How Early do Social Determinants of Health Begin to Operate? Results From the Fragile Families and Child Wellbeing Study.
Anao Zhang, Yolanda C Padilla, Yeonwoo Kim
PMID 28705692WHAT IT FOUND
Children who were bullied more often or in more ways rated their health worse.
Each extra bullying episode was associated with children being 11.9% less likely to rate health excellent or very good.
Key findings
01For every additional time a child was bullied in the past month, the child was 11.9% less likely to report excellent or very good health versus poor or fair health, and 7.2% less likely to report good health versus poor or fair health.
02Compared with no bullying, three types of bullying were associated with 66.6% lower odds of excellent or very good health versus poor or fair health, and two types with 39.8% lower odds; one type was not significantly different.
03Being picked on or left out was associated with 23.2% lower odds of excellent health versus otherwise; being hit or having things taken away was not significantly different.
STILL TO COME
How it was doneWhat they foundWhat it means for RNs
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What it does not show
This was a cross-sectional analysis, so it shows an association at one time point, not that bullying caused poor health. Bullying and health were both child self-report, and the paper says more work is needed to validate self-rated health in this age group. The sample oversampled unmarried parents and is more generalizable to urban, relatively disadvantaged U.S. children living with mostly unmarried mothers. Children not living with their mothers at least half the time were excluded, so the analysis did not cover them. Analyses were limited to non-Hispanic white, non-Hispanic black, or Hispanic children with complete information on the study variables. Cyberbullying was not measured. The statistical models were unweighted, although the paper says it controlled for mother characteristics used in creating weights.
The easy way to misread this
Do not read the 23.2% lower odds as proof bullying causes poor health. This was a cross-sectional association, not a test of an anti-bullying intervention. The non-significant result for physical aggression does not mean hitting or taking things is harmless.