What is bullying?

Some definitions are written for research purposes, and are quite tight, such as Roland's definition: 'Bullying is longstanding violence, physical or psychological, conducted by an individual or a group against an individual who is not able to defend himself in the actual situation.' See the book edited by Roland and Munthe.
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Comment

If you want to try to find out how much bullying is going on in a school, it is important that all the people who are asking and answering questions use the word 'bullying' in the same way. For example, some people might answer 'no' to the question, 'have you ever been bullied?' because they see bullying as being physical violence only. Other people might answer yes to the same question because they were once subjected to some minor name-calling, which did not upset them very much at all!
(Andrew Mellor)
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Article details

E Roland (1989) 'A System Oriented Strategy Against Bullying', in the book: 'Bullying: an international perspective', edited by E Roland and E Munthe. This is now out of print.
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