ABSTRACT Background: In order to support efforts to prevent bullying, more needs to be understood about students’ own explanations of bullying in their everyday school lives. In-depth qualitative analysis can contribute important insights regarding insider perspectives in terms of how students understand and explain the social interaction patterns of bullying. Purpose: The aim of the study was to examine, in detail, how a small sample of lower secondary school students explain why bullying happens and to develop a grounded theory analysis based on the students’ perspectives. Method: The participants in the study were 17 Swedish lower secondary school students aged between 13 and 15 years. A total of 17 qualitative interviews and 3 follow-up interviews were conducted. Grounded theory methods based on a constructivist position were used to explore and analyse the data. Findings: The findings are based on data collected from young people who had witnessed bullying. The analysis of their explanations of why bullying happens resulted in six categories: social positioning, victim constructing, bullying normalising, rule diffusion, rule resistance and cultural ideals. These categories are interrelated, and the core process of bullying was identified as social positioning. The analysis suggested that the main concern of those who engage in bullying is to gain and maintain a high social status. Victims, in turn, were socially constructed as ‘different’ and ‘wrong’, and were connected with a low-status position. Conclusions: The study draws attention to the need for students’ understandings of bullying to be considered – for example, through student consultations. It is hoped that the current findings could be helpful as a starting point when investigating students’ perspectives and giving students a voice in bullying prevention approaches at school.

中文翻译：

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中学生如何解释欺凌？

摘要 背景：为了支持防止欺凌的努力，需要更多地了解学生对日常学校生活中欺凌的解释。在学生如何理解和解释欺凌的社会互动模式方面，深入的定性分析可以提供有关内部人士观点的重要见解。目的：该研究的目的是详细研究一小部分初中学生如何解释欺凌发生的原因，并根据学生的观点进行扎根的理论分析。方法：该研究的参与者是 17 名年龄在 13 至 15 岁之间的瑞典初中学生。共进行了 17 次定性访谈和 3 次后续访谈。使用基于建构主义立场的扎根理论方法来探索和分析数据。调查结果：调查结果基于从目睹欺凌的年轻人那里收集的数据。他们对欺凌发生原因的解释分为六类：社会定位、受害者建构、欺凌规范化、规则扩散、规则抵抗和文化理想。这些类别相互关联，欺凌的核心过程被确定为社会定位。分析表明，欺凌者的主要关注点是获得和维持较高的社会地位。反过来，受害者被社会建构为“不同的”和“错误的”，并与地位低下有关。结论：该研究提请注意需要考虑学生对欺凌的理解——例如，通过学生咨询。希望当前的调查结果可以作为调查学生的观点并让学生就学校欺凌预防方法发表意见的起点有所帮助。