Faculty of Psychology, University of the Basque Country, UPV/EHU, Donostia/San Sebastian, Spain.
Biodonostia Health Research Institute, Group of Environmental Epidemiology and Child Development, Donostia/San Sebastian, Spain.
Child Neuropsychol. 2023 Jul;29(5):742-759. doi: 10.1080/09297049.2022.2115991. Epub 2022 Aug 28.
Bullying has been identified as the most common form of aggression and a major source of stress among children and adolescents. The main objective of this study was to analyze the association that school context in general and bullying in particular might have with hair cortisol concentration (HCC), examining the effect of executive function and sex on this association. The study included 659 11-year-old preadolescents from the cohorts of Gipuzkoa and Sabadell of the INMA (INfancia y Medio Ambiente-Children and Environment) project. We gathered information about school-related factors (bullying, school environment, problems with peers and academic performance) and executive function (risky decision-making). Hair samples were collected to measure cortisol concentrations and Structural Equation Modeling was used to examine associations between school-related factors, executive function and HCC. Results showed that being involved as a bully/victim was related to higher HCC and, higher HCC was associated with poorer executive function. This study may contribute to a better understanding of the consequences that chronic exposure to a stressful factors may have on preadolescents' health and developmental outcomes. Besides, our results are relevant for designing programs for prevention and intervention, which could modify individual physiological responses to stress and reduce the effects of stress on the health.
欺凌已被确定为儿童和青少年中最常见的攻击形式和主要压力源。本研究的主要目的是分析学校环境，特别是欺凌行为与头发皮质醇浓度（HCC）之间的关联，检验执行功能和性别对这种关联的影响。该研究纳入了 INMA（儿童与环境）项目中的 Gipuzkoa 和 Sabadell 队列中的 659 名 11 岁的青春期前儿童。我们收集了与学校相关的因素（欺凌、学校环境、与同伴的问题和学业成绩）和执行功能（冒险决策）的信息。采集头发样本以测量皮质醇浓度，并使用结构方程模型来检验学校相关因素、执行功能与 HCC 之间的关联。结果表明，作为欺凌者/受害者与较高的 HCC 有关，而较高的 HCC 与较差的执行功能有关。这项研究有助于更好地理解儿童长期暴露于压力因素可能对其健康和发育结果产生的影响。此外，我们的研究结果对于预防和干预计划的设计具有重要意义，因为这些计划可以改变个体对压力的生理反应，减轻压力对健康的影响。
