Risk and Protective Factors Associated with the Bullying Involvement of Students with Emotional and Behavioral Disorders

Abstract

Bullying has been recognized as a dynamic process, where involvement is based on interactions between an individual and the social-ecological factors related to the individual's environment. While involvement in bullying is not exclusive to one population of students, evidence suggests that students with disabilities are overrepresented within the bullying dynamic. However, few empirical studies have explored subgroup differences among this population of students. The current study examined rates of bullying involvement and the intersection of individual attributes among middle school students (n = 163) identified with specific disabilities and their peers without disabilities (n = 163). As hypothesized, students with emotional and behavioral disorders (EBD) engaged in significantly higher levels of bullying and fighting than other subgroups of students. Additionally, higher levels of anger predicted higher levels of bully perpetration for students with EBD, where higher levels of victimization predicted higher levels of bully perpetration for students with disabilities other than EBD. These findings demonstrate the importance of recognizing the influence of the characteristic differences between subgroups of students with disabilities, and the unique influence these characteristics may have on student involvement within the bullying dynamic.