Bullying victimisation and association with health related quality of life, depression and social support in urban disadvantaged primary schoolchildren

Abstract

Although widespread, victimisation research in primary schools is negligible, particularly with regard to disadvantaged school contexts. The current paper presents analysis of data from the longitudinal ‘Healthy Schools’ programme. The current paper explored victimisation, depression, health-related quality of life (HRQoL), and social support among 458 Irish primary school children in DEIS-Band 1 primary schools. It was found that victimisation frequency (33.8%) was consistent with recent literature, and these victimisation rates positively correlated with levels of depression. Victims scored lower on all five HRQoL subscales compared to non-victims. Moreover, frequently victimised children scored lower on four of these HRQoL subscales, compared to non-victims. Important considerations emerge from the results, such as the consistency of victimisation rates compared with more affluent regions, the importance of focusing on specific bullying behaviours when considering victimisation rates, and the effect of victimisation on corresponding health consequences. In addition, future research should continue to move towards a behaviour based assessment of victimisation to provide a holistic overview of the problem.