Joint Development of Bullying Victimization and Perpetration Among Disabled and Nondisabled Students In Late Elementary School

Background and Purpose: Youth’s involvement in bullying—whether as victimization, perpetration, or both—is associated with a variety of negative consequences. Given these adverse outcomes, it is critical to understand how bullying victimization (BV) and bullying perpetration (BP) evolve over time to understand the mechanisms that sustain bullying involvement. Specifically, once students experience BV or engage in BP, do these behaviors remain stable over time? Does experiencing BV increase the likelihood of later BP, and vice versa? Examining the stability and reciprocity of BV and BP is especially important during late elementary school, as this period is marked by various developmental changes that may heighten students’ vulnerability to bullying involvement. Moreover, the need to understand this joint development is even more pressing for disabled students, who are overrepresented in bullying dynamics. However, empirical studies examining the longitudinal dynamics of BV and BP remains limited, let alone studies focusing on disabled students’ experiences. To address these gaps in the literature, this study addresses two research questions (RQs): (1) How do BV and BP co-develop across late elementary school? (2) Does this joint development differ by students’ disability status? If so, how?
Methods: Data were drawn from the Early Childhood Longitudinal Study, Kindergarten Class of 2010-11, which followed a nationally representative cohort of kindergarteners in the United States. This study used Waves 7–9 data (Spring 2014–2016; Grades 3–5). The analytic sample included 9,133 students. BV (student-report) and BP (teacher-report) were measured using four items on a 5-point Likert scale (mean score). Disability status was measured with one item indicating whether a student had an Individualized Education Program on school record at Wave 7. To address the RQs, this study used a random-intercept cross-lagged panel model (RI-CLPM), which allows for a more precise understanding of the joint development of BV and BP at the within-person level by distinguishing within-person processes from between-person differences. RQ1 was addressed with the full-sample RI-CLPM, and RQ2 was addressed with the multiple-group RI-CLPM (with disability status as a grouping variable).
Results: Within-student stability existed for BV and partially for BP. No statistically significant reciprocal effects existed between BV and BP in both directions. These overall patterns were similar across disabled and nondisabled students, but disabled students consistently reported higher levels of both behaviors than their nondisabled peers across all waves.
Conclusions and Implications: Findings suggest that role transitions in bullying dynamics are relatively rare, which may reflect the difficulty of altering power dynamics among students in school settings. In addition, disabled students are consistently more vulnerable to bullying involvement. This may stem from their structurally disadvantaged positions due to disability stigma within school contexts, which may increase their likelihood of being victimized while also leading some to engage in perpetration with various motives (e.g., avoiding further victimization, reclaiming a sense of power). Overall, the findings highlight the importance of addressing power imbalances among students—with attention to the role of disability in shaping peer power dynamics—to strengthen school-based bullying prevention and intervention efforts.