The use of cartoons to assess cognitions, emotions and copying strategies in bullying situations

Short description of the methodological aspects of the research

1. The Cartoons
   
   This working group has designed a new psychological assessment instrument, named SCAN BULLYING, a short abbreviation standing for 'Scripted-Cartoon Narrative of Bullying'. It is designed to assess cognitions, emotions and coping strategies in bullying situations.
   
   SCAN BULLYING presents a prototypical story of peer bullying using a set of 15 cartoons each portraying different scenes of peer bullying. In line with the conceptual definition of bullying discussed in the psychological literature, the narrative line of the cartoons emphasises a consistent pattern of behaviour and an imbalance of power.
   
   The cartoons are presented in a pre-ordered sequence. The first ten cartoons are displayed all together in three adjacent rows to convey the idea of temporal and spatial continuity of the various events. A masculine and a feminine version of the same story have been designed, but the scenarios were carefully constructed thematically so as to be gender neutral.
   
   The first cartoon represents an approach situation, setting a reference point for the peer interactions that follow in the school setting. This first figure shows a schoolboy/girl walking towards the entrance of the school building and a group of other children hanging around near the door, looking in his/her direction. This scenario is a rather neutral setting representing the beginning of a series of unpleasant and mean acts performed by one individual or by a group of peers. The following nine cartoons present different types and contexts of peer bullying, namely: an entry situation in a play context (cartoon 2); a scene of teasing (cartoon 3); physical harassment situations, such as, threats and a menace to damage of one's belongings through to real damage (cartoons 4 to 6); a group attack (cartoon 7); coercively being pushed or intimidated to conform to the group's commands (cartoons 8 and 9) and, finally the tenth cartoon portrays the victim at a distance onlooking the group of peers, behind a tree.
   
   This set of ten cartoons is completed with five extra cartoons which are presented after having concluded a clinical interview to children, individually. Each of these five cartoons represent a different ending to the narrative. Specifically, one represents an optimistic solution where children end up playing together, implicitly a friendly situation; two cartoons present solutions through social support, either involving an adult or a peer; another cartoon considers a retaliation ending where the child asserts his/her anger by throwing something at the aggressor; and the last possible ending is a dismissing one, where the victim stays by him/herself alone. These last five cartoons are presented in a randomised order to control for order of presentation effects.
   
   
2. The Interview
   
   In addition to the scripted-cartoon narrative, we devised an interview to capture, among other issues:
   
   
   1. what do children think about peer bullying
   2. to what kind of causes do they attribute bullying
   3. what kind of emotional experience do they attribute to the story's protagonists
   4. how they themselves relate to the protagonists' emotional states and show capacity for empathic and sympathetic feelings
   5. what capacity they evidence to cope adaptively with aversive and distressing situations which typically are involved in the process of a bullying relationship
   
   
3. The Coding Scheme
   
   A coding scheme and an instruction's manual for administering the SCAN BULLYING have been drawn up (but may be further revised). The scheme of analysis aims to devise a format to analyse the various aspects explored in the interview. The suggested coding scheme is divided in three parts, each part deals with a specific aspect of the interview. It should also be noted that the coding categories apply to content and not to structural or formal aspects of the children's discourse narratives.
   
   Coding categories are constructed using a dual process. In some instances, categories are elaborated on the basis of theoretical and empirical studies to permit the identification of common or recurrent themes and issues in the child's responses. This is the procedure followed with the categories to code the children's mental representations, causal attributions and coping strategies. The codes for emotions are partly elaborated from the coding manual of 'Children's Responses to Social Failure' by Hymel et al. (1991), and on a content analysis of the child's responses to the questions on emotions and self-conscious emotions. The analysis focuses on specific issues and evaluates the types of responses given by interviewees in order to assess differences in the way children think and reason about bullying situations in school, how they relate these experiences to emotional states and, more specifically, what kind of understanding and appraisal they make of aspects that supposedly involve a moral dimension and elicit self-conscious emotions. Finally, another set of coding categories are thought of as a way to assess how the child copes with such unfavourable and stressful situations and what kind of strategies they choose to solve the problem.
   
   Each team is circulating a video tape with interviews in its own mother-language. For current drafts of the Manual and Coding Scheme, please contact Ana Almeida (e-mail: aalmeida@iec.uminho.pt)
   
   
4. Plans for research using scan bullying
   
   Two separate studies are planned. Both of them will investigate mental representations, emotional attributions and coping strategies in bully-victim situations.
   
   The first study will be carried out by the Madrid, Florence and Braga teams and coordinated by Cristina del Barrio. The participants for this study will be selected from public schools in urban areas and from average socio-economic income families. A total of 60 pupils from three age levels (nine, eleven and thirteen year olds), balanced for gender, will take part. The aim of this study is to validate the measurement instrument across the different age levels and the two gender groups.
   
   The second study will be carried out by the Braga, Florence, Calabria, Seville and Roehampton teams and coordinated by Ana Almeida and Ersilia Menesini. It will further investigate differences in responses according to bully-victim status. The sociometric screening will use either the Sutton and Smith Questionnaire on Participant Roles (1999) or the Ortega et al. (1999) sociometric questionnaire, on children aged nine and thirteen years. The selected samples will include twenty each of bullies, victims and controls, balanced by age levels and possibly by gender. For this second study, specific contributions will also be developed by the Braga, Florence and Roehampton teams. Braga and Florence will use the CCQ-set (Block & Block, 1980) to correlate data from the cartoon study with ego-resilience and ego-control measures. Roehampton will develop specific measures of family interactions.

• Block & Block (1980). The role of ego-contol and ego-resiliency in the organization of behaviour. In W.A. Collins (Ed.), Minnesota Symposia on Child Psychology: Vol 13. Development of cognition, affect, and social relations (p. 39-101).
  
  
• Hymel, S., Woody, E., Bowker, A. & Zinck, B. (1991) Children's responses to social failure. Coding Manual. Unpublished, University of Waterloo.
  
  
• Ortega, R. et al, (1999). See this website, Report on general survey questionnaires and nomination methods concerning bullying.
  
  
• Sutton, J. & Smith, P. K. (1999) Bullying as a group process: An adaptation of the Participant Role approach, Aggressive Behaviour, 25, 97-111.