By The Bullying Of Children's Mental Toughness And Depression, Anxiety, Relationship

In the research to understand bullied children, researchers traditionally havefocused their studies on individuals who are already experiencing the problem. Theirconcern has been with identifying the characteristics and symptoms that theseindividuals present. While understanding risk factors that are correlated with bullyingproblems can provide critical information in prevention and early interventionprogram planning (especially in getting services to populations in greatest need),risk-focused prevention and early intervention are problematic for several reasons.First, the application of risk-focused prevention often leads to the identification,labeling, and stigmatizing of youth, their families, and their communities. Second, afocus on young people's risks or deficits often obscures teachers', parents', and otheradults' vision in seeing strengths that young people have. Third, a focus on risks anddeficits leaves parents, teachers, and other adults feeling helpless and hopeless. On thecontrary, resilience study focused on children's positive protective factors andcapacities. Exploring the resilience of bullied children can help us understand whysome bullied children shake off the effects of bullying problems and grow up well,and provide more information about mechanism of bulling behaviors and bullingintervention programs. The present study provided a new perspective of bullyingresearch, and it also made the first step of resilience research in China. Two questionswere explored. First, relationships between bullied children's resilience and symptomsof depression and anxiety were explored. Second, the model of relationships betweenbullied children's resilience and emotional problems based on the framework ofresilience in action was proved.Using Healthy Kids Resilience Assessment, Olweus Bullying/VictimizationQuestionnaire (revised in China), Center for Epidemiologic Studies Depression Scaleand State-Trait Anxiety Inventory, 1819 junior middle school students wereinvestigated. The results are as follows:1.Bullied children scored higher than normal children (not being bullied children) onthe level of depression and anxiety.2.Bullied children's degree of being bullied positively predicted their depression andanxiety. The more degree of being bullied they suffered, the higher level ofdepression and anxiety they exhibited. Bullied children's resilience negativelypredicted their depression and anxiety. The higher resilience they had, the lowerlevel of depression and anxiety they exhibited.3.All students were divided into four categories according to high/low resilience andbeing bullied or not. On the level of depression and anxiety, high resilient normalchildren scored significant lower than high resilient bullied children. High resilientbullied children scored significant lower than low resilient normal children. Therewere no differences between low resilient normal children and low resilient bulliedchildren.4.The model of relationship between bullied children's resilience and emotionalproblems based on the framework of resilience in action was acceptable. Themore external protective factors bullied children had, the higher level of resilienttraits they had, and then they experienced lower level of depression and anxiety.