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Dr. Haber Invited to South Korea by U.S. State Department to Speak on Bullying Prevention

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Dr. Joel Haber has bee invited to participate in the U.S Traveling Speaker Program.
From October 7-12, 2013, Dr. Haber will be speaking to the South Korean people about bullying prevention.

In Korea, bullying became an issue of general concern in the 1980s. Young people say that bullying is one of the biggest problems they face. Bullying does not target only those that are different because of their race, ethnicity, class or disability. It happens to those who are simply “different,” in some way, such as having a different back-pack, a prettier pencil case, wearing a skirt instead of pants, and so on. A victim can become a bully the next day and a victim again the following week.

The negative effect of bullying on the entire school environment as well as the harmful impact on the victims, bullies, and witnesses has been well documented. The Korean National Commission on Youth Protection found that 10.7% of elementary school students, 5.6% of middle school students and 3.3% of high school students have been bullied. Of the 174 victims of bullying that have been counseled, 5 have tried to commit suicide, 13 have received psychiatric treatment, 63 have refused to go school and 93 “have felt desperate” in school life.

Another domestic report in Korea found that bullied students suffer greatly. Among them, 46.6% of students feel malice and desire revenge against the bullies; 16% hated and physically abused themselves; 14.1% are in mental state of panic; 8.4% are frequently absent from school; 4.3% committed suicide or ran away from home; 3.2% suffer from hypochondria and 3.2% experience social phobia. There has been much research on bullying prevention in various countries on the “what,” “why,” “who,” and “where,” but the “how” to prevent this is still in a hole.

As the issue of bullying and school violence is becoming an international issue, ways to resolve and find good solutions through dialogue and sharing case studies are becoming more available. The experience the United States has had in dealing with the issue, specifically in terms of programs and counseling, would be of great interest and benefit to Korean educators and administrators working in the field. The speaker program would create an opportunity for shared experiences between U.S. and Korean students, parents, and educators, and emphasize the importance of diversity and equal rights for all, including for those with disabilities.

Signs of Bullying

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1. How does a parent, teacher or adult figure recognize signs that a child is being bullied?

[Joel Haber] Bullying comes in many forms, so the key is looking for a change in behavior that may indicate a social issue is causing the child some pain. For young kids, this may be physical symptoms that cause them to try to avoid school, social settings or after school activities. School avoidance is another. Shutting down communication with parents or friends can also happen due to embarrassment or humiliation.

2. What are the long-term mental consequences of bullying?

[Joel Haber] New studies have revealed an elevated risk across a wide range of mental health outcomes into adulthood for victims. Victims of bullying in childhood were 4 times more likely to have anxiety disorders as adults copared to those with no hx of bullying. Bullies, too suffer. They were 14/5 times more likely to develop panic disorder as adults and almost 5 times more likely to experience depression. Men who were both bullies and victims, up to 19 times more likely to have suicidal thoughts as adults compared to controls. Females were 27 times more likely to develop anxiety such as agoraphobia. These were for the normal population, but if you have pre-existing psychiatric problems in childhood, they re most at risk.

3. What are some long-term physical consequences of bullying?

[Joel Haber] See above, because bullying in all its forms can cause the above results.

4. What should parents do to help their child who is being bullied?

[Joel Haber] First, is to be a good listener and begin conversations with your children about bullying when they are young. Ask questions routinely and without emotion, “who do you sit with at lunch, on the bus, play with at recess, etc. Ask them if they ever see kids getting picked on, left out or bullied in school and does that ever happen to them?” If so, each case is different, but we try to tell parents to brainstorm solutions with their child and see if their child can handle a situation first because if they can develop successful skills in dealing with it, it can build resilience. However, telling the school, confidentially may be helpful too, since they can watch the situation carefully, when the parent cannot. Good communication with parents and schools is essential.

5. What should parents not do if their child is being bullied?

[Joel Haber] Don’t blame your child for bullying, don’t get enraged about it and scare your child into shut down mode, and don’t storm the school and be a bully yourself if you suspect a problem with your child. Be the best role-model you can be.

6. Please mention any other advice you have to offer.

[Joel Haber] My book, Bullyproof Your Child for Life, Protect Your Child from Teasing, Taunting and Bullying for Good, has many strategies that parents can use to help their child find the right strategy for their bully issues.

7. If you have an example or situation of a specific troubling bullying issue you have dealt with in the past can you explain it? And the advice you gave and how you handled it?

[Joel Haber] A 13 year old teen in her first week of middle school, came to see me because she had been excluded and bullied by her friends even though they had been best friends for years. What she didn’t realize is that her reaction to all this which was very dramatic and upsetting, actually fueled the bullying because her friends had seen this as a fun game to get attention from other new girls in school. When we role-played ways to reduce the drama, she was able to see that her real power inside was to reduce the fun these girls were getting at her expense. She became much more confident and successful socially when she developed a back up group of friends. Now the bullying girls pursue her, but she divides her time now with many friends.

8. What is some of your history and how did you get into this field?

[Joel Haber] As a Psychologist I have spent the last 20 years working to reduce violence and bullying in youth. I used to work in Domestic Violence and found lots of bullying and targeted children coming from those homes. After that work, I decided to work with children and teens to prevent these behaviors from forming many years ago, and building my training and research to help individuals and communities find ways to reduce the pain of bullying. I now sit on the Board of Advisors with the “Bully” movie, Cartoon Network, and consult with the American Camp Association, corporations and schools in addition to seeing individuals in my private practice. I feel blessed to be able to make a contribution to reduce the pain and suffering caused by bullying through my speaking and website at www.respectu.com.

Relational Bullying

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Most popular among girls but also rampant among boys, the goal of this sort of bullying is social exclusion. It can take the form of gossip and exclusion from a lunch table, team, club, etc. If done on an ongoing basis, this form of bullying is likely the most hurtful and most damaging long-term. The targets don’t just feel bullied by one person; they feel bullied by the whole peer group. It’s a very sophisticated and manipulative form of bullying. It is also hitting a girl exactly where she’s vulnerable—in her social likability.

Beyond about grade four, children’s identity and self-esteem are dependent upon their peer groups far more than their families. When they feel shunned by and cut off from their peers, their self-esteem plummets and they feel like they have no “safe place.” It’s the exact opposite of what they want at that age, which is a feeling of belonging. Gossip, whether true or not, tends to be extremely hurtful and runs rampant in the young teen population.

Former friends may stop making eye contact and passing the target in hallways out of fear of being associated with this “social pariah.” The target may hear giggling as she passes by, or watch people move away from her when she sits on a bench or on the school bus. Her trust in her peers is shattered, and she’s likely to feel helpless and very alone.

It mimics the way a child feels when punished by being put in a “time out” corner. No words are necessary; the child is made to feel bad by being excluded from the family or group activities.

This is also what’s at play when someone has a birthday party and invites everyone in the class . . . except one or two kids. That’s just plain mean, and I encourage you as parents to make sure that your child doesn’t contribute to making someone else feel excluded. The rule I find appropriate is: half or all, nothing in between. The child can invite everyone in the class, or half the people in the class (or less), but not a number in between those two.

As a parent, you may say this is ridiculous. “Why should I invite a kid who may be mean to my kid?” However, following along with the exclusion mind-set just teaches your child to do the same. They think, “Exclusion is acceptable if my parent allows it.”

“I remember feeling like such a loser when everyone in my sixth grade class got invitations to a girl’s party, except for me and one other girl,” says a woman named Arisa. “I was a new girl in school, but it was a few months into the year, so she did know me. I spent the day looking around the room and thinking, “She thinks every person in this room is cooler than I am.” Apparently, she kissed a boy for the first time there, so the party was a hot topic for months afterwards. I felt so isolated. And it was a self-fulfilling prophecy: the more insecure I felt about not being part of ‘the group,’ the less able I felt to make friends, which meant I just got more and more lonely and an easier target for teasing.”


Prevent bullying with help from Dr. Joel Haber : Bullying Expert, Counselor, Speaker and Author

Verbal Bullying

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Taunting and name-calling fit into this category. Boys and girls are about equally likely to verbally bully and be bullied. Boys may bully boys or girls; girls typically bully only other girls.

What starts out as a taunt based on truth can easily morph into taunting based on whatever seems to get a rise from the target, regardless of whether or not there’s any basis in reality. Maybe your child wears braces and kids call her “Metal Mouth.” They see they get a reaction from her, so they see what else they can call her to drive her up a wall. Doesn’t matter if she’s pretty and they call her “Horse-Face,” or if she’s an A student and they call her stupid; they’re not necessarily saying things they actually believe. They’re just saying things that trigger strong emotional and behavioral responses. If they see that she gets really upset when they say she stuffs her bra, it makes no difference if they actually think so or not—they’ll keep saying it because they see it upsets her.

They may find it even more fun to say ridiculous things they know aren’t true, because it shows they can get a rise for no reason at all. No one actually believes the bully when he says, “I slept with your mom last night,” or “You got those shoes out of the Dumpster,” but his cronies will still crack up if it elicits a denial from the target.

And the target may tell the parent, “I just ignored him! I didn’t do anything to provoke him and he still kept it up!” But what this usually means is, “I didn’t say anything and I didn’t cry.” There are plenty of other ways the child may have reacted without even realizing it was a reaction—body language and facial expressions can be dead giveaways that a kid has been affected, and enough proof for the bully that the bullying was successful.

The target may have frowned or closed her eyes, folded her arms, bitten her lip, furrowed her eyebrows, run away, put her head down, looked away in an exaggerated manner, or any number of other cues that signify hurt or anger. Seeing the target really go berserk is the ultimate goal, but these little visual cues are enough to keep up the behavior to see if the target will eventually crack completely.

By now, most of us realize that the adage “Sticks and stones may break my bones, but words will never harm me” is a load of bull. The truth is that broken bones heal. Broken hearts are much harder to mend, and broken spirits can be lifetime handicaps.

And parents, no matter how many times you tell your kids, “You’re smart and attractive,” if all they hear from peers is “You’re stupid and ugly,” the latter is what they’ll internalize. They don’t believe you. You’re biased—and besides, you’re “old”! You’re not going to negate the effects of verbal bullying just by assuring your child that the kids’ words aren’t true. Something has to change within the child to make the message sink in: Who cares what bullies think? I’m okay. I’m special. And who I am is perfectly likable.

Prevent bullying with help from Dr. Joel Haber : Bullying Expert, Counselor, Speaker and Author

Effects of Bullying Last Into Adulthood

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Long term effects of bullying behavior are now becoming well documented.  The following study adds new data to a body of knowledge that should leave little doubt about how significant bullying is for those who are targeted or involved in using bullying behavior against others.  I would love to hear your comments.

By CATHERINE SAINT LOUIS

Victims of bullying at school, and bullies themselves, are more likely to experience psychiatric problems in childhood, studies have shown. Now researchers have found that elevated risk of psychiatric trouble extends into adulthood, sometimes even a decade after the intimidation has ended.

The new study, published in the journal JAMA Psychiatry on Wednesday, is the most comprehensive effort to date to establish the long-term consequences of childhood bullying, experts said.

“It documents the elevated risk across a wide range of mental health outcomes and over a long period of time,” said Catherine Bradshaw, an expert on bullying and a deputy director of the Center for the Prevention of Youth Violence at Johns Hopkins University, which was not involved in the study.

“The experience of bullying in childhood can have profound effects on mental health in adulthood, particularly among youths involved in bullying as both a perpetuator and a victim,” she added.

The study followed 1,420 subjects from Western North Carolina who were assessed four to six times between the ages of 9 and 16. Researchers asked both the children and their primary caregivers if they had been bullied or had bullied others in the three months before each assessment. Participants were divided into four groups: bullies, victims, bullies who also were victims, and children who were not exposed to bullying at all.

Participants were assessed again in young adulthood — at 19, 21 and between 24 and 26 — using structured diagnostic interviews.

Researchers found that victims of bullying in childhood were 4.3 times more likely to have an anxiety disorder as adults, compared to those with no history of bullying or being bullied.

Bullies who were also victims were particularly troubled: they were 14.5 times more likely to develop panic disorder as adults, compared to those who did not experience bullying, and 4.8 times more likely to experience depression. Men who were both bullies and victims were 18.5 times more likely to have had suicidal thoughts in adulthood, compared to the participants who had not been bullied or perpetuators. Their female counterparts were 26.7 times more likely to have developed agoraphobia, compared to children not exposed to bullying.

Bullies who were not victims of bullying were 4.1 times more likely to have antisocial personality disorder as adults than those never exposed to bullying in their youth.

The effects persisted even after the researchers accounted for pre-existing psychiatric problems or other factors that might have contributed to psychiatric disorders, like physical or sexual abuse, poverty and family instability.

“We were actually able to say being a victim of bullying is having an effect a decade later, above and beyond other psychiatric problems in childhood and other adversities,” said William E. Copeland, lead author of the study and an associate professor of psychiatry and behavioral sciences at Duke University Medical Center.

Bullying is not a harmless rite of passage, but inflicts lasting psychiatric damage on a par with certain family dysfunctions, Dr. Copeland said. “The pattern we are seeing is similar to patterns we see when a child is abused or maltreated or treated very harshly within the family setting,” he said.

One limitation of the study is that bullying was not analyzed for frequency, and the researchers’ assessment did not distinguish between interpersonal and overt bullying. It only addressed bullying at school, not in other settings.

Most of what experts know about the effects of bullying comes from observational studies, not studies of children followed over time.

Previous research from Finland, based on questionnaires completed on a single occasion or on military registries, used a sample of 2,540 boys to see if being a bully or a victim at 8 predicted a psychiatric disorder 10 to 15 years later. The researchers found frequent bully-victims were at particular risk of adverse long-term outcomes, specifically anxiety and antisocial personality disorders. Victims were at greater risk for anxiety disorders, while bullies were at increased risk for antisocial personality disorder

Types of Bullying

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Over the next few posts I will discuss the types of bullying behavior.

Physical Bullying
This is the one that’s easiest to identify. Punching, kicking, hair-pulling, bra-snapping, tripping, shoving someone into a locker—these can all be physical bullying episodes. Maybe surprisingly, this is usually the type of bullying with the fewest long-term scars for the target. Physical bullying has a beginning and an end. Once the incident is over, the bullying is over for a period of time. Depending on who wins the battle, the dynamic can shift immediately—the target can knock out the bully and suddenly gain power and brush off his target status. That’s not exactly the ideal; most likely, the bully will just move on to someone else, and the target will either learn that fighting back is a way to gain power, or feel sick about the event. But it does sometimes stop the bullying.

Mark was a boy with a Catholic mother and a Jewish father, going to a Catholic prep school, when he found a Swastika taped to his locker. He’d been called “Jew boy” before and had been taunted about his religion, as well as his size (short and skinny). He usually just ignored the taunts, and today was no exception. He stuffed the Swastika picture into his coat pocket and forgot about it until his father found it later that night and demanded to know what happened.

The school took the bullying seriously—so seriously that the bully was suspended from school, even though it seemed that no one was happy about that idea. The boy was very popular, and once word got out that it was Mark’s “fault” that the boy was kicked out, the bullying kicked into high gear.

He was in the locker room one day when a big athlete began chasing him around the room, threatening to kill him. Mark ran like his feet were on fire.

“Then I saw a half-open locker door in front of me,” he says. “As I ran past it, I swung it hard behind me, and the kid fell to the ground. I just thought, ‘Thank God,’ because if not for that locker, that kid was going to kill me!”

And the bullying stopped.

But Mark reflects that he knew even then that this was a pretty screwy way to solve the problem. There’s a danger in retaliation against a physical bully, of course. What if—and this is usually the case—the target can’t beat the bully? If the target takes the bully up on his challenge, there’s no guarantee whatsoever that the worst that’s going to happen is a black eye or a few bruises.

We have to remember that a large number of schoolkids today may have greater access to and awareness of weapons, and may in fact be carrying them. And what looks like a one-on-one challenge can turn into a ten-on-one fight.

But in typical cases, physical wounds heal. It’s when the physical bullying escalates or is combined with the other two forms of bullying that there’s more risk of long-term damage.

Prevent bullying with help from Dr. Joel Haber : Bullying Expert, Counselor, Speaker and Author

Sibling Rivalry and Bullying

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Kids test out their power and aggression with each other first, generally because there’s a natural age imbalance, but how it develops and progresses is a function of parenting. If kids find out they can get away with it and aggression pays off, it will continue and turn into bullying.

Sibling rivalry is really just natural competition between siblings. Kids normally test out power issues with each other at home before they test them out with friends—it’s more natural to do it at home, and easier to do with siblings than with parents (they don’t bully their parents normally because there are clear consequences). It’s not a problem unless sibling aggression crosses the line based on a parent’s value system and parenting style.

Parents need to be really clear and up front about what is acceptable and what isn’t. You can teach kids that conflict is acceptable, but that they need to use words that are not hurtful when they have an issue with their siblings, and that they may never harm someone physically. There must be consequences every time this is challenged.

Whenever you see kids getting too aggressive, you must step in and not let it escalate. Separate them, give them time to calm down, and see if they can work out a way to share and be more positive with each other. Otherwise, sibling rivalry turns into bullying and kids take those bully and target roles into the classroom, sports, camp, and elsewhere.

There are no strong studies about how birth order affects bullying behavior. It can be argued that each role in the family dynamic could contribute to bully or target behavior, depending on how the family plays out those roles. An oldest child may bully a younger sibling out of jealousy—the oldest child once had the parents’ exclusive attention, and wants to prove that he or she is still more powerful. A youngest child may learn to bully others because he or she had to “grow up fighting” for power. A middle child may feel lost in the family dynamic and bully others to draw attention—even if it’s negative attention. And, conversely, any of them could fall into target roles just as easily.

Prevent bullying with help from Dr. Joel Haber : Bullying Expert, Counselor, Speaker and Author

Prevent Bullying with Friendship Groups

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The treatment and the cure for most bullying is friendship. When children feel so marginalized that they withdraw from social contact, you’ve hit a really dangerous point. Some children, because of special needs or poor social skills, have extreme trouble making friends. Others just lack the confidence that anyone might like them, possibly because they’ve already been bullied and no one has stood up for them (therefore making the children believe that everyone hates them).

When a child develops the social skills to become “friend-eligible,” that child has picked up an important bully shield. Even if the child’s friends also get teased, they can still have a sense of belonging and can still serve as modulators for the effects of the bullying. There’s often a spillover effect once kids figure out that they’re friend-eligible. A child who had no friends at school may find friends at summer camp or in a club. At that point, the child realizes that he or she is worthy of friendship and has the ability to make friends: “Hey, I’m not a loser after all!” So the following year, it’s more likely that he will also find friends at school or not take on the belief that he is a loser in every situation.

Prevent bullying with help from Dr. Joel Haber : Bullying Expert, Counselor, Speaker and Author

Social Dominance Theory and Bullying

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According to Social Dominance Theory, there is a hierarchy in all group situations. Someone’s always going to be at the top of the ladder and someone’s always going to be on the bottom.

Now, of course, no one wants to be the one on the bottom—therefore, they want someone else to be on the bottom. This is part of what explains the “do-nothing” bystanders and even those who participate in bullying despite their consciences. As long as people continue to shun someone else, they’re safe from being the biggest loser in school—a title no one wants to claim.

A man named Daniel says that his son, a second grader at the time, had become a target of the class bully, a boy who’d been left back about three times and was a lot bigger than his classmates. Daniel told his son to ignore the kid. “It didn’t work for him, but a week or so later, while sitting at the dinner table, my son proudly announced that he’d been able to figure out how to handle Henry: ‘I told Henry that if he would stop beating on me, I would help him beat up the other kids!’

“Needless to say, we quickly informed him this wasn’t an option.” Daniel’s son was able to talk his way out of it and even reason with the bully that he should probably quit it now before he got to high school and wasn’t the biggest kid in school anymore and lines of people were waiting to pound on him. But you can see the logic in his initial thought—out of self-preservation, he was willing to help the bully terrorize someone else to get himself out of trouble!

Standing up for someone who’s on the bottom carries a big risk. It means that you could take that person’s place. You could look like a fool, could be laughed at and picked on and isolated. It takes a person with fairly high social standing to intervene and stop bullying alone. But if a group of kids take a stand, the bully is less likely to continue. It’s much less appealing to pick on a target who has a buffer of friends or allies. Friendship Groups The treatment and the cure for most