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Mentoring, Bullying, and Educational Outcomes Among US School‐Aged Children 6‐17 Years
Author(s) -
Azuine Romuladus E.,
Singh Gopal K.
Publication year - 2019
Publication title -
journal of school health
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.851
H-Index - 86
eISSN - 1746-1561
pISSN - 0022-4391
DOI - 10.1111/josh.12735
Subject(s) - receipt , odds , educational attainment , psychology , medicine , injury prevention , poison control , developmental psychology , clinical psychology , logistic regression , environmental health , world wide web , computer science , economics , economic growth
ABSTRACT BACKGROUND Ensuring the optimum development of all children and their attainment of age‐appropriate educational outcomes is of great interest to public health researchers and professionals. Bullying and mentoring have opposite effects on child development and educational attainment. Mentoring exerts protective effects on youths against risky behaviors; however, the protective effects of community‐oriented natural or informal mentoring on educational outcomes and bullying are largely underexplored. We examine associations between mentoring, bullying, and educational outcomes among US school‐aged children 6‐17 years. METHODS We analyzed the 2011‐2012 National Survey of Children's Health (N = 65,593) to estimate prevalence and odds of repeating a grade in school, lower school engagement, and bullying perpetration according to mentoring receipt and sociodemographic characteristics. RESULTS Overall, 5.4% of US school‐aged children without a mentor perpetrated bullying against other children; 11.4% repeated more than one grade in school; and 23.0% had low school engagement. Children without mentors had 2.1 and 1.3 times higher adjusted odds, respectively, of bullying other children and low school engagement than those with mentors. Proportion of children who bullied others or repeated grades was higher among minority children. CONCLUSIONS Findings indicate that mentoring may be a pathway for providing programs that prevent bullying and improve educational outcomes among school‐aged children.