Lots of us joke around with each other, call each other names or
"horse around," but that's not considered bullying if you have a
good relationship with each other or if you don't intend any harm.
Bullying occurs when one person (or more) repeatedly hurts another person through words or actions. Bullying
may involve direct physical actions such as hitting or shoving, verbal
assaults such as teasing or name-calling, or it may involve more indirect
actions such as socially isolating a person or manipulating friendships. A
bully wants to put his or her victim in distress in some way.
Bullies seek power.
Many
children and teens are bullied by their peers.
In a study in Scandinavia, which began an extremely successful program on
addressing bullying, which has been duplicated throughout the US, about 9
percent of students in primary and junior high schools reported that they
had been bullied "now and then" or more frequently, and 7
percent admitted that they had bullied other students at least "now
and then." In the same
study, 27 percent of middle schoolers said they had been victims of
bullying.
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