The Norwegian Education Mirror 2022

The Student Survey defines bullying as repeated negative actions by one or more people against a pupil who may have difficulty defending themselves. Bullying can take the form of calling someone ugly things, excluding people, backbiting, hitting, pushing or holding someone down.

6 per cent of pupils report that they have experienced bullying

Of the pupils who responded to the Student Survey in autumn 2021, 5.9 per cent report that they have experienced being bullied at least two to three times a month, either online or by other pupils or adults at school. This figure was 5.8 per cent in 2020 and 6.0 per cent in 2019 (Wendelborg 2022).

In the same survey, 4.6 per cent of pupils reported being bullied by classmates at least two or three times a month, while 1.2 per cent stated that they have been bullied by adults at school. The proportion of pupils who have been bullied by adults increases at secondary school level, and is highest among boys in Year 10. On average, more boys than girls, mostly in Years 9 and 10, state that they have been bullied by adults at school (Wendelborg 2022).

2.2 per cent of all pupils state that they have experienced digital bullying. This is the same as in 2020, while the figure was 1.8 per cent in 2019. Nearly half of pupils who say they have been bullied online report that they have also been bullied in other arenas (Wendelborg 2022).

It is the youngest pupils especially who report online bullying. In Year 5, 3.9 per cent of pupils have experienced digital bullying, compared with 0.7 per cent of pupils in Level Vg3. A bigger proportion of girls than boys state they have been digitally bullied in Years 7-9, but the picture is reversed in Year 5. Gender differences are small among other grades (Wendelborg 2022).

Other surveys indicate that the scope of digital bullying or other negative incidents online could be higher. This can relate to how bullying is defined. For example, the 'Barn og medier' survey from 2020 shows that 26 per cent of young people between the ages of 9 and 18 have experienced someone being mean to them or bullying them on the internet, on their phone or while playing games in recent years. The proportion of boys who have experienced this is higher than that of girls. Girls have experienced someone posting images that make them sad or angry more than boys (Norwegian Media Authority 2020).

Bullying by classmates decreases as pupils get older

The proportion of pupils who say they have been bullied by classmates decreases as pupils get older. Digital bullying also decreases.

A lot of bullying is not noticed at school

Of the pupils who reported being bullied by classmates, 36 per cent reported that none of the adults at school knew about their bullying. Of the pupils who reported that school knew about their bullying, 15 per cent said that the school did nothing about it. There are slight differences between how boys and girls answer when they are asked if their school did anything to help (Wendelborg 2022).

One reason that a bullied pupil might not tell an adult about it could be that bullying is linked with shame (Eriksen and Lyng 2015). Other reasons could be that pupils do not trust adults, do not believe that adults can help, or are scared that the bullying will get worse if they tell anyone (Seland et al. 2020).

If a school has inadequate follow-up of school environment matters, the pupil and their parents can complain to the state administrator. During the 2021-2022 school year, 1,474 complaints were made to the state administrator. In comparison, 1,343 complaints were made in the 2020-2021 school year, and 1,380 in the 2019-2020 school year (The Norwegian Directorate for Education and Training 2022a).