Young people's comparisons of cross-gender and same-gender bullying in British secondary schools

Background: Young people are highly aware of gender differences in bullying, yet little is known about boys bullying girls and vice versa. Most research focuses on bullies and victims but rarely on bully–victim dyads. Since same-gender bullying is more frequent than cross-gender bullying, studies on same-gender bullying tend to dominate. The aim of this study is to extend knowledge on cross-gender and same-gender bullying. Currently there is no consensus on whether same-gender and cross-gender bullies are associated with particular forms of bullying. A reason is that gender has traditionally been used as a subject variable in bullying research, whereas a gender-as-a-stimulus framework may be more useful for understanding cross-gender bullying. Purpose: The following study takes a gender-as-a-stimulus-variable focus in order to determine how boys and girls in British secondary schools socially construct cross-gender and same-gender bullying. Gender refers to masculinity and femininity roles that are socially constructed. Such ‘myths’ about dichotomous gender differences nonetheless impact on ‘real’ bullying experiences since they structure status hierarchies, and children tend to evaluate their own and their peers' adequacy in terms of gender stereotypes. To increase our understanding of how gender and gender roles affect power imbalances in the school-bullying dynamic and risk for victimisation, this study asks: ‘Why might a boy (girl) bully a girl (boy)? ’ and ‘Is a female (male) victim worse off with a same-gender bully or a cross-gender bully? ’ Sample: From eight mixed-sex British state secondary schools, 471 students, aged 11–16, sampled from Years 7, 9 and 11, were interviewed in 96 groups of approximately five students each (about 60 students from each school). The average age of the students in the study was 13 years 6 months, and 54% of the sample were girls. Four of the schools were in Cambridgeshire, an area of low ethnic mix and relatively high socio-economic status (SES), and four in east London, an area of high ethnic mix and lower SES. Design and methods: Taking an interpretivist approach, qualitative data were collected through 96 semi-structured group interviews between November 2003 and May 2004. Rather than assuming a dichotomous gender model, the gender distribution of the groups was left to chance, resulting in 86 mixed-sex groups. Each group read a short vignette about a person of their own age who is being bullied by same-gender and opposite genders peers. Half of the groups were allocated a vignette about a male victim and the other half a female victim. To balance this interpretivist focus with findings about gender-as-a-subject-variable, quantitative data were collected via 404 individual interviews, and the focus group data were subjected to limited quantification. Results: Bullying, like peer relationships, needs to conform to age and gender norms if individuals are to minimise risk for further victimisation. There are disparities of power between bully and victim which are considered more acceptable to exploit and disparities which are less acceptable to exploit. The least problematic bully–victim dyad is boy-to-boy. The most unacceptable dyad is a boy physically harming a girl, even if in defence against the girl's bullying behaviour. Conclusions: As well as reflecting gender stereotypes, students' discourse also demonstrated considerable variability and inconsistency, illustrating the complexity of gender role development and the dynamic experience of gender-related bullying. Both gender-role conformity and non-conformity were cited by students as making bullying problematic. This study contributes to knowledge about social cognitions that support and prohibit bullying in different bully–victim dyads.