Another Reason to Put a Stop to Bullying — Dave’s Diary

This headline should make every school counselor, teacher and administrator sit up and take notice: Being bullied as a child can do more damage to a person’s mental health than abuse or neglect at home.We are doing a lot better at protecting kids from bullies in school, but there is still a lot of un-policed territory out on the Internet and in social media.

Across the pond, British researchers have found that kids who are the victims of bullies are about five times more likely to develop anxiety compared with those who were mistreated by their parents or other adults.

U.S. News & World Report says kids who were bullied were also nearly twice as likely to self-harm and have more symptoms of depression by age 18 as those who were mistreated by adults. The non-confrontational approach of “you know how boys are” or “all teen girls are mean to each other at some point” can no longer be accepted in the face of such statistics.

The study, published in The Lancet, looked at bullying data from more than 4,000 kids who were mistreated in the U.K. and 1,500 kids in the U.S.

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