Childhood bullies and victims and their risk of criminality in late adolescence: the Finnish From a Boy to a Man study.

OBJECTIVE

To study correlations of childhood bullying and victimization with juvenile criminality.

DESIGN

Longitudinal birth cohort study from age 8 years to ages 16 to 20 years.

SETTING

Population-based study from Finland.

PARTICIPANTS

The sample comprised 2551 boys (86.6% of the original birth cohort) with complete information about bullying and victimization from parents, teachers, and children at age 8 years.

MAIN OUTCOME MEASURE

Information about criminal offenses from the National Police Register at ages 16 to 20 years.

RESULTS

Frequent bullies and those who frequently both bullied and were bullied (8.8% of the sample) were responsible for 33.0% of all juvenile crimes during the 4-year study period. Frequent bully-only status predicted both occasional and repeated offending, whereas bully-victim status predicted repeated offending. Bullying predicted most types of crime (violence, property, drunk driving, and traffic offenses) when controlled with parental education level. However, frequent bullies or victims without a high level of psychiatric symptoms were not at an elevated risk for later criminality.

CONCLUSIONS

Boys who frequently bully are at risk for later criminality when this condition is accompanied by a high level of psychiatric symptoms. Frequent bullies should be actively screened for psychiatric problems.