Development of Research on School-Bullying - Essay Example

Since Olweu’s first scientific study on bullying in 1973, an extensive, widespread and in-depth varied study on the problem ensued. Bullying issues such as nature, prevalence, effects, interventions, methodology, and others are taken-up. Yet, these studies remain insufficient to tackle all bullying issues. For one, Mishna (2004) observed that studies on bullying focus more on bullying than victimization. Though developmental issues like cyber-bullying (Hinduja & Patchin, 2010; Campbell, 2005) and anti-bullying programme development (Stevens, De Bourdeaudhuij & Van Oost, 2001) are also studied.

School-bullying research studies may not be enough, despite its breadth and depth, to fully understand and solve the problem, but one thing has been clear: Bullying is a very complex issue requiring multi-disciplinary attention. This literature review aims to examine the development of bullying research – its gains and remaining deficiencies – for its further advancement.In his article, Bullying in schools: Thirty years of research, Smith (2011) illustrates the development of research on school-bullying, showing its periodic development in four waves from its inception to its present modern issues.

The first wave (early 70’s – 1988), to Smith’s account, illustrates the beginnings of scientific bullying research in Scandinavia through Heinemann, who called serious attention on the matter in his book, Mobbing – Group Aggression against Boys and Girls (1972). Though Olweus (1993) has noted that as early as 1960 the problem of bullying has already raised concerns in Sweden (p. 1). However, it was actually Dan Olweus who pioneered the first scientific study on bullying, earning him the title, “‘father’ of bullying research” (Smith, Pepler & Rigby, 2004, xvii).