Bullying-Behaviour Scale (BBS).

Abstract

The Bullying-Behaviour Scale (BBS; Austin, & Joseph, 1996) is designed to assess bullying behaviours in school. The item pool for the scale was derived from the Peer Victimisation Scale (PVS; Neary & Joseph, 1994) and involved changing the tense of the item from passive to active. Thus, the BBS scale consists of 6-forced choice items, three of which refer to being the perpetrator of negative physical actions (e.g., hit and pushed, picked on, bullied) and three referring to being the perpetrator of negative verbal actions (e.g., teased, horrible names, laughed at). As with the PVS (Neary & Joseph, 1994), the BBS is designed in the same format as the Self-Perception Profile for Children (SPPC; Harter, 1985). This allows the scale to be inserted within the SPPC in order to reduce the saliency of the items. Designed to be used in conjunction with the PVS (Neary & Joseph, 1994). When both scales are used in conjunction, researchers may be able to determine the grouping (e.g., Smith, Boulton & Cowie, 1993) into which each child should be placed. As such, children may be categorised as victims only, bullies only, or being both a bully and a victim simultaneously. Responses are scored according to the scoring instructions for scoring the SPPC sub-scales (i.e., sum of six items divided by six).