Elsevier

Addictive Behaviors

Volume 34, Issues 6–7, June–July 2009, Pages 561-567
Addictive Behaviors

Victimization from mental and physical bullying and substance use in early adolescence

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.addbeh.2009.03.012Get rights and content

Abstract

Logistic regression analyses were used to assess the association between victimization from mental and physical bullying and use of alcohol, cigarettes, marijuana, and inhalants among middle school students. Self-report data were analyzed from 926 ethnically diverse sixth through eighth grade students (43% White, 26% Latino, 7% Asian American/Pacific Islander, 3% African American, 14% mixed ethnic origin, and 5% “other”) ages 11–14 years from southern California. Substance use was collected at two time points (fall 2004 and spring 2005) during an academic year. Models were run for each substance separately. Results supported an association between victimization from bullying and substance use. Youths who experienced each type of bullying (mental or physical) separately or in combination were more likely to report use of each substance in spring 2005. This finding held after controlling for gender, grade level, ethnicity and substance use in fall 2004.

Introduction

During the middle school years (grades 6–8), an increasing number of youths become the victims of bullying (e.g., Espelage, Bosworth, & Simon, 2001), or repeated “intentional physical and psychological harm” (Smith & Thompson, 1991, p. 1). Bullying can include verbal or written name-calling, teasing, and threats, social exclusion, and hitting, kicking, or other violent bodily contact (Espelage et al., 2001). Bullying can negatively affect concentration, self-esteem and social relationships in school, and promote feelings of isolation and hopelessness, often with long-term consequences that lead into adulthood (Batsche and Knoff, 1994, Kaltiala-Heino et al., 1999, Olweus, 1993). National statistics on the incidence of victimization from bullying indicate that bullying is a significant problem. Finkelhor, Ormrod, Turner, and Hamby (2005) sampled a nationally representative group of children between the ages of 2–17 and found that 50% of their sample had experienced bullying, which they termed emotional bullying or teasing. In earlier work that focused directly on school aged children, Nansel et al. (2001) found that 10.6% of students in grades 6 through 10 in the United States reported being victims of bullying and another 6.3% reported being both victims and perpetrators. They defined bullying as when someone “[says or does] nasty and unpleasant things to him or her” or “when a student is teased repeatedly in a way he or she doesn't like.”

Bullying victimization may be more prevalent among certain racial groups; at the same time boys and girls may be more likely to experience certain forms of bullying victimization. Results on race and its relationship to the prevalence of bullying victimization are equivocal, with many studies reporting higher victimization rates among Whites in comparison to African Americans and Hispanics; however, other studies report higher rates in African American populations compared to Whites and Hispanics (Peskin et al., 2006, Spriggs et al., 2007). Similarly, gender differences have been found for bullying victimization. Studies suggest that girls and boys experience these forms of bullying to a differential degree (Chesney-Lind et al., 2007, Ordonez, 2007). Specifically, boys are more likely than girls to experience physical bullying (Batsche and Knoff, 1994, Finkelhor et al., 2005; Nolin et al., 1995, Olweus, 1993, Whitney and Smith, 1993) and girls are more likely to demonstrate verbal/relational bullying than physical bullying (Smith, & Thompson, 1991; See Chesney-Lind et al., 2007 for a review). Further research in the area of bullying victimization and race and gender is needed.

In addition to being a time when the likelihood for experiencing bullying increases, early adolescence is also a key developmental period for initiation into substance use (D'D'Amico et al., 2005, Johnston et al., 2007). For example, 12% of 6th graders report lifetime use of alcohol (D'Amico, Ellickson, Wagner et al., 2005) compared to 39% of 8th graders (Johnston et al., 2008). In addition, from 6th to 8th grade, marijuana use increases more than eight fold (i.e., from 2% in 6th grade to 18% in 8th grade), cigarette use almost triples (i.e., from 9% in 6th grade to 22% in 8th grade), and by 8th grade 16% of youths report using inhalants (D'D'Amico et al., 2005, Johnston et al., 2008). Early initiation of substance use can lead to increased use and problems in late adolescence (Grant, 1997, Stice et al., 1998), which can then lead to substance abuse and/or dependence in young adulthood (D'Amico, Ellickson, Collins, Martino, & Klein, 2005). Thus, it is important to understand factors that may contribute to substance use.

One factor that may be associated with substance use is being the victim of bullying. There is a great deal of research that supports a strong association between victimization and substance use in adult populations (Kaufman Kantor and Straus, 1989, Kilpatrick et al., 1997, Martino et al., 2004). Despite the co-occurrence and increase of both bullying and substance use in early adolescent populations, few studies have examined this association. Research in this area has shown that victimization from bullying is associated with alcohol use among high school students (Kaltiala-Heino et al., 1999), with students who reported experiencing mental bullying victimization on a weekly basis also reporting heavier drinking compared to youths who did not report experiencing mental bullying victimization. Another study (Kuntsche & Gmel, 2004) found that teens who drank alone were more often victims of bullying than those who drank in social settings.

Although these studies add to our knowledge on bullying and substance use, the focus of this work to date has been on older youths. In addition, previous studies have mainly focused on alcohol use and have not addressed use of other substances, such as cigarettes, marijuana, and inhalants, all of which tend to increase during early adolescence. Furthermore, earlier work has not controlled for prior substance use when examining the relationship between substance use and bullying victimization. Therefore, they are unable to address whether or not the association between bullying victimization and substance use is significant for youths who already use a given substance. Finally, the questions examining bullying victimization have been limited and no one has examined whether mental or physical bullying may differentially impact substance use and whether these associations may differ depending on race and gender.

Our study attempts to address these gaps in the literature through an examination of the potential relationship between bullying victimization and substance use. Specifically, we assessed middle school (6th–8th grade) adolescents' 30-day alcohol, cigarette, marijuana, and inhalant use (ACMI) in fall 2004 and spring 2005. We examined both mental bullying (e.g., rumors, teasing, and threats) and physical bullying (e.g., pushing, shoving, hitting, and fighting) for the past 12 months in spring 2005.

We expected that victims of either type of bullying would be more likely to use ACMI compared to those who did not report victimization. Moreover, we hypothesized that youths who experienced both types of bullying would use ACMI more than those who had not experienced both types of bullying. We also expected that this association would be significant even after controlling for demographics and prior substance use. We expected that gender would play a role in bullying victimization rates, with more boys reporting physical bullying victimization and more girls reporting mental bullying victimization. We were interested in assessing whether ethnic differences would emerge in this younger population.

Section snippets

Participants

Data for these secondary analyses came from youths who participated in a survey which was collected from sixth, seventh, and eighth graders from middle schools in southern California during fall 2004 and spring 2005 (D'Amico & Edelen-Orlando, 2007; D'Amico & McCarthy, 2006). Youths who were outliers for age were excluded from further analyses (i.e., youths under 10 and older than 14 years of age, n = 11), based on the theory that these youths may represent cohorts that are developmentally behind

Cross tabulations

Cross tabulations indicate that of those students who used any of the substances investigated in this study at Time 2, 70–86% did not report use of that substance at Time 1. This suggests that some students started using substances during the time period while they were victimized. These data also show that the majority of youth who reported using any other substances also reported drinking alcohol (76%, 71%, and 72% respectively for co-occurring cigarette, marijuana, or inhalant use). However,

Discussion

During the middle school years, bullying victimization and substance use both tend to increase. In spite of this phenomenon, research has primarily examined this association among older adolescents. The unique contributions of this study include its focus on early adolescents, assessment of both mental and physical bullying victimization, examination of the association between these two types of bullying victimization and several substances: alcohol, cigarettes, marijuana, and inhalants, and

Acknowledgements

This work was supported by a grant from the National Institute of Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism (R21AA13284) to Elizabeth J. D'Amico. The authors would like to acknowledge the support of the Santa Monica School District and the two middle schools where this research was conducted. We would like to thank the Principals and PE departments whose support made this project possible. We would also like to acknowledge Mary Lou Gilbert and Stefanie Stern for their work on this project.

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