An Evidence-based Approach for Bullying Prevention

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ABSTRACT An Evidence-Based Serious Game Approach for Bullying Prevention Administrative Supplement Bullying, in its most familiar form, is a serious public health concern. This is especially true during the middle-school years, a transition period when bullying increases. Cyberbullying, an electronic evolution of face-to-face bullying, is willful and repeated harm inflicted through computers, cell phones and other electronic devices to threaten, harass, embarrass, or socially exclude another. Both victims and offenders of bullying and cyberbullying are more likely to have low self-esteem, suicidal ideation, depression, substance use, and lower academic achievement. In this project, National Health Promotion Associates (NHPA) developed a bullying and cyberbullying prevention intervention for middle school students, including interactive classroom sessions and corresponding serious games, based on the evidence-based substance abuse prevention approach called Life Skills Training (LST). The LST prevention model teaches youth personal self-management skills, social skills, drug refusal skills, and other life skills needed to successfully navigate developmental tasks, increase resilience, and facilitate healthy psychosocial development. The LST program has been extensively tested and found to effectively prevent substance use in a series of randomized controlled trials (RCT) with behavioral effects reported in over 30 peer-reviewed publications. In the present study, we have developed the intervention materials and are now conducting a rigorous randomized controlled trial with 24 middle/junior high schools that have been assigned to either the LST prevention program alone or LST with the newly developed bullying/cyberbullying materials. The outcome evaluation assesses changes in behaviors, norms, attitudes, and knowledge for bullying/cyberbullying and concurrent alcohol, tobacco, and other drug (ATOD) abuse between the two experimental conditions. To examine the impact of the intervention, survey data are being collected immediately before and after its implementation and at 12- and 24-month follow-up assessments. We are also conducting a process evaluation to document dosage, fidelity implementation, and school/community events. In March of 2020, the Covid-19 pandemic spread across the United States and had a disruptive impact on this research, especially the activities conducted in schools. Schools throughout the country, including those participating in our randomized controlled trial, were closed by state and/or local officials. These abrupt closures had a severe impact on the trial fieldwork. All field activities, including intervention implementation and data collection, had to be halted. In addition, NHPA’s office (located in White Plains, New York) and all businesses not designated as “essential” were closed by an executive order of the NYS governor. Where possible, employees were instructed to establish at-home workstations and work from home. The proposed administrative supplement is requested to address the significant and adverse disruption to the trial based on the Covid-19 school closures that abruptly stopped: 1) intervention implementation; 2) survey data collection; and 3) process data collection.