Bullying among Students of Intermediate Schools in Al-Najaf. A Societal Study

Academic Paper from the year 2024 in the subject Pedagogy - School Pedagogics, grade: PhD Researcher, University of Babylon (Najaf Al-Ashraf Directorat), course: PhD, language: English, abstract: The current study is an attempt to discover forms of bullying that students expose in Iraqi intermediate schools, characteristics of bullies/victims, and sittings and timings in which bullying occurs. It is a descriptive societal study in one of the Iraqi Govenorates which is Al-Najaf Al-Ashraf. The data was collected from Iraqi intermediate school students by means of face-to-face interviews. The total number of participants is (2000), (1000) boys and (1000) girls whose ages range between (13-16) years. The importance of this study is to know and understand what types of bullying among students of intermediate schools and how to treat or reduce this societal phenomenon. Bullying is a serious and common problem nowadays not only for bullies and their victims, but also for the total community because of its psychological, social and physical impact on individual development. One of the bullying incidents is school bullying which is widespread nowadays. Olweus (1994) defines bullying as a repeated behavior (including both verbal and physical behaviors) that occurs over time in a relationship characterized by an imbalance of strength and power. In addition, Dodge (1991) adds that bullying is a subset of aggression.