What Causes Bullying?

A number of different factors have been identified which contribute to bullying problems. Family  and school factors contribute.

School factors: The social context and supervision at school have been shown to play a major part in the frequency and severity of bullying problems. While teachers and administrators do not have control over individual and family factors which produce children who are inclined to bully, bullying problems can be greatly reduced in severity by appropriate supervision, intervention and climate in a school.

Family factors: A number of child-rearing styles have been found to predict whether children will grow up to be aggressive bullies. A lack of attention and warmth toward the child, together with modelling of aggressive behaviour at home, and poor supervision of the child, provide the perfect opportunity for aggressive and bullying behaviour to occur . Modelling of aggressive behaviour may include use of physical and verbal aggression toward the child by parents, or use of physical and verbal aggression by parents toward each other. The connection between witnessing wife assault by children, particularly male children, and bully behaviour by children toward peers, has not been well studied, but studies do indicate that aggressive behaviour of all kinds is elevated in children who witness violence by their father toward
their mother