Racial Bullying and Victimization in Canadian School-Aged Children

Abstract

Numerous individual factors, including race, have been identified to date that may place children at risk for bullying involvement. The importance of the school’s environment on bullying behaviours has also been highlighted, as the majority of bullying occurs at school. The variables associated with racial bullying and victimization, however, have rarely been specifically examined. The purpose of the current study, therefore, was to determine which individual- and school-level factors are associated with racial bullying and victimization. Canadian records from the 2001/2002 Health Behaviors in School-Aged Children Survey (HBSC) were used for the current analyses. Participants included 3,684 students and their principals from 116 schools from across the country. Results indicated that racial bullying and racial victimization were more strongly related to individual factors such as race and sex than school-level factors. African-Canadian students were found to engage in racial bullying as well as report being racially victimized. In addition, school climate did not account for observed differences between schools on racial bullying and victimization, but racial bullying appeared to decrease in supportive schools with higher teacher diversity.

Keywords

children racial bullying racial minority groups school victimization

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