Bullied Kids Do Worse In School, Study Finds

Kids who get bullied in school are more likely to do worse academically, have low confidence and dislike school than other students, according to a new study from the American Psychological Association.

Around 24 percent of the students studied experienced chronic bullying over their time in school. These children disengaged from school and performed less well along academic metrics.

"It's extremely disturbing how many children felt bullied at school," said lead researcher Gary Ladd of Arizona State University. "For teachers and parents, it's important to know that victimization tends to decline as kids get older, but some children never stop suffering from bullying during their school years."

The study was published in the Journal of Educational Psychology by a team led by Ladd. It followed 383 kindergarten students from public schools in Illinois into early adulthood; by the five-year mark, some students had moved and covered 24 different states.

Researchers had to track down the subjects over the years, losing track of around a quarter of them.

"People moved and we had to track them down all over the country," Ladd said. "We put people in cars or on planes to see these kids."

Ladd noted that bullying can be a very difficult problem to detect and fix.

"Frequently, kids who are being victimized or abused by other kids don't want to talk about it," he said. "I worry most about sensitive kids who are not being taken seriously and who suffer in silence. They are being told that boys will be boys and girls will be girls and that this is just part of growing up."

Photo credit: U.S. Department of Agriculture