زورگویی و تنهایی اجتماعی و عاطفی در یک نمونه از زندانیان مرد بزرگسال

Abstract The present study explored social and emotional loneliness, and victimisation among a sample of adult male prisoners. 241 prisoners took part, completing a behavioural measure of behaviours indicative of bullying (DIPC-R: Direct and Indirect Prisoner behaviour Checklist, Ireland, J.L. 2003. The Direct and Indirect Prisoner behaviour Checklist — Revised. Psychology Department, University of Central Lancashire). and a measure of social and emotional loneliness (SELSA: Social and Emotional Loneliness Scale for Adults, DiTommaso, E. & Spinner, B. (1993). The development and initial validation of the social and emotional loneliness scale for adults (SELSA). Personality and Individual Differences, 14, 127–134.). Differences between the groups involved in bullying (i.e. pure bullies, pure victims, bully/victims and those not involved) were noted, with victim groups (pure victims and bully/victims) presenting with higher levels of social loneliness than those not-involved. Emotional loneliness was not a distinguishing characteristic for membership to the pure victim or bully/victim group, and instead was found to be associated with the type and amount of victimisation reported: victims who reported multiple types of victimisation presented with higher levels of emotional (family) loneliness than victims reporting just one type of victimisation. Increased victimisation was also associated with increased levels of social and emotional loneliness, most notably with regards to indirect victimisation. The results are discussed with reference to the environment in which the victimisation is taking place, and we outline a potential application of life events and added stress models in understanding social maladjustment (loneliness) among prisoners.

1. Introduction Bullying has proven a difficult concept to define in terms its exact characteristics (Smith & Brain, 2000). There is a developing consensus, however, that the term ‘bullying’ represents an all-encompassing term to describe a range of aggressive behaviours that can occur between individuals (Ireland, Archer & Power, 2007). Prison based researchers have opted for a broad definition of bullying: An individual is being bullied when they are the victim of direct and/or indirect aggression happening on a weekly basis, by the same perpetrator or different perpetrators. Single incidences of aggression can be viewed as bullying, particularly where they are severe and when the individual either believes or fears that they are at risk of future victimization by the same perpetrator or others. An incident can be considered bullying if the victim believes that they have been aggressed towards, regardless of the actual intention of the bully. It can also be bullying when the imbalance of power between the bully and his/her victim is implied and not immediately evident (Ireland, 2002: p. 26). Despite attempts at formulating a definition, however, there is a developing consensus among forensic researchers that the term “bullying” is simply one used to describe intragroup aggression, with the possibility of developing a fixed, measurable and prescriptive definition of ‘bullying’ unlikely to materialise ( Ireland & Rowley, 2007). Social relationships are a particularly important factor to consider in the perpetrator and victim relationship. Hodges and Perry (1996) suggest that, among children, there are three core social risk factors for victimisation: having few friends, having friends unable to protect you and, being rejected by peers. There has been support for these findings (e.g. Boulton and Underwood, 1992 and Boulton et al., 1999), with victims scoring higher on measures of loneliness (e.g. Kochenderfer and Ladd, 1996 and Prinstein et al., 2001). Research with children indicates that loneliness is not only related to overt [direct] victimization, but to relational [indirect] victimisation (Crick & Grotoper, 1996). Victims of multiple forms of aggression are also reported to be at increased risk of adjustment difficulties, including loneliness, than victims of one or no forms of aggression (Prinstein et al., 2001).

3. Results Results pertaining to the Direct and Indirect Prisoner Checklist — Revised will be presented first, followed by the social and emotional loneliness scale. 3.1. Direct and Indirect Prisoner behaviour Checklist — Revised (DIPC-R) Kuder–Richardson-20 was used to assess the reliability of each subscale of the DIPC-R, both for items indicative of ‘bullying others’ (bully items) and for those indicative of ‘being bullied’ (victim items). Each subscale was found to be reliable (direct bullying = .96 [33 items]; direct victim = .94 [33 items]; indirect bully = .83 [12 items]; indirect victim = .86 [12 items]; coercive bully = .95 [nine items]; and coercive victim = .94 [nine items]). Although the DIPC-R does not use the term ‘bullying’ in the checklist, the following results are for those who reported engaging in at least one interaction indicative of bullying others or of being bullied. Overall, 29% reported engaging in at least one interaction defined as ‘bullying others’. With regard to the different types of bullying, 14% reported engaging in at least interaction defined as ‘indirect bullying’, 16% reported engaging in at least one interaction defined as ‘direct’ bullying (6% physical, 4% psychological, 12% verbal, 6% theft-related and 1% sexual), and 3% reported engaging in at least one interaction defined as ‘coercive bullying’. With regards to behaviours indicative of ‘being bullied’, 48% of prisoners reported experiencing at least one interaction defined as such. With regard to the different types of ‘victimisation’, 38% reported experiencing at least one interaction defined as ‘indirect victimisation’, 35% reported experiencing at least one interaction defined as ‘direct victimisation’ (11% physical, 8% psychological, 17% verbal, 20% theft-related and 5% sexual), and 4% reported experiencing at least one interaction defined as ‘coercive victimisation’. 3.2. Bully categories Participants were divided into four categories as follows; ‘pure bullies’ (those who solely bully others); ‘bully/victims’ (those who report both bullying others and being victimised themselves); ‘pure victims’ (those who solely report being bullied) and ‘not involved’ (those not reporting any bully or victim items). Classification into each bully-category was based on the reporting of perpetrator and/or victimisation items on the DIPC-R (regardless of the type or number of items reported). Forty-six percent of offenders (n = 111) were classed as not involved, 25% (n = 61) pure victims, 23% (n = 55) as bully/victims and 6% (n = 14) as pure bullies. 3.3. Social and emotional loneliness (SELSA) Each subscale of the SELSA proved to be reliable; family (a = .91, n = 221, items = 11); romantic (a = .81, n = 214, items = 12); peers [social] outside prison (a = .80, n = 216, items = 14) and peers [social] in prison (a = .91, n = 207, items = 14). The emotional loneliness scale (family and romantic) was also reliable (a = .89, n = 213, items = 23), as was the social loneliness scale (peer in and peer out: a = .95, n = 205, items = 28). All item-total correlations were positive. There was also an association demonstrated between total emotional and total social loneliness, with increased emotional loneliness significantly predicting increased social loneliness, demonstrated via a regression model (R2 = .27, SE = 18.9, β = .53, df = 197, F = 75.1, p < .0001). This was further confirmed by a significant positive correlation between total emotional and social loneliness (r = .52, n = 199, p < .001).