Brief antibullying intervention for adolescents in public schools

This was a controlled experimental study whose subjects were 1,043 students in 5^th through 9^th grades from public schools in Porto Alegre/State of Rio Grande do Sul, conducted between April and November 2015. Adolescents and school teachers randomly assigned to the intervention group participated in two meetings focused on educative aspects of bullying. Outcome was assessed using the Bullying Questionnaire - victim and perpetrator version. Generalized Estimating Equations was used to evaluate the effect of the intervention.

Results:

Average age of subjects was 12.5 (SD=1.62) years. A total of 613 (58.7%) adolescents participated in interventions. They were compared to 430 (41.3%) participants in the control group. The study did not observe any significant difference in bullying scores after the intervention.

Conclusions:

This study indicates the usefulness of clarifying precisely what bullying is in schools as part of an initial approach to an educative strategy on this topic.

Keywords:
Bullying; Adolescent; School health services

Characteristics		Intervention	Control	p-value
Characteristics		n=613 (58.8%)	n=430 (41.2%)	p-value
Sociodemographic
Sex*	Female	322 (52.5)	204 (47.4)	0.120
	Male	291 (47.5)	226 (52.6)	0.120
Age**		12.51 (1.66)	12.69 (1.56)	0.088
Ethnicity*#	White	268 (44.4)	213 (50.2)	0.279
	Black	147 (24.4)	93 (21.9)
	Brown	162 (26.9)	95 (22.4)
	Others	26 (4.2)	23 (5.3)
School Performance
Repetition*	Yes	218 (35.6)	185 (43.1)	0.017
	No	394 (64.4)	244 (56.9)
Expulsion/suspension*##
	Yes	38 (6.3)	29 (6.8)	0.823
	No	569 (93.7)	397 (93.2)
Bullying
Victim**	Total	28.3 (24.4; 32.2)	29.1 (24.7;32.4)	0.138
Perpetrator***	Total	25.36 (22.4; 28,8)	26.3 (22.4;29.6)	0.022

Time	Group			p-value
Time	Intervention	Control	Total	Group	Time	Interaction
Direct physical
Before	10.3[10.1;10.4]	10.6[10.4;10.8]	10.4[10.3;10.6]	0.001	<0.001	0.068
After	10.5[10.3;10.7]	11.2[10.8;11.5]	10.8[10.6;11.1]
Total	10.4[10.2;10.5]	10.9[10.6;11.1]
Direct verbal
Before	10.5[10.3;10.7]	11.2[10.9;11.5]	10.8[10.6;11.0]	<0.001	<0.001	0.742
After	10.9[10.6;11.2]	11.6[11.2;12.1]	11.3[11.0;11.5]
Total	10.7[10.5;10.9]	11.4[11.1;11.7]
Indirect
Before	7.7 [7.5; 7.8]	7.9 [7.7; 8.2]	7.8 [7.6; 7.9]	0.047	0.005 308.	0.760
After	7.9 [7.7; 8.1]	8.2 [7.9; 8.5]	8.1 [7.8; 8.2]
Total	7.8 [7.6; 7.9]	8.1 [7.8; 8.3]
Total
Before	28.4[28.0;28.8]	28.9[28.5;29.4]	28.7[28.4;29.0]	0.070	0.320	0.994
After	28.6[28.2;29.0]	29.1[28.6;29.6]	28.8[28.5;29.2]
Total	28.5[28.1;28.9]	29.1[28.6; 9.4]

Time	Control			p-value
Time	Intervention	Group	Total	Group	Time	Interaction
Direct physical
Before	9.9[9.8;10.1]	10.1[9.9;10.2]	10.0 [9.8; 10.1]	0.162	0.001	0.556
After	10.1[9.9;10.3]	10.3[10.0; 10.6]	10.2[10.1;10.4]
Total	10.0[9.9;10.2]	10,2[10.0; 10.4]
Direct verbal
Before	9.5[9.3; 9.7]	9.7[9.5;10.0]	9.6 [9.5; 9.8]	0.080	0.026	0.767
After	9.7[9.5; 9.9]	9.9 [9.65; 10.23]	9.8[9.6; 10.0]
Total	9.6[9.4; 9.8]	9.8 [9.65; 10.09]
Indirect
Before	6.7[6.6; 6.8]	6.7[6.6;6.9]	6.7[6.6; 6.8]	0.284	0.025	0.378
After	6.8[6.6; 6.9]	6.9[6.7;7.1]	6.8[6.7; 6.9]
Total	6.7[6.6; 6.8]	6.8[6.7;6.9]
Total
Before	26.3[26.0;26.6]	26.7[26.3;27.0]	26.5[26.2;26.7]	0.081	0.880	0.707
After	26.3[26.0;26.6]	26.7[26.3; 27.0]	26.5[26.2;26.7]
Total	26.3[26.1;26.6]	26.7[26.3;27.0]

Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Sul. Escola de Enfermagem Rua São Manoel, 963 -Campus da Saúde , 90.620-110 - Porto Alegre - RS - Brasil, Fone: (55 51) 3308-5242 / Fax: (55 51) 3308-5436 - Porto Alegre - RS - Brazil
E-mail: revista@enf.ufrgs.br

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[1] Corresponding author:
Gabriela Bottan E-mail: gabibottan@gmail.com