2018’s States with the Biggest Bullying Problems

Wallet Hub, Sep 6, 2018

In the next 7 minutes, a child in the U.S. will be bullied. It may be the son or daughter of someone you know. It may even be your own child. Meanwhile, only four in 100 adults will intervene. And only 11 percent of the child’s peers might do the same. The rest — 85 percent — will do nothing.

According to the CDC’s 2017 Youth Risk Behavior Surveillance System, 19% of students in grades 9-12 said they were bullied on school property in the previous 12 months. 14.9% of students surveyed said they were cyberbullied. Bullying takes many forms, and technological advances have opened new ways for bullies to hide behind anonymity.

Besides the physical, emotional and psychological tolls it takes on victims, bullying produces adverse socioeconomic outcomes. The Association for Psychological Science recently found that those who are bullies, victims or both are more likely to experience poverty, academic failure and job termination in their adulthood than those who were neither. In addition, the affected individuals are more likely to commit crime and to abuse drugs and alcohol.

Even our schools take a financial hit from bullying. According to a National Association of Secondary School Principals report, the average public school can incur more than $2.3 million in lost funding and expenses as a result of lower attendance and various types of disciplinary actions.

In light of back-to-school season, WalletHub measured the prevalence and prevention of bullying in 47 states and the District of Columbia to help bring awareness to its harmful effects not only to America’s young people but also to society as a whole. They examined each state based on 20 key metrics, ranging from “bullying-incident rate” to “truancy costs for schools” to “share of high school students bullied online.”

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