Girls & bullying

New research from the Universities of Warwick and Hertfordshire identifies differences between girls’ bullying and boys’ bullying.

One of the findings was that girls are more likely to be the victims of sustained bullying than boys. Such assertions add fuel to the misleading assumption that girls are more malicious and cruel than boys. After a teaching career of almost thirty years in co-ed, all boys’ and all girls’ schools, including the last 14 years as the Deputy and then the Head of two all girls’ schools, I would like to offer what I hope may be a useful overview of girls’ bullying behaviour, and their response to the bullying behaviour of others.

First of all, I would assert that girls are not naturally more malicious and cruel than boys, just as I would not accept that women are more malicious and cruel than men. However, girls are both more subtle and more sensitive. Girls are also more likely to interpret unfriendly behaviour as bullying.

In fact, we all tend to use the word ‘bullying’ too readily these days. Children will occasionally be unkind to each other. Friendships shift and, when they do, some can feel left out and hurt. But ‘bullying’ presupposes a sustained period of deliberately inflicting pain in some way. Relationships tend to matter very much to girls. Being accepted and being popular are particularly important to them, and they are more sensitive and easily hurt when they feel isolated.

I think bullying takes place in every school (and probably most work environments too). However, schools have become far more adept at anticipating and preventing bullying and spotting and dealing with problems if they do happen. They will have policies which they will use to guide them and make expectations clear to the children. They will openly say that bullying is not tolerated in their communities. And they will discipline bullies and support those who are the target of bullying on a case by case basis.

Schools also work to support and strengthen those who are the targets of bullying. Given that we can all find ourselves on the receiving end of some sort of intimidation, we need to develop the strategies to defend and assert ourselves, and schools can help to give your daughter the tools to deal with such situations.

If you feel your daughter is being bullied talk to the staff at her school and work with them to help her. Also, read more about Coping with girls’ bullying. You may have to work hard to persuade your child that talking to the school is the right way forward, but, in my experience, it is.

Jill Berry, Dame Alice Harpur School, Bedford