The findings show that the proactive-moderating (PM) approach is the one most frequently used by class teachers to tackle physical, verbal and indirect bullying. This approach seeks to tackle bullying before incidents happen, and stresses the importance of teacher-pupil interaction at the regular class level. Teachers report that the PM approach is the most effective method of tackling pupils’ bullying behaviour. The teachers clearly see their role as important in that the strategies most highly recommended to pupil victims and bullies are at the class level. There are significant differences among teachers in terms of the relationships between their perceptions of the nature of bullying, their beliefs and attitudes, their teaching experience, support from the Head and senior staff, school size, and teachers’ choice of approaches to tackling bullying. Teachers have broad perceptions of the nature of bullying, so they tend to adopt the RM and PM approaches in the classroom. The strongly humanitarian teacher has positive beliefs and attitudes towards his/her teaching and classroom management. He/she will adopt counselling skills to guide pupils’ bullying behaviour instead of using a RE or ignoring approach. Teachers with many years teaching experience tend to adopt a proactive approach (PM and PE) to tackle bullying behaviour, because they believe that prevention is better than cure. If the Head and senior staff have a clear policy towards bullying, then a proactive approach will be used in the school. Bullying incidents happen most frequently in larger schools. Hence, these schools tend to use a proactive approach to prevent pupils’ bullying. It appears from the findings that many Taiwanese teachers recognise their important roles in schools in relation to dealing with the bullying problem. Both senior staff and class teachers need in-service training, because the complex nature of bullying compounds the difficulty of detecting bullying. The provision of core material on the topic should be seriously considered as an essential part of basic training for teachers. This study represents a good starting-point for school staff to utilise in formulating a more effective whole-school anti-bullying policy, thereby helping to reduce the rate of juvenile delinquency in Taiwan.

Conflicting results from published school-based anti-bullying initiatives have prompted psychologists to suggest that advances in tackling bullying will rely upon developing a greater understanding of the psychological processes underpinning bullying behaviour. This thesis aimed to address this issue by attempting to clarify the coping processes engaged in by pupils experiencing peer aggression or bullying. In order to achieve this aim, pupils’ use of coping strategies was examined within a transactional coping framework, where coping was conceptualised as a dynamic interaction between the person and their environment. Participants were 837 pupils (318 P5s, 306 S1s, 213 S2s; 48.4% male) attending mainstream Primary and Secondary schools in Scotland. Pupils completed a range of measures, at five different points in time, over a period of approximately 18 months. Variables measured at more than one data point included victimisation, appraisals (threat, challenge, control), coping strategy use, and psychological well-being (depression, self-esteem). Variables measured once included sociometric status of P5 pupils, self-efficacy of S1 and S2 pupils, bullying behaviour and emotional reaction to peer aggression. Five separate studies are reported, each focusing on a different aspect of the coping process: the stability and persistence of bullying; how pupils cope with different types of bullying; how pupils’ appraisals, emotions and coping strategies are related; the self-efficacy and hostile attribution biases of pupils involved in bully-victim problems; and the efficacy of coping strategies for maintaining psychological well-being and preventing subsequent bullying. Findings support the utility of the transactional coping model for examining coping among bullied pupils, and highlight the need to incorporate appraisals of, and emotional reactions to, bullying when researching coping responses. Furthermore, results indicate that different types of bullying are coped with in different ways, and that a “vicious circle” may operate whereby victimisation leads to further victimisation. Such findings are discussed in relation to their potential impact upon future intervention strategies, while suggestions for future research examining pupils’ coping strategies are also considered.