Various scholars view bullying as a form of abuse that uses intimidation, aggression, and coercion to habitually torment others in an aim of showcasing and maintaining social imbalance. Such forms of verbal and emotional harassment often leave the victim with a scarred emotional and mental wellbeing because bullies achieve their intentions of disgracing the victim’s appearance, size, abilities, reputation, orientation, class, religion, strength, or race. Individual’s subjected to bullying may not only be confined to school settings but also at home and the workplace (Nixon, 2014).
The main targets of bullying are adolescents in school setting or when using online platforms. With technological advancement, bullying has transcended to social media platforms thereby popularizing cyberbullying. With almost every teenager gaining access to the internet and establishing a social media presence, there is an increase in perpetration and victimization in bullying. Currently, cyberbullying is becoming the most popular form of aggression due to lack of jurisdiction against the freedom of expression by online users and lack of personal accountability. Regardless of the context, the victims of bullying consequently develop emotional and mental health issues that affects their normative lifestyles and how they interact in their peers on a face to face setting.
Delegate your assignment to our experts and they will do the rest.
The Emotional Impact of Bullying and Cyberbullying on Victims Mental Health
Most scholars agree that the prevalence of bullying thrives from the uncertainty surrounding the frequency of occurrence in schools, at the workplace, home, or online. Bullying negatively impacts on the mental health and the emotions of the victim because of the researched manifestations such as social isolation, low self-esteem, anxiety, insomnia, guilt, and depression (Bond et al., 2001). The difficulty in detecting such incidences on a global platform makes users of social media susceptible to such instances.
According to Nixon, cyberbullying requires further study because it presents one of the most complex and trending hurdle while researchers seek for anti-bulling solutions (Nixon, 2014). Ortega agrees on the notion of complexity by further explaining that more other types of bulling, cyberbullying results in highest rates of suicide, anxiety, loneliness, and depression (Ortega et al., 2012). Adolescents and young adults that are victims often result to delinquency, substance abuse, and aggression because they would refrain from involving a third person to deal with the online altercations. Unfortunately, cyberbullying is hard to prevent because there is a high number of unmonitored social media usage and unlimited access for online delinquents.
Therefore, these scholars agree that the emotional and mental health impact of cyberbullying is more dominant than physical bullying because the online perpetrators do not see the immediate consequences of their actions and will therefore lack personal accountability. Cowie further elaborates by saying that on the other hand, traditional bullying carries the worry for face to face confrontation with the negative emotional turmoil of the victim making the perpetrator more likely to correct their actions (Cowie, 2011). According to Cowie, traditional bullies are easily caught and disciplined as opposed to the online bully who might use anonymous identities and locational addresses.
Scholars also agree that it is difficult to categories some actions as bullying because in the past and in some current contexts it is viewed as some sort of rite of passage and thereby normalized in the society (Nixon, 2014). Therefore, many people were exposed to the vice were expected to maintain brevity through such incidences of emotional insults, mocking, and physical confrontation. Most guardians would urge their children to fight back so as to pose as strong individuals in the community.
Bond agrees that such age-old ideologies of bullying permissiveness present a deeper resentment for the victim’s ability as well as for the people that are supposed to protect them from bullies (Bond et al., 2001). Such individuals have a high suicidal ideation because they feel like they are worthless even when they are surrounded by their primary caregivers and social circles. They feel helpless because they cannot expose their internal weakness by reporting such incidences to authority figures. Furthermore, many authority figures in these cases side with the bully who is viewed as physically strong and showing survival instincts in a tough society.
As a consequence of fear of victimization, a lot of youth bottled up their emotions and would rarely discuss anything pertaining to the details of their ordeal. They would just show reactions to such incidences such as avoiding school, social withdrawal, shyness, emotional and physical insecurities, and consequently becoming bullies as a way to revenge. Further taunting by their caregivers such as older siblings, guardians, or relatives created a lack of social support for the challenge and led to grave mental health issues (Bond et al., 2001).
Victims of bullying and cyberbullying lost trust in people and develop social anxiety that is used as a strategy to avoid victimization. They become vulnerable to any form of negative feeling or action towards their existence, they may therefore tend to take light roasts negatively because they develop low self-esteem. In their adult life, they attach school and work contexts as unsafe areas even for their future children of loved ones. Recent studies indicate that emotional and mental problems that result from victimization directly relate with maladjustments into the society. According to Nixon, the onset of emotional turmoil stems from victimization through bullying (Nixon, 2014) . The after effects may not be observed in an initial sense but young adults that experienced any form of bullying show left esteem and emotional problems (Bond et al., 2001). Ortega proposes that evaluation of the prevalence of bullying during adolescent years will help researchers to develop studies that look at the factors that encourage bullying and develop findings that can help psychologists to deal with adult mental health issues (Ortega et al., 2012)
In particular recent studies on suicide and behavioral tendencies show that there is a high rate of suicide amongst adolescents that were victims and perpetrators of cyberbullying. This is because the victim suffers from undiagnosed depression and anxiety while the perpetrator is often venting on some pats instance where they experiences bullying of some sort. The victim is often a target because they expose their personal information online such as documenting their daily activities in social media platforms such as Facebook. The perpetuator therefore uses such personal information to make a personal attack on the victim. In the meantime, most adolescents are already facing some form of insecurities based on the changes in their bodies and thought patterns. Attacking their physical appearances based on the images that they share online while seeking high approval from strangers has a significant effect on their esteem and anxiety levels (Cowie, 2011).
Conclusion
Parents and guardians of adolescents need to evaluate violence and substance abuse as manifestations of coping with bullying on either a physical or a virtual level. The victim often uses such delinquent behavior as a way of coping with the anxiety and depression which are negative emotional and mental health impact of bullying. In order to deal with the negative mental and emotional impacts of bullying and cyberbullying, it is important to also develop watchdog organizations that contain the spread of such vices. As an un-isolated behavior, bullying can only be minimized by confrontation or reaching out to authorities about such incidences. Ignoring as a solution increased the prevalence and made the emotional and mental impact adverse. Opposing bystanders also elevate the challenge while training authority figures to adequately address bullying so that the victim does not suffer further taunting once the authority is absent.
References
Bond, L., Carlin, J. B., Thomas, L., Rubin, K., & Patton, G. (2001). Does bullying cause emotional problems? A prospective study of young teenagers. Bmj , 323(7311), 480-484.
Cowie, H. A. (2011). Coping with the emotional impact of bullying and cyberbullying: How research can inform practice. International Journal of Emotional Education, 3(2), 50-56.
Nixon, C. L. (2014). Current perspectives: the impact of cyberbullying on adolescent health. Adolescent health, medicine and therapeutics, 5, 143.
Ortega, R., Elipe, P., Mora ‐ Merchán, J. A., Genta, M. L., Brighi, A., Guarini, A., ... & Tippett, N. (2012). The emotional impact of bullying and cyberbullying on victims: a European cross ‐ national study. Aggressive behavior , 38(5), 342-356.
