The Role of Bystanders in Teen Bullying

By Meghan Vivo

What’s the best way to combat teen bullying? Talk among parents and school officials often centers on punishing the bully for his boorish behaviors or building the confidence of the victim. The advice covers the spectrum: “Stand up for yourself” to “Ignore bullies and they’ll eventually go away.”

But the problem doesn’t go away. Teen bullying has continued to escalate, affecting as many as 50 percent of all young people and carrying such long-term risks as depression, suicidal thoughts, substance abuse, and poor academic and job performance.

A New School Culture

Teen bullying is beginning to garner widespread attention, and a new way of addressing the problem is emerging. Experts now recommend focusing our efforts on an entirely different population: the bystanders. The bystanders are the teens who witness bullying incidents every day at school, online, or in their neighborhood but don’t get involved, either because they fear the wrath of a teen bully being directed at them or don’t know what else to do.

For the first time, the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) has included a section on bullying in its new recommendations for pediatricians. In addition to recommendations for counseling for teens and their families and increasing awareness of bullying, the AAP has recommended that schools adopt a prevention model developed by Dan Olweus, a research professor of psychology at the University of Bergen, Norway, who focuses on the role of bystanders.

According to Dr. Robert Sege, chief of ambulatory pediatrics at Boston Medical Center and a lead author of the new policy statement, “Olweus’s genius is that he manages to turn the school situation around so the other kids realize that the bully is someone who has a problem managing his or her behavior, and the victim is someone they can protect.”

Why Bystanders?

Why the focus on bystanders? For one, there’s safety in numbers – something the victim of bullying does not have on her side. Moreover, no adolescent likes to be criticized by a group of her peers. While admonishment from a principal, teacher, parent, or other authority figure is easy to ignore, and may even make teens more angry and aggressive, research shows negative feedback from peers has an immediate and lasting effect.

In addition, bystanders are present at most bullying incidents. A recent study found that peers were present in 85% of bullying episodes, but intervened in only 10%. Bullies like an audience, but not a disapproving one.

Through classroom discussions, parent meetings, and consistent responses from school officials, experts believe schools and their pupils can send a strong message that bullying will not be tolerated. Changing the school culture will take time and education – most bystanders continue to feel afraid of taking a stand, some prefer to disassociate themselves from the victim, and some even blame the victim or cheer the bully on.

But few interventions have proven more effective than a group of bystanders taking a stand against bullying. A recent study published in the Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry showed that a new psychodynamic approach to bullying in schools that focuses on enhancing empathy in bystanders and changing power dynamics school-wide can reduce children’s experiences of aggression in school and improve classroom behavior.

How to Empower the Bystander

The most common response to bullying is to do nothing – but doing nothing fuels the bully’s fire. Mobilizing the largest and most influential group, the bystanders, is one of the best ways to bring about change. Bullies thrive on power and control, and being questioned or confronted by peers usurps their sense of power. It only takes one person to take a stand and mobilize others to jump into action.

To change the culture in schools, teens need to be empowered to speak up against bullying. Without education and support, teens who know what’s right will fail to act. When asked what they should do in a bullying situation, about two-thirds of children say they should intervene, but only one-third of elementary school children actually do – and  only one-quarter of high school students will intervene.

Parents are the first line of defense in teaching adolescents how to treat others with courtesy and respect. Here are a few ways you can instill these values in your teen and do your part to combat teen bullying:

Be a Good Role Model. Model respect, compassion, and cooperation at home in your relationship with your spouse and family members. Be aware of how you use language; for example, don't use insults based on sexual orientation, race, or gender. Teach your children to treat others the way they want to be treated and help them understand that their behavior has an impact on others.

Praise Good Works. If you catch your child doing a good deed or treating another person with empathy and kindness, praise her efforts. Similarly, talk to your child about selfish or unkind behavior and apply disciplinary measures as appropriate.

Encourage Volunteerism. Talk to your teen about getting involved in community service projects. Instilling a sense of connectedness to others and a desire to serve will not only make your child a better person, but also a happier person in the long run.

Take a Stand. Although you don’t want your child to step directly into a bully’s line of fire, you can encourage her to get help when she witnesses a bullying incident and take a clear stance against cruelty to others rather than passively accepting or enabling bullying behaviors. Studies show that if a bystander discourages the bully there is a 50% chance that the bully will stop. An act as simple as booing rather than clapping or laughing can make a big difference.

If your child knows the bully, she may be able to diffuse the situation by diverting his attention to something else, warning the bully that others have gone for help, or nonconfrontationally encouraging the bully to stop. If she knows the victim, a phone call or eating together at lunch can be a show of support, or she can offer the victim a way out (for example, telling the victim a teacher is looking for her).

Be Part of the Solution

We all have the power to contribute to the problem or be part of the solution. Whether you are a parent, school official, teenager, or pediatrician, standing by and doing nothing while another human being is mistreated makes you part of the problem. There is always something you can do to make things better – and most of the time, you’ll be backed by others who feel the same way.

Targets of bullying, and even the bullies themselves, need help. Some may need to spend time away at a wilderness program or residential treatment center to learn better coping skills and work through underlying emotional or behavioral issues. Others may simply need the people around him to find their voice and take a stand.