quite large.
Secondly, it is important to begin early. Young children can be influenced, it seems, to be less
involved in bullying, more readily than older children. Early intervention is clearly very desirable.
Thirdly, we are evidently more successful in helping children to protect themselves from the
bullies than in stopping those who bully. Victimised children are more strongly motivated to learn
how to change their behaviour than those who bully.
Clearly we need to redouble our efforts in dealing more effectively to discourage the behaviour of
those who bully others in schools, if only because these children are more likely than others to
become aggressive and violent adults.
Fourthly, given that current evidence suggests that problem-solving methods may be at least as
effective as punitive methods in dealing with perpetrators, greater awareness of how and when
these methods can be used is strongly recommended. (See Rigby, 2001). .
Finally, it is my firm impression - based on a recently completed study of what 40 Australian
schools are doing to counter peer victimisation (funded by the Criminology Research Council) - that
a large number of Australian schools are in fact designing and implementing well considered
programs to reduce bullying – programs which contain features that have been shown - in well
controlled studies - to enjoy a significant measure of success (Rigby and Thomas, 2002).
References
Alsaker, FD & Valkanover, S 2001 ‘Early diagnosis and prevention of victimization in
kindergarten’, in J Juvonen & S Graham (eds), Peer harassment in school, Guilford Press,
New York, 175–195.
Cowie, H, Smith, PK, Boulton, M & Laver, R 1994, Cooperation in the Multi-ethnic classroom,
David Fulton, London.
McMahon, SD, Washburn, J, Felix, ED, Yakin, J & Childrey, G 2000 ‘Violence Prevention:
program effects on urban pre-school and kindergarten children’, Applied and Preventive
Psychology, 9, 271–281.
Olweus, D 1991, ‘Bully/victim problems among school children: Basic facts and effects of a
school-based intervention program’, in DJ Pepler & KH Rubin (eds) The development and
treatment of childhood aggression, Erlbaum, Hillsdale, NJ, 411–448.
Ortega, R & Lera, MJ 2000, ‘The Seville Anti-Bullying in School Project’, Aggressive Behaviour,
26, 113–123.
Pepler, DJ, Craig, WM Ziegler, S & Charach, A 1994, ‘An evaluation of an anti-bullying
intervention in Toronto schools’, Canadian Journal of Community Mental Health, 13, 95–
110.
Petersen, L & Rigby, K 1999, ‘Countering bullying at an Australian secondary school’ Journal of
Adolescence, 22, 4, 481–492.
Pitt, J & Smith, PK 1995, Preventing school bullying, Home Office Police Research group, 50
Queen Anne’s Gate, London SW1H9AT.
Rigby, K (2001) Stop the bullying: a handbook for schools. Melbourne: ACER.
Rigby, K 2002 A meta-evaluation of methods and approaches to reducing bullying in pre-schools
and in early primary school in Australia, Commonwealth Attorney-General's Department,
Canberra. Phone 1800 703 777. Download:
http://www.ncp.gov.au/ncp/publicationentry.asp?PUBID=47&XMENU=3
Rigby, K and Thomas, E.B. 2002, submitted) How Australian schools are responding to the
problem of peer victimisation in schools: a report for the Criminology Research Council.
Salmivalli, 2001,‘Combating school bullying: a theoretical framework and preliminary results of an
intervention study’, paper presented at an International Conference on Violence in Schools
and Public policies, Paris, 2001.
Stevens, V, de Bourdeaudhuij, I, & Van Oost, P 2000 ‘Bullying in Flemish schools: an evaluation
of anti-bullying interventions in primary and secondary schools’,British Journal of
Educational Psychology, 70, 195–210.
