Psychiatric morbidity in children involved in bullying treated at the Free State Psychiatric Complex

South African Journal of Psychiatry

 
 
Field Value
 
Title Psychiatric morbidity in children involved in bullying treated at the Free State Psychiatric Complex
 
Creator Masakala, Mosa Mofokeng, Matieho Muchocho, Amanda Sibisi, Siphesihle le Roux, Johan le Roux, Helene Joubert, Gina
 
Subject — bullying; victims and bullies; psychiatric conditions; health profile; involved versus not involved.
Description Background: Bullying is a multifaceted problem with many consequences.Aim: This study aimed to determine the psychiatric morbidity of children involved in bullying, either as bullies or victims, treated at the Child and Adolescent Mental Health Care Centre of the Free State Psychiatric Complex (FSPC).Setting: Free State Psychiatric Complex, Bloemfontein, South Africa.Methods: This retrospective cross-sectional study included children under 18 years treated at the FSPC Care Centre between January and September 2017. Information was extracted from patient files.Results: Of 288 patients, 98 (34.0%) were involved in bullying: 66 were bullies, 28 victims, 3 bully-victims, and 1 unspecified. For gender and family structure, there were no statistically significant differences between children involved and those not involved in bullying and between bullies and victims. Almost all bullies (95.4%) had aggression as presenting complaint compared with 39.3% of the victims (p 0.01). Statistically significantly more victims, than bullies, reported sadness (21.4%, 4.6%, p = 0.02). Attention deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) was diagnosed in most children, both involved (73.5%) and not involved (63.2%). Statistically significant differences for the presence of conduct disorder were found between children involved and those not involved in bullying (31.6%, 10.0%, p 0.01) and between bullies and victims (39.4%, 14.3%, p = 0.02).Conclusion: The prevalence of conduct disorder diagnosis was more common in bullies than in victims and those involved in bullying as opposed to those not involved.Contribution: Psychiatric information of bullying victims and perpetrators in the Free State, which had a high prevalence of bullying in a national survey.
 
Publisher AOSIS
 
Contributor None
Date 2023-03-30
 
Type info:eu-repo/semantics/article info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersion — —
Format text/html application/epub+zip text/xml application/pdf
Identifier 10.4102/sajpsychiatry.v29i0.2000
 
Source South African Journal of Psychiatry; Vol 29 (2023); 6 pages 2078-6786 1608-9685
 
Language eng
 
Relation
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https://sajp.org.za/index.php/sajp/article/view/2000/2898 https://sajp.org.za/index.php/sajp/article/view/2000/2899 https://sajp.org.za/index.php/sajp/article/view/2000/2900 https://sajp.org.za/index.php/sajp/article/view/2000/2901
 
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Rights Copyright (c) 2023 Mosa Masakala, Matieho Mofokeng, Amanda Muchocho, Siphesihle Sibisi, Johan le Roux, Helene le Roux, Gina Joubert https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
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