Developing a cognitive behavioral intervention program to reduce bully tendencies in primary school children and the program effectiveness

The goal of this study was to develop a cognitive-behavioural programme aiming to reduce the bullying among elementary school children and evaluate its efficacy. Fiftyfour students from the 5th and 6th grades were assigned to cognitive-behavioural intervention group (20 students), placebo control group (16 students) and no intervention control group (18 students) according to their scores based on Child Form of Bully-Victim Determination Scale "bully" subscale. The group intervention was runned for 13 weeks. The students filled at the Child Form of Bully-Victim Determination Scale, Coopersmith Self Esteem Inventory, Empathy Scale for Children, and Adolescents and Inventory of Cognitions Related to Bullying for Children, and before and after the intervention and during 4 months follow up. All the scores were analyzed using repeated measures Anova. Results showed that, although there were no significant difference between group x time interaction, the scores related to bullying had a significant relation with time. This significance was related to the difference between Cognitive Behavioral intervention group's and placebo group's scores in before and after tests. In both groups the bullying scores decreased significantly. One other finding suggested that the cognitions related to bullying had a significant relation with time. This significance was thought to be related with the difference between before and after tests in the Cognitive Behavioral intervention group. The decrease in the bullying scores was significant after the group intervention.