CONTENTS

About This Course

Table of Contents

1. School Bullying: What It Is and Why It Hurts
2. The Role of Bullies, Victims, and Witnesses
3. Factors Contributing to Bullying and Violence
4. Screening and Assessment
5. Treatment For Children and Adolescents
6. Prevention and Intervention
7. Legal and Ethical Issues

Supplements
Case Studies
Fact Sheets
References
Resources

The ABCs of Bullying
Addressing, Blocking, and Curbing School Aggression

Clinical Issues With Children and Adolescents

Mental health professionals in the schools or in the community working with kids treat the whole gamut of emotional and behavioral problems. In the context of bullying and school violence, professionals may see students with depression, anxiety, conduct disorder, alcohol use, suicidality, and issues relating to being a child of an alcoholic or witnessing domestic violence.

As discussed earlier, certain influences, whether they are familial or biological, play a role in whether a child may become a bully or victim. Children and adolescents may present with depression, but the underlying reasons behind the depression may be connected to a bullying/victim issue. It is not uncommon for a mood disorder, depression, to coexist with an anxiety disorder. Similarly, alcohol use disorders often coexist with mood disorders and anxiety disordersref.

Assessing and diagnosing disorders in children can be challenging for several reasons, includingref:

• Children are often unable to verbalize thoughts and feelings.
• Clinicians become more reliant on others' interpretations of the child, such as parents, teachers, and other professionals.
• Children's normal development is not static, in that a behavior at a certain age may be quite normal, but at another age might suggest a mental illness.
• Criteria for diagnosing most disorders in children have been derived from those for adults.
• The boundaries between normal and abnormal are more fluid and less clear in children than adults.

Despite these challenges, clinicians can effectively assess and treat children and adolescents by looking at the frequency of a given symptom, how long it is present, and whether the symptom is occurring at an unexpected time. Many symptoms, such as outbursts of aggression, fearfulness or shyness, and difficulty paying attention are normal for children at specific ages.

By gathering information from various sources, clinicians working with children and adolescents hope to gain as comprehensive a framework as they can. Screening questionnaires provide a guide for professionals to interpret results. Scored behaviors can then be examined to indicate a need for a referral to a mental health professionalref.

The American Academy of Pediatrics has developed a checklist of environmental situations and potentially stressful events that can help a counselor recognize the complexity of a child's life. A child's behavior may stem from a reaction to any one or more of these situations.