AMA takes action to prevent bullying

In recognition of the National Day of Action Against Bullying and Violence, the AMA today released two new practical tools to help raise awareness of child and adolescent bullying and its health effects and to provide sound advice about who people can turn to for help.

The Minister for School Education, Early Childhood and Youth, The Hon Peter Garrett MP, and AMA President, Dr Steve Hambleton, launched the two new AMA brochures at Mascot Public School in Sydney this morning.

A brochure for older children and adolescents, Bullying: What you need to know, explains what bullying is, provides specific information on cyber bullying, and gives advice about how to deal with being bullied and how to identify bullying behaviours.

A second brochure, AMA Guidance for Doctors on Childhood Bullying, contains a childhood bullying fact sheet for use by medical professionals who are interested to know more about childhood bullying and its health impacts.

Minister Garrett said that all school students need information and encouragement to work collectively towards reducing the incidence of bullying in Australian schools.

“It’s been estimated that one in four school students are bullied every few weeks or more,” the Minister said.

“Schools have an important role to play in the prevention of bullying and many schools are making concerted efforts to prevent and address the problem.

“There can never be too much information to help prevent bullying and I am sure that schools and families will welcome the contribution of the AMA in the ongoing campaign to stamp out bullying and its harmful effects,” the Minister said.

Dr Hambleton said that young people might be reluctant to disclose that they are being affected by bullying, especially online or through social networking sites, and that is why the AMA is promoting doctors as a source of safe and reliable information and advice about bullying.

“Doctors are a trusted and confidential source of information in the community,” Dr Hambleton said.

“We want young people to know that they can talk about bullying with their family doctor, and we want to make sure that doctors are equipped with comprehensive information and advice to help their young patients.

“The physical and mental health consequences for people who are bullied are serious.  Victims of bullying can become traumatised, anxious and seriously depressed, and sometimes these problems can continue through to adulthood.

“The AMA congratulates the Government and the Minister for taking a strong stand against bullying,” Dr Hambleton said.

Background:

• Research from the Murdoch Children’s Research Institute found students who were bullied had almost a two-fold increase in the likelihood of depressive symptoms the following year;
• While schools can work towards the prevention of face to face bullying, cyber bullying that happens outside the school setting is an increasing problem;
• Cyber bullying can take a number of forms including sending threatening text messages or emails; circulating untrue, embarrassing or hurtful information by sms, email or social networking sites; emailing or posting altered images; sending a virus or spy ware or taking on someone’s identity online and damaging their reputation;
• Cyber bullying can involve a wide audience, the person being bullied may have little or no respite from online bullying, and the person or people doing the bullying may have some element of anonymity;
• According to a January 2012 study by the Ipsos Social Research Institute, of the 24 countries surveyed Australia was the worst place for bullying over social networks, and the fifth for bullying online (this means that Australians were more likely to bully on social network sites like Facebook and Twitter than in chat rooms or on mobile phones);
• A survey conducted by BoysTown found that the most prevalent forms of cyber bullying were name calling (80 per cent), abusive comments (67 per cent), and spreading rumours (66 per cent);
• Recent research suggests that 10 to 15 per cent of students have experienced cyber bullying more than once (experience from the US and the UK suggests that this could increase to 30 to 40 per cent);
• In a survey conducted for the recent Government Inquiry into Cyber Safety, 8.8 per cent of survey participants (15,592) admitted that they had cyber bullied someone else. Of those, 66 per cent reported that they had also been the victim of cyber bullying;
• Research commissioned by Microsoft in 2008 found that 83 per cent of parents did not know what to do if a child was being cyber bullied, and two out of three were unsure of the best ways to help their children; and
• Facebook has introduced tools that aim to reduce cyber bullying (and identify those people who may be at risk of suicide).

Schools and medical practices can obtain hard copies of the brochures by contacting the Federal AMA at mrickard@ama.com.au

Bullying: What you need to know is available electronically at http://ama.com.au/youthhealth/bullying

AMA Guidance for Doctors on Childhood Bullying is available electronically at http://ama.com.au/youthhealth/bullying-guidance-for-doctors

CONTACT:         John Flannery                       02 6270 5477 / 0419 494 761

                        Kirsty Waterford                    02 6270 5464 / 0427 209 753

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