Psychologists combat bullying by looking into the reasons behind the mental and emotional factors as to why students bully. Developmental psychologist Jaana Juvonen has spent a decade researching bullies and their victims. She debates the long held theory that bullies have low self-esteem and are disliked by their peers. On the contrary, her findings show that bullies often times have very high self-esteem and are liked by students and teachers alike. At the beginning of her research, she found it difficult to convince people that bullying was a serious problem. 10 years ago, bullying was not seen as such a big issue: "it was very much a challenge for us to convince our audiences that bullying is a problem. Ten years ago — and even today in some parts of the country and in some families — there was a belief that bullying is just part of growing up … and that these experiences are even needed [by the victims] because they ‘help build character’"(UCLANewsroom). This is far from true, as bullying can have a serious impact in a child’s life. From Juvonen’s research, we find that victims of bullying are usually unpopular.
The research found that "bullies are, by far, the coolest kids," Juvonen said. "And the victims, in turn, are very uncool”(UCLANewsroom). While researching elementary students, however, she found that bullies were not seen as cooler than other students. Elementary students did not like the students who they deemed bullies. That led to the question “Why is sixth grade the year bullies are deemed popular?” Juvonen concluded it was because sixth grade is a year of great transition, form elementary school to middle school: "Think about all the changes that kids go through when they transfer from elementary school to middle school. The school not only becomes an average seven times larger than their elementary school, but now they go from one [class] period to the next, having a different teacher in each and also different classmates."
The sociological perspective helps us to understand and analyze scientifically social phenomena like bullying’s correlation with suicide. Because bullying occurs in patterns and to large numbers of people then they are deemed consequences of social structures. Bullying is deviant behavior. People learn to bully from society. Socialization is the process in which we develop our awareness of social norms and values. If during socialization bullying is seen as normal, then the child will assume that this is the case. In a study done by Japanese sociologists Shoko Yoneyama and Asao Naito, it is suggested that the social structure of schools is the cause of bullying: “These include authoritarian, hierarchical, and power-dominant human relationships, alienating modes of learning, high levels of regimentation, dehumanizing methods of discipline, and highly interventionist human relationships in an excessively group-oriented social environment”(tandfonline).
