Bullying

It's during the middle school year's children become either a part of the in-group or out-group. The in-group are peer group's children feel they belong to and are insiders of. The out-group are groups of children who feel they they don't belong and are outsiders and known as 'them.' Children who share common attributes and interests would be an in-group, whereas children who are viewed as different are the out group. Children who are part of the out-group are more likely to be targeted by bullying and may become bullies themselves. The concept of these groups relates to the concept of how peer pressure influences peer relationships. Cultural values dictate which attributes are desirable in friends as well as other common interests.

Bullying during the  middle school years takes on different forms including direct and indirect bullying. Types of bullying include physical and verbal bullying. Direct bullying involves a plan to attack and carry out that plan against the victim such as physical and verbal bullying. Physical bullying includes physical aggression such as hitting, kicking, pushing, stealing and using weapons. Verbal bullying includes hurting with words such as name calling, teasing or making racial slurs.

Indirect bullying is also known as relational bullying and involves tactics that may be hidden in order to target and due damage to the victim's social relationships. Relational bullying involves using relationships to hurt, manipulate others, such as spreading rumors and intentionally excluding someone from a group or influencing friends to do certain behaviors. For example, making sure someone's friends turn against them by lying, scheming, and manipulating others into believing and doing things against the person. It can also include the bully threatening something if they don't help the person carry out their plans.

Cyber bullying happens when a child is threatened, harassed, humiliated, embarrassed or targeted in some other way by another person when using the internet, mobile device or other digital technology. There are two types of cyber bullying: direct attacks and cyber bullying. Direct attacks are messages sent to a child directly, for example, through a message on Facebook. Cyber bullying is bullying that happens by proxy. This is bullying that uses other people to bully the victim either with or without the victim's knowledge. Children who lack protective systems such as family and friends can by overly trusting and find deception and harassment on the internet. Mobile devices also create problems with bullying. Text bullying is when people send hurtful or embarrassing text messages to people on their phones. People who want to bully others this way have access to their phones twenty-four hours a day. The victim may not recognize the number that's sending the text which makes text bullying more anonymous and is on the rise.