Schools need to have the confidence that they can look after the best interests of students and should not be put in a compromising situation due to episodes of bullying, says Dr Raymond Hamden, clinical and forensic psychologist with the Human Relations Institute and Clinics in Dubai.
If the bullying behaviour of a child is left unpunished or not corrected, it could lead to problems in adulthood. “This behavioural disorder will result in anti-social behaviour later on in life,” he says.
Schools, law enforcement authorities and parents should cooperate so that these situations are correctly diagnosed and quickly remedied. Anger and aggression could be due to genetic factors and if this is the case, the traits can be seen from birth. Most often though, when you a child is a bully at home, it is most likely due to learned behaviour from parents who are modelling anger and aggression at home.
Very often, says, Dr Hamden, parents do not recognise the signs (of their bullying child or a child being bullied) unless their attention is drawn to them by the school, or their friends and neighbours complain about their child’s behaviour. What also can keep parents in the dark is the ability of a bully to be exhibiting normal behaviour at home. “A child who is a bully at school may be manipulative and sweet at home,” says Dr Hamden. “Also, bullying behaviour can be anything from becoming friends with another child and stealing his lunch box, or inviting him home and beating him up, to hitting him at the playground or in an alley.”
It is also important to understand the way a child’s behaviour changes when he is the victim of bullying. His changed behaviour could be because he is compensating for being bullied at school.
There are two types of victims, according to Dr Hamden. One is a passive victim and the other is a proactive victim (see traits below), who sometimes goes on to become a bully himself. One should watch out for signs, like an abrupt change in a child’s behaviour. Has he gone from being courteous, kind and sympathetic to others, cooperative at home, productive at school and interested in extra-curricular activities, to getting poor grades, not wanting to go to school, lacking in motivation for studies, no longer involved un exercise or hobbies, not interested in families and friends? If the answer is yes to many of these conditions, then you have a problem.
It is normal for children sometimes to be tired of the usual routine and want a change in terms of how they move away from a task or situation. But if you sense changes in the child’s general principles of living, then the child could be traumatised, says the specialist.
Children are more exposed to the world today than ever before and their young minds do not have the experience to decipher right from wrong. “Being a child, teenager or a youth in today’s times is not an easy job,” says Dr Hamden, noting that parenting is being left to television’s influence.
“Television is today motivated by violence, sexuality and profanity; these have been the three money-making elements for decades and they haven’t changed much,” he says. Even in “nonsensical music” and dance performances, there is an element of aggression. “Parents are not listening to the songs (which often have lyrics with disturbing overtones) their elementary school-going children are dancing to. Instead, many of them believe it is cool to let their them dance to these songs at birthday parties.”
The process of nurturing a child to withstand such negative influences and benefit from positive ones that will build them to be strong, assertive individuals needs to start from the early years, he says. The more involved a parent is in his child’s development, the less the chances are of things going drastically wrong.
