The Causes and Psychological Effect of Bullying in High School - Essay Example

These types of bullying are often carried out on the victims based on their sexuality, gender, race, religion, abilities, body size, and age among other features (Carey, P. 34). From these factors that promote bullying, it is apparent that the power imbalances that favor and promote bullying could be social, economic, and physical powers. Although bullying affects the bullied more than the bully, the stereotypical notion that the bullied is never affected by his/her actions should be revised.

That is to say, the portrayal of a bully as some tough and self-confident individual who conquers all his/her victims no longer stands. Besides harming their victims, high school bullies are also emotionally, physically, and psychologically affected by their actions (Carey, P. 89). In fact, psychological instability has been identified as a major cause of bullying tendencies in high school bullies. It can therefore be asserted without fear of contradiction that ‘true bullies’ are quite rare since most bullies are also affected or bullied by their actions.

This paper therefore explores the causes of bullying and the emotional and psychological effects of high school bullying on bullies. Causes of High School Bullying Despite the recently reported increased awareness of bullying in high schools, little has been achieved as far as reducing the cases of bullying in schools are concerned. This situation may be due to the fact that the identification and the tackling of the real causes of high school bullying are still quite big challenges to parents and teachers.

There are numerous causes of high school bullying that are however quite apparent and concerned parties such as teachers and parents should take them into account. In other words, it appears that the only affective solution to high school violence is the identification of the variety of reasons for which high school students become bullies. The first cause of high school bullying is frustration. The cause of frustration in these cases could be impairments and such impaired students may be resentful if such impairment is not being recognized.

These impairments include allergy, undiagnosed PTSD, learning disabilities, autism, deafness, and dyslexia among other difficulties. The frustration particularly stems from the fact that these impaired students are expected to perform at par with the other able-bodied classmates. The matter is made worse by the fact that no attempts are made to identify the source of their frustration. The second cause of high school bullying is bad or lack of role models for high school students at home and the larger communities they come from.

Absence of proper role models to look up to results in high school students missing the opportunity to learn positive behavior skills. Coupled to this cause is abuse at home, which results in abused children expressing their anger on their classmates. Family neglect just like home abuse causes retardation in children’s emotional, psychological, and behavioral developments. The other causes of high school bullying are undue influence from friends or crowds, conduct disorders, personality disorders, and antisocial disorders.

Psychological and Emotional Effects of Bullying There are several psychological effects that researchers have found high school bullies to be prone to including low self-esteem, childhood and adulthood behavioral problems, and depression disorders and other psychological disorders. Besides