What is bullying?

Also known as: bully, aggressive behavior.

Bullying is an intentional and aggressive behavior by a person that causes physical or emotional harm to the victim being bullied. It’s a common problem among school-age children (approximately half of school aged children have been bullied at some time) but can also occur among adults.

Bullying may be physical or verbal. Boys tend to bully both sexes physically or with threats, while girls tend to bully girls, more often verbally. Online and email bullying occurs on social networking sites.

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Reviewed by: Jack Wolfsdorf, MD, FAAP

This page was last updated on: 1/29/2019 3:21:13 PM