Recalling Memories of Childhood Bullying: Links Between Early Victimisation and Anxiety in Adulthood

Recalling Memories of Childhood Bullying: Links Between Early Victimisation and Anxiety in Adulthood

Jenna Rayner

2014

Objectives: This study investigated the relationship between retrospective reports of bullying (primary school, secondary school and general experiences of bullying) with social anxiety (SAD), generalised anxiety (GAD) and grit (perseverance). Method: Demographic information was obtained from participants (n=147) as well as measures from primary school bullying, secondary school bullying and general bullying experiences utilising the Retrospective Bullying Questionnaire (RBQ; Schafer et al., 2004). The Social Phobia Inventory (Connor et al., 2000) measured social anxiety in participants, the Penn State Worry Questionnaire (Meyer et al., 1990) assessed general anxiety and the Grit Test (Duckwoth et al., 2007) evaluated participant’s determination. Results: There was evidence that primary school bullying was associated with higher levels of GAD whilst higher levels of SAD were associated with general bullying experiences. There was no evidence to suggest that the individual difference measure of grit impacted upon anxiety for participants. The results support previous studies which have linked anxiety disorders in adulthood to earlier experiences of bullying

In the Retrospective Bullying Questionnaire (RBQ) (Schafer et al., 2004), there are a number of sections, three of which were used in this study. The first looks at bullying in primary school, the second at bullying in secondary school and the third section at general bullying behaviour. The general bullying behaviour section concentrated on the long-term effects of any bullying the participants had experiences of in primary or secondary school. This section asked such questions as “Do you ever have dreams or nightmares about the bullying events?” and “Do you ever feel distressed in situations which remind you of the bullying event(s)?” (appendix A).
This questionnaire was subject to intensive pilot studies by Schafer et al. (2004) and insight was gained from the success of Rivers (2001) study which also utilised a retrospective measure. Reliability of the RBQ was assessed in the Schafer et al. study, which found a good level of test-retest reliability (Spearman correlation coefficients, primary school r=.88, secondary school r=.87).
The Social Phobia Inventory is a 17-item self-report questionnaire (Connor et al., 2000) that screens for social anxiety disorder and assesses the acuteness of such a disorder. The measure has three subsections which evaluate key symptoms of SAD: fear of social situations, avoidance of social situations and physiological discomfort within social situation. Each item is rated on a scale from zero to four. Scores ranged from 0 to 68, and a cut off score of 19 or above distinguishes between healthy controls and SAD sufferers. The SPIN has previously demonstrated good internal consistency as well as suitable test-retest reliability.
The Penn State Worry Questionnaire (Meyer, Miller, Metzger & Borkovec, 1990) is a 16-item questionnaire which has been considerably utilised in existing studies to measure generalised anxiety disorder in participants. This questionnaire has been shown to differentiate between different anxiety disorders, e.g. General anxiety sufferers score higher than phobics (Meyer et al., 1990). The scoring for questions 1, 3, 8, 10 and 11 were reverse scored for the analysis. Each answer is scored on a five point likert-type scale ranging from 1= not at all typical to 5= very typical. The scores could range from 16 to 80 where the average score in a “normal” student population was 49. The average score in a GAD population was 68 for men and women (Hawkins, 2008).
The Grit Test (Duckworth, Peterson, Matthews, & Kelly, D.R. (2007) is 12-item questionnaire which considers how ‘gritty’ a person you are. It looks at how you face challenges as a person and what your reaction to them is. The scores are added up and divided by 12. The maximum score on this scale is 5 (extremely gritty), and the lowest scale on this scale is 1 (not at all gritty). This measure was included as a personality measure to explore if there are any links between what type of person you are, and whether this affects if you are bullied or not.
Procedure
Following the briefing sheet, participants received a consent form to inform them of the nature of the study, their participation requirements, and their right to withdraw should they so wish. Once consent was gained, participants were asked to provide some demographic information on the following: gender, age, educational achievement, relationship status, ethnicity and employment status. For the purposes of analysis, females were coded as 1, whilst males were coded as 2.
Questionnaires made up the materials for this research project. Once participants had completed these they were informed of the end of the study and given more insight into the nature of the study. Participants were also given helplines and details of advisory websites, where they could go if they felt they had been affected by the nature of the research. The information for two journal articles whose research has facets of the current research were given, so that participants could gather more information if they so wished

Lancaster University

Rayner2014

Anamarija Veic

English

Data and a form

Dr Kathleen MCulloch

MSc

Social Psychology

A total of 167 adults participated in the study and were all informed of the nature of the research. Participation was voluntary and all participants completed the survey online via Surveymonkey. The sample was an opportunity sample, as the researcher posted links to her survey via Facebook, twitter and www.thestudentroom.co.uk (a site for students to offer advice and help to each other). Friends on Facebook reposted or shared the advertisement for participants in order to reach a wider audience. Once the participants followed the link to the survey on Surveymonkey, they were faced with a briefing note which explained the nature of the study, as well as their voluntary participation in the study (describing how the participant can withdraw from the study with no repercussions).
From the initial sample of 167 adults, data from 20 participants were excluded due to the incomplete nature of the data. This left a total of 147 participants, 72% female (106 female, 41 male) with an age range of 16-63. Participants were predominantly Caucasian (95%).

Correlational Analysis