Bullying Victims See Lower GPAs, Particularly High Achieving Blacks And Latinos, Study Shows

Bullying victims often cite lasting psychological damage as a consequence, but a new study shows that those who are bullied also suffer academically, especially high-achieving black and Latino students.

The study shows that students who reported being bullied in the 10th grade saw a slight decrease in GPA by 12th grade -- but the change is sharper for black and Latino students who tend to earn high grades.

While the overall decrease in GPA for bullied students over the studied period was 0.049 points (on a GPA scale with 0 being the lowest and 4 being the highest), black students saw a 0.3-point decrease in 12th grade GPA from a 3.5 GPA in 9th grade -- before they were bullied. Worse, high achieving Latinos who were bullied experienced a 0.5-point drop in GPA from a 3.5 their freshman year. Carrying the same control variables, bullied white students only saw a 0.03-point drop in GPA.

"Stereotypes about black and Latino youth suggest that they perform poorly in school," study co-author Lisa M. Williams said in a statement. "High achieving black and Latinos who do not conform to these stereotypes may be especially vulnerable to the effect bullying has on grades."

Low-achieving black and Latino students proved to respond less academically to bullying, yielding under 0.1-point decrease in GPA over the period, whereas low-achieving white students responded more with over a 0.1-point drop.

All Asian students, whether high- or low-achieving, experienced a 0.3-point decrease in GPA after being bullied in 10th grade.

Led Williams, a doctoral student in sociology at Ohio State University, and Anthony A Peguero, a sociology professor at Virginia Tech, the study worked off of previous national bullying data and surveyed 9,590 students across 580 schools. The results are presented today at the American Sociological Association's annual meeting in Las Vegas.

Williams and Peguero found that 40 percent of those studied reported experiencing instances of bullying. The researchers analyzed the causal effects of bullying on academic performance by removing variables of a student's former grades and family background.

The results of this study echo those of another released earlier this month, in which research showed that schools with more instances of student bullying yielded lower test scores.

Recent studies have also revealed other negative effects of bullying beyond psychological damage, including higher odds of bullying victims becoming overweight or obese.

Comments

[medic628]

12:12 AM on 08/29/2011

To any student out there who wants to get their education. Do not let anyone stand in your way. Move them. Go around them. Get them out of you way and proceed with your dream. Education is power.

[Larsami1]

08:13 PM on 09/16/2011

I agree but when you're around it daily, it has a negative effect that can't be ignored. It's written that the tongue has the power of life and death and so it does. I would take a very secure student to let the ridicule pass. Eventually, the student will fight, change schools or even have suicidal thoughts.

[Loyal Whig]

09:52 PM on 08/28/2011

This is why school vouchers are important.

The smartest students need to be free to move to the best schools where being smart is not selling out.

[treemonkey]

02:32 PM on 08/28/2011

It is great to see new ground broken in understanding the effects of bullying on high achieving minority students. I also believe that this is another tip of the iceberg revelation. How many students could be much higher performing, but have either consciously, or subconsciously adjusted their own performance down, in order to avoid bullying in the first place. The very smart often have to manage their performance, as well as how others perceive them, in order to avoid negative consequences and outright bullying. As an upper grade, elementary school teacher in an inner city school, I find myself repeating, and teaching strategies that others from this neighborhood have used to be able to excel in middle and high school while surrounded by many who resent their success. Like many real life problems, this is a tough complex issue to solve, but if we do not grapple with it, and if we just stick to the Race to the Top, blame the teachers for everything approach, we lose the opportunities to really advance our educational system. Endemic poverty produces situations that if we could work with, we could make grand improvements, rather than trying to solve problems with more lip service.

[Racial victim]

09:01 PM on 08/27/2011

White kids can be denied an equal education when they report that they and their white friends are being threatened every day and assaulted. I have a letter from a school district saying my son can not go to some of his classes and can only use the nurse's restroom. This is what happens when whites report that are being threatened and assaulted by african americans. I thought equal meant equal for everyone. State atty office did not inform me they represente­d the school if a court case ever came up. Their investigat­ion took 7 months with them finding he was being bullied but there was nothing they could do. I missed the 6 month deadline for a federal civil rights investigat­ion. We moved to another state to get an equal education regardless of race.

[duel1980]

02:19 PM on 08/29/2011

This seems a bit discriminatory.....bullies comes in all colors.....I am sorry that your son went through such a traumatic experience.

[been2there]

04:19 PM on 08/27/2011

My son attended an online charter school; for one of his projects, he surveyed other students to see why they chose the school. 75% cited bullying.
We really do have a serious problem when excellence is socially unacceptable.

[duel1980]

02:21 PM on 08/29/2011

oh didn't you get the memo. We are now the United States of Mediocrity. Being a nerd is not just uncool, it makes your a social pariah. Just check out what TV offers nowadays...."16 with Kids"...."Keeping up with the Kardashians".....

[UWorlds1]

03:02 PM on 08/27/2011

I have to blame other blacks for this also. When I was going to school and made very high marks, blacks would say I was trying to be 'white'. This still goes on today. Black people need to celebrate school and not respect violence. Some people are more concerned with what they wear to school, who is going with who, etc. We need to take advantage of public schools and make them the best they can be.

[been2there]

04:21 PM on 08/27/2011

Sadly, this is often true. I stopped and picked up a couple of black girls once because they were surrounded by a jeering ring of kids angry because these two had aced a test. It was a scene right out of Little Rock at its worst, except the tormenters were also black.
The two girls chose to go to independent study and continue to excel.

[ggranny]

08:59 PM on 08/27/2011

I have always said that we don't have bad children... we have bad parents. You are right about the silly stuff like what to wear personally I like uniforms, but many students and THEIR PARENTS don't. Children learn from their parents and if parents were more involved with their children and their schools we would not have so much bullying. Some parents only go to the school when their child is in trouble and most will be ready for the teachers involved. We as a race can be our own worst enemy...so full of envy, jealousy and suffering from low self-esteem...some only feel good about themselves as they tear down others that may be self assured and work hard to make good grades. Parents get involved with your children...develope a relationship with them and their teachers. That's what we did back in the day. We taught our children the three R's Respect for self...Respect for others and Responsility, and it paid off.

[been2there]

12:31 AM on 08/27/2011

As some one who was bullied mercilessly, I can only say, "Well, no surprise, Sherlock!"

[francisco cortes]

11:41 PM on 08/26/2011

I am a teacher of mathematics in Puerto Rico, i do not like bullying, i know how it feels being bullied, but reality in schools is more complex. Students bully but also adults, including teachers. I will show you everything; teachers bullying teachers, teacher bullying student, students bullying teacher, students bullying students, parents bullying teacher, is xtremely hard for a teacher to bully a parent. How to eliminate bullying among kids when adults themselve bully?

[randyman99]

07:07 PM on 08/26/2011

I must have been an outlyer. I am a European-American. Looking back, I got in a fight in 10th grade, and my attitude towards grades and school plummeted after that. Maybe I lost a full point. In senior year, I reapplied myself and pulled my GPA back up to A's for the year, but my overall GPA for high school suffered over 0.5 points.

[drmindhealer]

05:49 PM on 08/25/2011

The attitude of some parents and educators towards bullying needs to change. Perhaps "back then" it was seen as harmless but in the modern age bullying has the potential to cause widespread damage with the help of cyberspace. What used to be a comment written on the bathroom wall now quickly can become a tweet or a Facebook post that spreads through a town in seconds. In urban schools the effect is magnified - the stakes are even higher. I've seen it first-hand. ALL schools need a Zero Tolerance Policy that all students AND parents sign with real consequences. Teachers and administrators need training to spot it and intervene (some schools do this already and that is fantastic) before it is too late.

[butterfly7624468]

04:37 PM on 08/25/2011

I'm a teacher who has a zero tolerance policy against bullying regardless of what the policy is by the administration at my school site. It never ceases to amaze me how adults can turn a blind eye towards bullying and harassment. But that's the reality. When you teach at an at risk school, the conventional wisdom seems to be that it goes with the territory and the kids need to work it out for themselves. Not in this day and age. Tenure allows me to get confrontational with administrators and make them do something about it. Without that, there would be a whole lot more bullying going on.

[drmindhealer]

05:51 PM on 08/25/2011

Right on! You are on the front lines of it - thank you for being a stand for these kids!

[treemonkey]

02:36 PM on 08/28/2011

I would like to be your first F&F. Your willingness to stand up and do something about bullying, no matter what, is commendable. Keep up the good fight.

[JD Savage]

11:49 AM on 08/25/2011

Bullying goes beyond the numbers, to those left behind in its tragic wake. Check out http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wa595xwWT1s

[Dk Schae]

11:43 AM on 08/25/2011

When I want to school back in the day (I graduated High School in '85), bullying was nothing more then teasing and name calling. Sometimes there was a fight. But it wasn't life threatening. In today's world kids have access to spreading bad rumors around online making a person's life hell, and there are more kids who use knives and guns and other weapons as a means of bullying.

[TexasTreader]

11:41 AM on 08/25/2011

As long as schools are paid for having bodies in the seats, bullying will be an ignored problem. Thugs should be in reform schools with security to deal with them.

[Racial victim]

09:04 PM on 08/27/2011

The bullies also put so much fear in other kids that they can't concentrate on learning and this keeps test scores down and some schools probably prefer lower test scores as the federal govt keeps throwing money at these schools. They make minor changes to keep from getting shut down after so many years of low test scores but nothing really changes.

[Nerdiac]

09:25 AM on 08/25/2011

I was a high achieving minority student in a typical "urban" neighborhood. The bullying referenced in this article probably means "teasing" to most, but in the really bad schools and areas, this teasing always escalates to violence. After a few occasions of me coming home bleeding from the bus stop, and having to deal with "authorities" who turned a blind eye, my mother (thankfully) homeschooled me. I would guess that this is the type of bullying that leads to grade point averages dropping. What kind of learning can you do in a severely toxic environment where all you can think about is how you're going to get home alive? Nowhere in the article did I see an examination of the differences between the school areas and cultures. Every neighborhood is not the same; every bully is not the same.

[Aesthete]

10:51 AM on 08/25/2011

I, too, was teased and bullied as a youngster as a consequence of high achievement. To this day, the blindness and inertia of many of the adults in charge never ceases to amaze me.