Using Stigmatization Theory to Identify Factors Related to Peer Victimization Among Adolescents

Introduction: Children and adolescents subjected to peer victimization (i.e. bullying) experience psychosomatic and social symptoms that threaten health and development. Peer victimization represents a pervasive issue, affecting 19.4 – 28% of adolescents in the United States, and the most recent Healthy People calls for a 2% decrease by 2020. Successfully achieving this goal requires understanding what predisposes some adolescents to being bullying victims, but a gap exists in current literature incorporating physical characteristics with psychological or sociological ones. This study uses Goffman’s theory of stigmatization, which includes physical features, to identify factors associated with being victimized by peers.

Methods: Secondary analysis of 2009 and 2011 Boston, Massachusetts data from the Youth Risk Behavior Surveillance System (YRBSS). Participants were 2,301 high school students in the Boston Public School System (12.7% Caucasian; µ 16.15 years old [s.d. 1.298]). Independent variables fit Goffman’s three types of stigmatization: Ethnic or Creed-based (age, sex, race/ethnicity, and immigration history), Physical Traits (height percentile, BMI), and Character Traits (average grades, sexual orientation, history of sexual intercourse).  The dependent variable was whether a student had experienced any bullying (at school or via technology) within the past year. Path modeling informed the multivariate hierarchical logistic regression technique used. Sex differences were evaluated by stratification.

Results: Being a girl increased an adolescent’s odds of being bullied (O.R. 1.58, p=0.005), and identifying as Black decreased the odds of being bullied (O.R. 0.64, p=0.042) in the full, unstratified model. Greater age decreased odds across all models (overall: 17 year olds O.R. 0.49, p=0.005), whereas any sexual orientation status besides heterosexual increased them (overall O.R. 2.85, p=<0.001, boys O.R. 5.93, p=<0.001). Body weight was significant in the overall and girls-only models in quadratic form (overall: BMI O.R. 0.78, p=0.01; BMI² O.R. 1.01, p=0.007), indicating greater odds of being bullied among the highest and lowest BMIs. Worse grades generally lowered odds of being bulled for boys (Mostly B’s O.R. 0.50, N.S.) but increased them for girls (Mostly D’s O.R. 2.43, p=0.019). Girls reporting ever having had sexual intercourse also had increased odds of being bullied (O.R. 1.8, p=0.004).

Conclusions: Stigmatization theory predicts factors associated with being bullied among a large, diverse sample of high school students. These findings suggest bullying prevention should start young; emphasize tolerance, variation, and sexuality as normal; and empower victims. Targeted interventions may benefit from offering sex-specific programs.