Bullying victimization of high school students: Psychological needs and emotional availability of parents

This study aimed to examine basic psychological needs and parental emotional availability as predictors of victimization of bullying among high school students. The study sample consisted of 1,198 high school students (588 girls and 610 boys) attending 9th, 10th, 11th and 12th grade classes at six high schools in Kadirli, Osmaniye. The data related to victimization of bullying was collected via the California Bullying Victimization Scale (Felix, Sharkey, Green, Furlong and Tanigawa, 2011); the data related to basic psychological needs was gathered through the Basic Psychological Needs Scale (Deci and Ryan, 2000); the data related to parental emotional availability was collected using the Parental Emotional Availability Scale (Lum and Phares, 2005) and the personal information about the participant high school students was collected using the Personal Information Form, which was designed by the researcher. The data was analyzed by means of basic statistical analysis and logistic regression analysis. To the study results, there was a negatively significant relationship between victimization scores, autonomy, competence, relatedness needs and parental emotional availability. When the relationships among being victimization of bullying, basic psychological needs and parental emotional availability were investigated in terms of gender, it was found that the average scores of being exposed to bullying peer victimization of male students were higher than those of female students. Also, there was no statistically meaningful difference found in parental emotional availability scores in terms of gender. Regarding basic psychological needs, a significant difference was found in only competence needs between the genders. Broadly, male students' competence needs score averages were higher than female students, and no difference was seen in autonomy and relatedness need scores. As the predictors of being exposed to bullying peer victimization, only autonomy need was predicted while other variables did not significantly contribute. The increase in autonomy need scores decreased the likelihood of bullying victimization. The analysis of the predictors - basic psychological needs and parental emotional availability- of bullying victimization was completed separately for each gender. The analysis results displayed that autonomy need and maternal emotional availability significantly predicted the possibility of bullying victimization among female adolescents. The increase in autonomy need and maternal emotional availability was revealed to decrease the likelihood of bullying victimization among female students. On the other side, autonomy and relatedness needs were specified as the predictors bullying victimization among male adolescents. The increase in autonomy and relatedness needs was found to decrease the likelihood of bullying victimization among male students.