Psihološka obzorja / Horizons of Psychology, 26, 74–82 (2017)
© Društvo psihologov Slovenije, ISSN 2350-5141
Znanstveni empiričnoraziskovalni prispevek / Scientific empirical article
* Naslov/Address: red. prof. dr. Sonja Pečjak, Oddelek za psihologijo, Filozofska fakulteta, Univerza v Ljubljani, Aškerčeva 2, 
1000 Ljubljana, e-mail: sonja.pecjak@ff.uni-lj.si
Članek je licenciran pod pogoji Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International licence. (CC-BY licenca).
The article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (CC-BY license).
DOI: 10.20419/2017.26.470
CC: 3560
UDK: 37.015.3:364.632
School climate in peer bullying: 
observers’ and active participants’ perceptions
Sonja Pečjak* and Tina Pirc
Department of Psychology, Faculty of Arts, University of Ljubljana, Slovenia
Abstract: Peer bullying is a phenomenon present in all schools. The school as an institution has a major role in limiting peer bullying. 
The primary goal of the study was to determine how different groups of students perceived school climate in relation to peer bullying 
regarding their role in peer bullying (active participants: bullies, victims, bully-victims and non-active participants: observers). 414 
students (from 18 primary and secondary schools) responded to The School Climate Bullying Survey (SCBS; Cornell, 2012), which 
measures the incidence of various forms of peer bullying and three dimensions of school climate (prevalence of teasing and bullying, 
aggressive attitudes, and willingness to seek help). The results showed that the active participants in peer bullying report a frequent 
presence of verbal and social bullying (54% and 40%, respectively) and a significantly lower frequency of physical and cyber bullying 
(14%). The largest differences between the groups of students were found in their perceptions of the prevalence of aggressive attitudes 
and willingness to seek help in a school context. In the perceptions of both of these dimensions we found a high degree of similarity 
between the groups of bullies and victim-bullies, and between the groups of victims and observers. The first two groups, when 
compared to the victims and observers, perceived to a greater extent that school allows aggression as a way of affirmation among 
peers and in school in general, and that neither teachers nor peers do not stop the bullying, which discourages the victims from seeking 
help from them. The results confirmed the existence of the association between students’ perceived school climate by bullying and 
their behavior (roles) in peer bullying.
Keywords: peer bullying, perceived school climate, bullies, victims, observers
Šolska klima pri medvrstniškem nasilju: 
zaznave opazovalcev in aktivnih udeležencev
Sonja Pečjak* in Tina Pirc
Oddelek za psihologijo, Filozofska fakulteta, Univerza v Ljubljani
Povzetek: Medvrstniško nasilje (MVN) je pojav, prisoten v vseh šolah. Pri omejevanju MVN ima šola kot institucija pomembno 
vlogo. Glavni cilj naše študije je bil ugotoviti, kako posamezne skupine učencev glede na vlogo v MVN (aktivni udeleženci: nasilneži, 
žrtve, žrtve-nasilneži in neaktivni udeleženci: opazovalci) zaznavajo šolsko klimo v povezavi z medvrstniškim nasiljem. V raziskavi 
je sodelovalo 414 učencev iz 18 osnovnih in srednjih šol. Uporabili smo Vprašalnik šolske klime pri medvstniškem nasilju (SCBS, 
Cornell, 2012), ki meri pojavnost različnih oblik MVN ter tri dimenzije šolske klime (dopuščanje nasilja, dopuščanje agresivnih 
stališč in spodbujanje iskanja pomoči). Rezultati so pokazali, da aktivni udeleženci MVN poročajo o pogostejši prisotnosti verbalnega 
in odnosnega nasilja (v 54 in 40 %) ter o pomembno manjši pogostosti pojavljanja fizičnega in spletnega nasilja (14 %). V zaznavah 
dimenzij šolske klime smo med skupinami učencev našli največje razlike pri dopuščanju agresivnih stališč učencev in iskanju 
pomoči. Ugotovili smo, da v zaznavah obeh dimenzij obstaja precejšnja podobnost med skupinama nasilnežev in nasilnežev-
žrtev ter med skupinama žrtev in opazovalcev. Prvi dve skupini v pomembno večji meri zaznavata, da šolsko okolje dopušča 
agresivnost kot način afirmacije med vrstniki in v šoli nasploh ter da niti učitelji niti vrstniki ne zaustavljajo nasilja in da zato 
pri njih ni smiselno iskati pomoči. Rezultati potrjujejo obstoj povezanosti učenčevih zaznav šolske klime pri MVN in njihovega 
vedenja (vlog) pri tem nasilju.
Ključne besede: medvrstniško nasilje, zaznana šolska klima, nasilneži, žrtve, opazovalci
75
Peer bullying
Peer bullying is a phenomenon prevalent in schools all 
around the world, irrespective of national, cultural, and 
political characteristics of the country. Some schools are 
dealing with this problem openly (Sullivan, 2011), while 
others conceal the bullying or even deny it. When can we 
talk about peer bullying? Whenever a student is repeatedly 
exposed to aggressive behavior by a peer or a peer group 
over a longer period of time (Olweus, 1993) or when there 
is a conscious, deliberate, and repeated aggressive behavior 
and manipulative and/or exclusionary behavior of one or 
more persons against one or more (of other) people who are 
physically, mentally, or socially disadvantaged compared to 
the bully (Smith, Ananiadou, & Cowie, 2003; Sullivan, 2011). 
In school, the following types of bullying take place (Berger, 
2007): physical bullying (e.g., pushing, kicking, damage to 
the property of another), social bullying (e.g., exclusion or 
social isolation), verbal bullying (e.g., making quips), and 
cyberbullying (e.g., spreading rumors via the internet or 
sending insulting telephone messages). Students appear in 
the roles of active participants: bullies (perpetrators of an 
aggressive act to other peers), victims (targets of bullies) 
and victim-bullies at the same time. In the fourth group, 
there are observers of peer bullying (students who are 
present as witnesses to what is going on). The criterion for 
grouping students into individual roles is the frequency of 
occurrence of aggressive behavior by students towards their 
peers in a certain period. The experts’ guidelines are one to 
two occurrences of a particular type of bullying in the past 
month (Cornell, 2012; Olweus, 1993), which we also took into 
account in our study. 
Previous studies, which included students from the same 
age group as ours (12 to 18 years), have reported different 
frequencies of peer bullying in various countries. The 
percentage of bullying ranges from 12 to 42% (Benitez & 
Justicia, 2006; Bradshaw, Sawyer, & O’Brennan, 2007; U.S. 
Department of Education, 2015; World Health Organization, 
2004; Wong, Lok, Wing Lo, & Ma, 2008). A common 
finding of studies from different countries is that among 
students verbal bullying is the most common, social bullying 
is somewhat less frequent, and physical bullying the least 
usual (Marsh et al., 2011; Polak, Smrtnik Vitulić, & Vošnjak, 
2011; Wang, Iannotti, & Nansel, 2009). However, the share of 
cyberbullying is increasing (Kowalski, Giumetti, Schroeder, 
& Reese, 2012; Smith et al., 2008; Wang et al., 2009), although 
it is still behind traditional bullying (U.S. Department of 
Education, 2015). It is important to point out that it is difficult 
to compare data from different studies because researchers 
use different criteria to identify the role of the victim and 
the bully and to explore the presence of bullying in different 
age groups of students and different schools/countries. It 
is particularly hard to assess the proportion of victims and 
bullies in cyberbullying since the development of information 
communication technology continually provides new forms 
of such bullying.
In our study, we were interested in the proportions of 
individual roles of students (victims, bullies, victim-bullies, 
and observers) in all four forms of peer bullying (physical, 
verbal, social, and cyber). In spite of certain common 
characteristics of peer bullying, it is reasonable to distinguish 
between individual forms of peer bullying, because, as the 
researchers point out (Marsh et al., 2011; Wang et al., 2009), 
each one has some distinctive features. For example, although 
physical bullying appears the least frequently, teachers and 
students perceive it as the most serious and consequently stop 
it earlier compared to the other forms of bullying (Posnic & 
Košir, 2016; Pečjak & Pirc, 2015). Because student observers 
are a large group, which is capable of stopping bullying in a 
classroom, it is important how sensitive they are to different 
forms of bullying. If they find verbal bullying to be acceptable, 
then their readiness to stop the bully and support the victim 
decreases. 
Theoretical background for understanding peer 
bullying in school context
In order to understand the fact that peer bullying in 
schools is a phenomenon that is difficult to eradicate, it has to 
be taken into account that peer bullying is not just about the 
relationship between two students – the bully and the victim. 
It is placed in a broader social context of a school/classroom. 
Therefore, our understanding of this phenomenon is derived 
from socio-ecological theories (i.e., Bronfenbrenner’s theory, 
2004) and social theories, e.g., model of planned behavior 
(Ajzen & Madden, 1986). These theories explain how an 
individual perceives social incidents, including peer bullying 
which affects his/her behavior, and how these perceptions 
affect his/her behavior.
Bronfenbrenner’s ecological systems theory (2004) 
explains that any conduct by an individual in a given social 
system affects other individuals in the system and that they 
have a reverse effect (back) to the individual. From this 
theory, Sullivan (2011) formed a model of “ripple effect”, 
which explains the dynamics of the process of peer bullying 
more precisely. The author compares bullying with a stone 
that is thrown into the water, and around which waves are then 
spreading in concentric circles. In the case of peer bullying, 
the primary victim of bullying is an individual student, and 
at the secondary level the victims of this violence are parents 
and student-victims’ families; but it also affects those who 
witness such violence - their peers in the classroom or other 
students at the school who hear about bullying. It can cause 
anxiety and feelings of unsafety or it may raise feelings 
of shame due to their lack of trying to stop the bullying. 
Therefore, the teacher’s/school’s reaction to peer bullying is 
very important because it represents symbolic information 
for all the students in the classroom/school. If they see that 
the teacher/school is trying to stop all instances of bullying, 
then it is more likely that they will not approve of it or that 
they will tell adults (teachers or parents) about it. However, 
if the school’s response to peer bullying is weak, this sends a 
message to the bullies that they may continue with bullying 
without being punished. This study is the first exploratory 
study in Slovenia to examine the way students perceive the 
messages of peer bullying conveyed by the school/teachers.
The model of planned behavior (Ajzen & Madden, 
1986) also explains the phenomenon of peer bullying 
Perceived school climate in peer bullying
76
among students in the classroom. Behavioral intentions and 
behavior of students are affected by i) the student’s personal 
beliefs about peer bullying (positive or negative attitudes 
towards bullying), ii) their subjective norms as generally 
accepted standards of behavior and feelings (whether they 
feel bullying is acceptable or unacceptable, which is under 
the influence of the reference group to which they belong), 
and iii) their perceived behavioral control (student’s belief 
about his/her competence for performing the bullying and 
beliefs about how external factors affect this behavior). If a 
student has positive attitudes towards peer bullying, if they 
believe bullying is acceptable (which is under the influence 
of their peers’ perceptions of it), and if the student estimates 
that external factors (the school, teachers) will not stop this 
bullying, then the student more quickly becomes a bully in 
relationships with his or her peers.
As it is apparent from both presented theories (the 
ecological theory and the model of planned behavior), peer 
bullying in a student’s behavior is the result of student’s 
individual characteristics and the influence of the social 
environment (norms, rules and values) on the student. All 
these social environment factors form the construct of school 
climate. Therefore, in our study, we considered how students 
perceive school climate regarding peer bullying. We had in 
mind that schools/teachers, with their reactions to bullying, 
send students clear messages about what is and what is not 
acceptable in (their) school. This enables them to contribute to 
the shaping of students’ personal beliefs and their subjective 
norms about the acceptability of different forms of behavior, 
which affect their behavior and continue to influence the 
shaping of the school climate. 
School climate and peer bullying
School climate is a multidimensional construct and refers 
to the quality and character of social interactions at school. 
It is defined by the norms, values, rules, organizational 
structures, and relationship patterns unique to each school 
(Cohen, McCabe, Michelli, & Pickeral, 2009). Positive school 
climate may be a protective factor for the school adjustment of 
students in general, for their academic adjustment (Lacey & 
Cornell, 2011), and for different risk behaviors, as well as for 
the students’ aggression towards their peers (Cook, Williams, 
Guerra, Kim, & Sadek, 2010; Hong & Espelage, 2012). 
Researchers point out that there is a reciprocal relationship 
between peer bullying and school climate (Brandyopathyay, 
Cornell, & Konold, 2009; Golstein, Young, & Bold, 2008). 
Violent behavior among peers affects school/classroom 
climate, e.g., the relations and the atmosphere among students. 
Namely, students avoid interactions with the bullies, they feel 
fear, and their feelings of safety are low in general. Waasdorp, 
Pas, O’Brennan, and Bradshaw (2011) reported that each time 
peer violence increases by 1%, the likelihood that students 
feel safe at school is reduced by 3%. Therefore, witnessing 
peer bullying on frequent occasions causes a lower sense of 
safety in all students, both in the victims and the observers, 
and indirectly impairs school climate (Golstein et al., 2008). 
The school staff (particularly teachers) can do the most in 
stopping the bullying, but it does need to be pointed out that 
a meta-analysis by Denny et al. (2015) showed that the peers’ 
and not the teachers’ intervention had a greater impact on 
reducing the bullying. However, there is evidence that school 
climate has a reverse effect on student behavior; if students 
know that certain rules of interpersonal behavior have to be 
respected and that they will have to take responsibility for 
bullying, many classroom bullies will cease this behavior 
(Salmivalli & Voeten, 2004).
Research problem
The first aim of our study was to investigate the frequency 
of various forms of bullying (physical, verbal, social, and 
cyber) in relation to the role of students in peer bullying.
Sullivan (2011) compares peer bullying in schools with an 
iceberg, where only a small part of peer bullying is identified 
and dealt with. One of the reasons behind this is that students 
report bullying only on rare occasions. Adair, Dixon, Moore, 
and Sutherland (2000) revealed that students report peer 
bullying to teachers and/or other adults in only 21% of the 
cases. Therefore, in our study, we were interested in how 
often our students report bullying from their peers in general 
and how often they report what happened to them to teachers. 
We assumed that students would rarely report being bullied 
to the teachers and that they would inform their parents or 
peers about it more frequently; this assumption was based on 
the results of studies in other countries (Ttofi & Farrington, 
2011). As a reason for this fact, researchers state that students 
most often do not report peer bullying to teachers due to their 
belief that they are not successful in preventing or stopping 
it.
Rigby and Bagshaw (2003) stated that approximately 40% 
of Australian 14-year-olds believe that their teachers do not 
do enough to stop the bullying. Fekkes, Pijpers, and Verloove-
Vanhorick (2005) reported similar results for Dutch students 
between 9 and 11 years of age. Only slightly over half of the 
students (53%) inform the teachers about bullying, but one-
third of them believe that after the disclosure the situation 
does not improve, while another third feels it becomes even 
worse. Such conditions in the classroom have hidden effects 
on the victims, such as feeling frightened, being under 
constant pressure, and the resulting fear of attending school. 
Therefore, the main goal of our study was to explore how 
students in different roles in peer bullying perceive school 
climate regarding peer bullying and to find out if there 
are any significant differences between them considering 
these roles. We were interested in finding out in what way 
student-victims, bullies, victim-bullies, and observers 
perceive ‘’messages’’ about acceptability or unacceptability 
of bullying behavior coming from their school or teachers. 
In line with socio-ecological theory (Bronfenbrenner, 2004) 
and the theory of planned behavior (Ajzen & Madden, 1986), 
these perceptions of the environment substantially affect the 
shaping of students’ norms in perceived behavior control 
and the student’s behavior. According to these theories, 
we assumed that bullies and victim-bullies would perceive 
school climate in peer bullying significantly differently from 
the victims and observers, which would consequently have an 
impact on their behavior.
S. Pečjak and T. Pirc
77
Method
Participants
In total, 414 students from 18 Slovenian schools 
participated in the study, 113 of which were primary (27.3%) 
and 301 secondary school students (72.7%). The sample was 
a convenient one. Students from the 7th to 9th grades were 
included in the primary school sample (20.4% from the 7th 
grade, 46.0% from the 8th grade, and 33.6% from the 9th 
grade); in the secondary school sample, there were students 
from the 3rd (42.9%) and 4th year (57.1%). There were more 
girls than boys in primary and secondary samples (53.1% 
in primary school sample and 58.1% in secondary school 
sample). However, no significant differences were found 
regarding gender representation, χ2(1) = .85, p =.21. 
The average age of the participants was 13.31 years (SD 
= 1.09) and 17.85 years (SD = 1.00) for primary school and 
secondary school students, respectively. 
Instruments
The School Climate Bullying Survey – SCBS. SCBS 
(Cornell & Sheras, 2003; Cornell, 2012) has four parts: the 
first part assesses the frequency of bullying or being bullied 
by others (physical, verbal, social, and cyber bullying); the 
second part asks students about whom they tell about being 
bullied, the third part is about the locations where bullying 
occurs, and the fourth part comprises of school climate scales. 
We translated three parts of the survey for the purposes of 
our study: the first, the second and the fourth. We used the 
standard procedure of translation; two independent experts 
translated the survey into Slovenian, and two independent 
English language experts translated it back to English, which 
was followed by coordinating both translations and forming 
the final version of the questionnaire. Students were asked 
to read the items which pertained to their behavior in school 
and to respond to them most honestly. In the beginning, they 
read a general definition of bullying: »Bullying is defined 
as the use of one’s strength or popularity to injure, threaten, 
or embarrass another person on purpose. Bullying can be 
physical, verbal, social, or cyber. It is not bullying when two 
students who are comparable in strength or power have a 
fight or argument.« 
Next, they assessed their behavior in general, i.e., they 
responded to two items about performing bullying or being 
the victim of bullying in the past month (2 items).
In the final section of the first part of the survey the 
students were given descriptions of physical, verbal, social, 
and cyber bullying (2 items for each type of bullying) in the 
past month. E.g., »Social bullying involves getting others 
repeatedly to ignore or leave someone out on purpose. 
During the past month (30 days) at school: a) I have been 
socially bullied. b) I have socially bullied another student.« 
To each statement the students responded on a 4-point scale 
indicating the frequency of performing bullying behaviors or 
being bullied by others (1 – never, 2 – 1-2 times a month, 3 
– once a week, 4 – several times a week). 
The second part of SCBS asks if the student has told 
someone that they were bullied in the past month (Yes/No) 
and to whom did they tell (a friend, teacher/another adult at 
school, parent).
The fourth part of SCBS determines three factors of 
school climate regarding bullying (Cornell & Sheras, 2003; 
Cornell, 2012): prevalence of teasing and bullying (4 items, 
e.g., Students here often get teased about their clothing or 
physical appearance.; Cronbach α in our sample was .75), 
aggressive attitudes (7 items, e.g., If you fight a lot, everyone 
will look up to you.;  α = .80), and willingness to seek help 
(9 items, e.g., Students here try to stop bullying when they 
see it happening.; α = .79). Students responded on a 4-point 
scale (1 – strongly disagree, 4 – strongly agree), with higher 
results indicating that the measured characteristic was more 
expressed. 
To test the construct validity of the SCBS on the Slovenian 
sample, we carried out a confirmatory factor analysis in 
Mplus 7 (Muthén in  Muthén,  1998–2010). We used the 
WLSMV estimator, which is the default estimator for ordered 
categorical variables. When evaluating the model fit, we used 
the following cut-off values of fit indices: RMSEA  <  .08, 
CFI/TLI  > (or close to) .90. The fit of the 3-factor model was 
satisfactory, χ2(167) = 581.7, p < .01; RMSEA = .078; CFI = .89; 
TLI = .87. The standardized factor loadings were adequately 
high: prevalence of teasing and bullying (factor 1), M(λ) = 
.54; aggressive attitudes (factor 2), M(λ) = .69; willingness 
to seek help (factor 3), M(λ) = .60. The correlation between 
factors 1 and 2 was .49, –.14 between factors 1 and 3, and –.55 
between factor 2 and 3.
Procedure and data analysis
Data were collected with The School Climate Bullying 
Survey in primary and secondary schools in May 2015. 
Students were divided into groups of bullies, victims, and 
victim-bullies if bullying behavior was present 1-2 times 
per month or more often, which is recommended by Cornell 
(2012) and Olweus (1993) as a standard for determining 
individual roles of students in peer bullying. This was done 
based on their responses regarding all four forms of peer 
bullying (physical, verbal, social, and cyber). Students who 
did not report bullying behavior were considered to be in the 
group of observers. χ2 and ANOVA were used to determine the 
differences between different groups of students by individual 
forms of peer bullying. Eta-squared (η2) and Cohen’s d were 
used as measures of effect sizes.
Results and discussion 
The forms of peer bullying from the 
perspective of students in different peer 
bullying roles and reporting about bullying 
We were interested in the distribution of different roles 
of students (victims, bullies, victim-bullies, and observers) 
by individual forms of peer bullying and possible differences 
between students regarding different forms of peer bullying 
(Table 1).
Perceived school climate in peer bullying
78
It is apparent from Table 1 that verbal bullying is most 
frequent among students. Namely, more than a half (53.7%) of 
all students actively participate as victims, bullies, or in both 
roles in this type of peer bullying. This is followed by 40% 
of students who are active participants in social bullying. 
Compared to these two groups, there are fewer students 
who actively engage in physical and cyber bullying (14%). 
In comparison to a similar study by Wang et al. (2009) in 
American adolescents, our results show that verbal and cyber 
bullying is present in the group of Slovenian adolescents in 
approximately the same proportion as is in the American 
adolescents (in the USA: verbal bullying in 53.6% and 
cyberbullying in 13.6%), but there is substantially more 
physical (20.8%) and social bullying (51.4%) in American 
adolescents.
Similar shares of verbal and social bullying were also 
found in other studies (Marsh et al., 2011; Olweus, 1995; Polak 
et al., 2011; Skumavc, 2016). The established distribution 
probably reflects a broader social attitude towards verbal and 
social bullying as more acceptable forms of bullying, which 
is also apparent in a school context. Or, as can be drawn from 
the model of planned behavior (Ajzen & Madden, 1986), 
verbal and social bullying is becoming a subjective norm in 
students as well as in teachers. Studies show that teachers and 
students recognize these types of bullying as less serious and 
threatening and that teachers tolerate them more and respond 
to them later or not at all (Bauman & Del Rio, 2006; Craig, 
Bell, & Leschied, 2011; Pečjak & Pirc, 2015). By allowing 
verbal and social bullying at school, this kind of behavior 
becomes more and more acceptable and normative. Group 
norms about the admissibility of peer bullying are formed, 
and they affect individual’s subjective norms (Ajzen & 
Madden, 1986).
Accordingly, we found significantly more verbal and 
social bullies than physical and cyber bullies. Most frequently 
the same students become victims as well as bullies in verbal 
bullying, which shows that in verbal bullying almost a quarter 
of students react aggressively – they answer disrespectfully 
and use insulting expressions and/or offending words. This 
is probably related to group norms becoming more and more 
tolerant of this form of bullying. A smaller proportion of 
students taking both roles (victims and bullies) was found 
in social bullying and an even smaller one in cyber and 
physical bullying. Yet, comparative analyses of studies on 
cyberbullying before the year 2000 and after the year 2010 
indicate that the share of cyberbullying is increasing in 
line with new technology development not only in primary, 
but also in secondary school students (Kessel Schneider, 
O’Donnell, Sueve, & Coulter, 2012; Kowalski et al., 2012). 
Further, we were able to discover some patterns indicating 
specific characteristics of individual forms of bullying from 
Table 1. There are fewer bullies in verbal, social, and cyber 
bullying than victims, suggesting that bullies in these types 
of bullying choose more than one victim. This was already 
noticed by other authors (Olweus, 1995; Pečjak, 2015). The 
reverse holds true for physical bullying, where there is a 
higher proportion of bullies than victims. This implies that an 
individual student is probably exposed to physical bullying 
behavior from several peers because the student victims’ 
response to bullying is passive and weak. In most cases, they 
ignore the bullies and leave the situation, which usually does 
not stop the aggressors. They rarely use more active strategies 
for confronting the bully, which are more effective (Hunter & 
Boyle, 2004; Waasdorp & Bradshaw, 2011).
Next, we were interested in whether students report the 
bullying that takes place in their school and whether they 
inform teachers about it. We found that more than a half of 
the students were not victims of any type of bullying (56.5%) 
in the previous month. However, among 179 students who 
were victims of peer bullying, as much as 141 (79%) of 
them did not share their experience with anyone and only 
38 students (21%) told about it to someone else. In 58% of 
these cases, the students confided to their friends, the next in 
line were parents (24%), and the last were teachers to whom 
only 18% of the students told about being bullied. Our result 
is in accordance with the studies performed in the USA and 
Australia, where researchers report that only between 20 and 
30% of students report about being bullied (Adair et al., 2000; 
Ttofi & Farrington, 2011).
Based on these results, an assumption could be made that 
students in general rarely report bullying, and most of the 
victims probably try to face the situation alone. It is important 
to note, however, that research results indicate that seeking 
help from adults and peers works better than trying to 
handle the situation alone (Davis & Nixon, 2011). Moreover, 
from the results of our study, it was also apparent that the 
percentage of students who do tell the teachers about bullying 
is smaller than in some other countries (Rigby, 2016). This 
leads us to the assumption that students in Slovenia do not 
trust teachers enough and do not perceive them as competent 
for dealing with peer bullying effectively. It is also possible 
that they perceive school climate regarding peer bullying in 
such a way that they consider reporting bullying to teachers 
as pointless, where such an action does not change anything, 
or the situation gets even worse after the intervention is made 
by the teachers. 
Table 1. The frequency of roles in peer bullying (PB) stratified by the form of bullying
Victims (V) Bullies (B) Victim-bullies (V-B) Observers Active participants in PB (V, B, V-B)
f % f % f % f % %
Physical 10 2.4 31 7.7 16 3.9 355 86.0 14.0
Verbal 74 17.7 51 12.2 95 22.8 193 46.3 53.7
Social 58 14.0 53 12.8 54 13.2 248 60.0 40.0
Cyber 25 6.1 16 3.9 17 4.1 354 85.9 14.1
Note: Nphysical = 413; Nverbal = 413; Nsocial = 413; Ncyber = 412; active participants: V – victims, B – bullies, V-B – victim-bullies.
S. Pečjak and T. Pirc
79
Perceived school climate regarding peer 
bullying in relation to student roles in peer 
bullying 
We were interested in how different groups of students 
(victims, bullies, victim-bullies, and observers) perceive 
school climate regarding peer bullying. Students were 
assigned to different roles on the basis of their responses to 
the question about their role in bullying in general without 
considering individual forms of peer bullying. In the school 
climate dimensions, we present the perceptions of individual 
groups of students with regard to the prevalence of teasing 
and bullying, aggressive attitudes, and willingness to seek 
help.
We used one-way ANOVA for independent samples to 
determine whether there were any significant differences in 
the perceptions of school climate dimensions regarding peer 
bullying between these groups of students. First, we performed 
Levene’s test for testing the equality of variances, which 
showed no significant differences between the variances 
of individual groups of students for any of the dimensions 
(for prevalence of teasing and bullying F(3, 407) = .98; p = 
.40; for aggressive attitudes F(3, 404) = .86; p = .46 and for 
willingness to seek help F(3, 403) = .477; p =  .70). 
Our data revealed the existence of significant differences 
in perceptions of all three dimensions of school climate 
regarding peer bullying, which is consistent with the 
findings of other studies (Bandyopadhyay et al., 2009; 
Elliot, Cornell, Gregory, & Fan, 2010). There were highly 
significant differences in dimensions of aggressive attitudes 
and willingness to seek help and in the prevalence of teasing 
and bullying between victims, bullies, victim-bullies, and 
observers (Table 2).
Post-hoc tests with Bonferroni correction for pairwise 
comparisons of group means showed no significant differences 
between active participants in peer bullying (victims, bullies, 
and victim-bullies) and the observers in their perceptions 
of teasing and bullying (the mean difference between 
victims and observers was .99; p = .40; the mean difference 
between bullies and observers was .67; p = 0.52; the mean 
difference between victim-bullies and observers was 1.00; p 
= .51). However, active participants, in general, agreed more 
strongly that students got teased about their clothing, physical 
appearance, and ethnicity than the observers did, but the 
effect size of these differences was small (η2 = .02).
Larger differences between individual groups of students 
were found in their perceptions of how many aggressive 
attitudes their school allowed for and whether these attitudes 
were reflected in the behavior of students. Here the differences 
between groups of students were highly significant with a 
large effect size (η2 = 0.14).  
There were no significant differences between student 
victims and observers in their perceptions that school allowed 
for aggressive attitudes (the mean difference was .48; p = 1.00). 
The groups of bullies and victim-bullies, however, agreed that 
school allowed for aggressive attitudes significantly more 
strongly than victims and observers (the mean difference 
between bullies and observers was 3.13; p < .01; the mean 
difference between bullies and victims was 3.61; p < .01; the 
mean difference between victim-bullies and observers was 
4.68; p < .01; the mean difference between victim-bullies and 
victims was 5.16; p < .01). 
We can conclude that bullies and victim-bullies agreed 
more strongly that their school environment allowed for 
aggressiveness as a way of affirmation among peers and 
at school, in general, more than victims and observers did. 
Compared to victims and observers, they also agreed more 
strongly that some students deserved to be victims and 
that aggressiveness is acceptable in some situations (e.g., if 
someone is teasing you or trying to hit you). The perception 
of these attitudes is called perceived behavioral control by 
Ajzen and Madden (1986) and can encourage bullies and 
victim-bullies to behave aggressively. 
Although the perception of aggressive attitudes, which 
are accepted in certain schools, do not necessarily reflect 
students’ behavior, allowing for them had the most predictive 
power in explaining the position of a bully (Pečjak & Pirc, 
2017). At the same time, these perceived »school attitudes« 
indicate group norms, which take place in a classroom/school 
regarding aggressiveness (Salmivalli & Voeten, 2004) and 
represent one of the elements of the model of planned behavior 
(Ajzen & Madden, 1986). Namely, if students perceive that 
school allows aggressive behavior as an acceptable form 
Table 2. One-way ANOVAs for differences in perceptions of school climate by peer bullying between individual groups of 
students
N M SD F df p  η2
Prevalence of teasing and 
bullying
Victim 28 11.79 2.77 2.96 3, 397 .032 .022
Bully 56 11.50 2.50
Victim-bully 23 11.73 2.43
Observer 294 10.73 2.79
Aggressive attitudes
Victim 28 11.14 3.22 21.38 3, 397 < .001 .139
Bully 56 14.80 3.85
Victim-bully 23 16.30 3.52
Observer 294 11.65 3.73
Willingness to seek help
Victim 28 25.75 5.45 7.84 3, 397 < .001 .056
Bully 56 22.61 4.64
Victim-bully 23 21.65 3.64
Observer 294 25.12 4.81
Perceived school climate in peer bullying
80
of affirmation in a classroom, then such a norm affects 
individual students through the process of peer group pressure 
or conformity. For example, even if a student thinks that 
bullying is wrong, the classroom influences may encourage 
him to join in the bullying or at least not to show sympathy 
for the victim. Therefore, these kinds of perceived beliefs in 
students have to be addressed by all school staff and reduced 
through constant communication in the classroom community 
(Gottfredson, Gottfredson, Payne, & Gottfredson, 2005). 
The same bipolar division of the students into two broad 
categories can be found in their perceptions of classroom 
climate regarding willingness to seek help. Post hoc tests 
revealed significant differences between victims and bullies 
(the mean difference was 3.13; p = 0.02) and between victims 
and victim-bullies (the mean difference was 4.29; p = 0.01). 
There were also significant differences between bullies and 
victim-bullies compared to the observers (the mean difference 
between bullies and observers was –2.51; p < .01; the mean 
difference between victim-bullies and observers was –3.67; 
p < .01). 
Between the first group (bullies and victim-bullies) and 
the second one (victims and observers), there was a highly 
significant difference with medium effect size (d = .67). 
Compared to the second group, the first group of students 
perceived school climate as an environment with significantly 
less encouragement of students to seek help when bullied. The 
first group agreed less that at school both teachers and peers 
stop the bullying if they witness it and that the school has 
clear rules on the consequences of bullying. This group also 
agreed less that teachers as individuals care for the students 
than the other group did.
They also agreed less that they would seek help from them 
if they witnessed the bullying or became victims themselves. 
If bullies and victim-bullies perceive school environment as 
unsupportive to the victims, this sends a message to them 
that the path for performing peer bullying is free. In contrast, 
the second group – victims and observers – perceived school 
climate as significantly more supportive, and they also 
perceived the teachers and peers as individuals’ to whom 
they would more probably turn to in case of being bullied. 
Such perceptions of victims and observers are particularly 
important, because as shown by previous studies (Craig, 
Pepler, Connolly, & Henderson, 2001, Elliot et al., 2008), a 
lack of confidence in the teachers’ ability to intervene is one 
of the key reasons why students often do not seek help from 
them.
On the other hand, some authors report (Hunter & Boyle, 
2004) that willingness to seek help from teachers and peers is 
an effective strategy, which helps the victims of peer bullying 
to resolve their role in less than two years (Smith, Talamelli, 
Cowie, Naylor, & Chauhan, 2004). 
Finally, some of the limitations of the results of our study 
should be mentioned. First, the results were gathered with 
a self-report technique, which is a less precise measure for 
identifying the roles of bullies and victims compared to the 
identification of teachers or peers (Cornell & Brockenbrough, 
2004). Second, we took only one-item criteria to determine 
a general role of students in peer bullying considering 
perceptions of school climate, which was in line with the 
original questionnaire (Cornell, 2012), but could have an 
impact on the validity of our results. Third, when we tested 
the construct validity of the SCBS questionnaire, the fit of the 
3-factor model was merely satisfactory, so we suggest that the 
structure of the Slovenian version of SCBS should be further 
examined in future studies.
Nevertheless, our findings enable some practical 
implications. First, it seems there is a need to raise awareness 
and sensitize pre-service teachers and teachers about ways of 
identifying peer bullying and for assertively and competently 
coping with it. Namely, the teachers are those who send clear 
messages about the acceptable behavior in school to the 
students by reacting and dealing with peer bullying, which 
consequently has an impact on students’ behavior. Second, 
the results, at least indirectly, suggest that the programs for 
reducing peer bullying should be implemented not only in the 
group of teachers but also in the group of student observers, 
because it might encourage them to try to actively stop the 
bullies (Denny et al., 2015; Elliot et al., 2008; Pečjak & Pirc, 
2017). 
Conclusions
The results of our study indicated different representations 
of individual forms of peer bullying among primary and 
secondary school students where verbal and social bullying is 
most common. This was probably due to lower sensitivity of 
all participants in the school environment for these two forms 
of bullying. At the same time, differences in the perceptions of 
school climate between various participants in peer bullying 
were established. It seems that especially bullies and victim-
bullies are driven by their perceptions to use aggressive 
behavior aimed at peers as a means of reaching their goals 
(social and other). 
With our study we wanted to emphasize that one of the 
most effective approaches for reducing peer bullying at school 
is a supportive school climate (Pearce, Cross, Monks, Waters, 
& Falconer, 2011). This enables open communication between 
students and teachers (also about bullying), develops a sense 
of belonging to the school, and protects the students from 
bullying. Next to supportive school climate, A. Gregory et al. 
(2010) also emphasize a second complementary aspect of safe 
school environment – the enforcement of school discipline 
(structure). It is therefore critical that in school environment 
the rules about inadmissibility of bullying are clearly stated 
from teachers and other school staff and that this kind of 
behavior is immediately and consistently responded to, which 
was already warned about by Sullivan (2011) with his model 
of ripple effect in peer bullying and also by the model of 
planned behavior (Ajzen & Madden, 1986).
Teachers’ work in prevention and intervention of peer 
bullying at school is important because research in children 
and adolescents shows (e.g., Stormshak, Bierman, Bruschi, 
Dodge, & Coie, 1999) that frequent behavior soon becomes a 
subjective norm from the students’ perspective. This means 
they evaluate such behavior as acceptable. If there is a group 
norm in which certain forms of peer bullying are admissible, 
then, again in accordance with the model of planned behavior 
(Ajzen & Madden, 1986), the probability of bullying 
increases.
S. Pečjak and T. Pirc
81
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Prispelo/Received: 13. 12. 2016
Sprejeto/Accepted: 29. 9. 2017
S. Pečjak and T. Pirc