Bullying Statistics

Here are some numbers that illustrate the scale of the problem and the enormity of its consequences.

Bullying Statistics:

According to the Department of Justice, 1 in 4 kids will be bullied or abused this month and in the Journal of the American Medical Association it is reported that 30% of kids admit to being a bully, a bully victim or both.

When students kill other students (such as in school shootings) the perpetrators are twice as likely to have been the victims of bullying.

According to the Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention, both bullies and bully victims are at an elevated risk for loneliness, poor school performance and substance abuse.¹

Bullying is most prevalent during the last years of elementary school (peaking at about grade 8) and continuing into the first years of high school.

The most common form of bullying is verbal (name calling) with violent bullying the least common.

Violent bullying rates decline as students move into higher grades.

Children with disabilities are at an increased risk to experience bullying. In one study, 62% of children with autism were bullied at least once a week.²

Gifted children, like children with disabilities are also at an increased risk to be bullied. IN one study, more than  two in three gifted kids reported being victimized and more than a third of those victimized said they had experience violent thoughts and fantasies in response to their bullying.³

According to the National Center for Education Statistics, students aged 12 to 18 who are being bullied are more likely to skip school, class or extracurricular activities due to a fear of a bullying incident. Of those being bullied, within 6 months of being asked, 7% of students skipped school, 7% skipped class and 6% skipped extracurricular activities.

Among students aged 12 to 18, bullied students were 4 times more likely to bring a weapon to school than non bullied students and 5 times more likely to have been in a fight within the last 6 months.⁴

In 2002, the US Secret Service concluded that many incidents of school shootings were directly linked to bullying experiences.

160 000 kids stay home from school each day to avoid a bully.

60% of boys who were classified as bullies between grades 6 and 9 have a criminal conviction by the age of 24, and by that age, 40% have 3 or more criminal convictions.

Between 15% and 30% of students are involved in cyber-bullying. Girls are twice as likely as boys to be involved.⁵