This paper describes the findings of a questionnaire survey of 377 eleven and twelve-year-old students in two English secondary schools. The survey investigated the relationship between self-esteem, response style and the stressfulness of being bullied. Both students with high and low self-esteem had experienced bullying behaviour from their peers. However, those with low self-esteem and passive response styles had been bullied more extensively and experienced greater stress as a result of this. The results suggest that those students who respond actively to bullying behaviour (either assertively or aggressively) expe rience less stress when they are bullied. The implications of these results for schools and parents are discussed. Given that aggressive behaviour cannot be condoned in a school setting, the usefulness of assertiveness training as a targeted intervention for persistently bul lied students is explored. This kind of intervention needs to be set within the context of a whole school anti-bullying policy and in conjunc tion with strategies for working with the students who are bullying others.
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