This dissertation focuses on the overall study, as well as the nuances, of bullying behaviours among school-going youth in India. A systematic review of past literature from India is presented by... Show moreThis dissertation focuses on the overall study, as well as the nuances, of bullying behaviours among school-going youth in India. A systematic review of past literature from India is presented by synthesizing 37 empirical studies examining psychometric properties of the instruments adopted, methodological characteristics, sample size and procedures, and characteristics of bullying behaviour. Results show that bullying is widely spread, and certain factors, like caste and religion, and their association with bullying behaviours are typical to the Indian culture. This dissertation also examines if dimensions of psychopathy, namely callous-unemotional traits, narcissism, and impulsivity, can differentiate between, bullies, victims, and bully-victims in a longitudinal capacity. Using a multi-informant approach and multinomial logistic regression analyses, it was found that psychopathy dimensions taken together provide a better fit in predicting bullying than the independent psychopathic subscales. The dissertation further investigates the structure and context of the relationship between victimization and Body Mass Index through a transactional model. Key results of structural equation modeling analyses yielded mainly concurrent relations between BMI and victimization, emphasizing that results from western countries may not generalize to India. Finally, bullying behaviours among youth as a function of their socio-economic status (SES) in classroom and self-perceptions of minority status are examined using a moderated-mediation growth model. Results show classroom level SES plays a significant role in predicting victimization cross-sectionally, and is mediated through perceptions of self. However, in the long run, being part of a minority, and perceiving self as such, leads to decreased victimization among youth in India. Show less
Child labour can stand in the way of linguistic development and mental health of Indian youth. "We looked at the linguistic development and mental health of children from different social classes... Show moreChild labour can stand in the way of linguistic development and mental health of Indian youth. "We looked at the linguistic development and mental health of children from different social classes in the context of child labour, sleep and academic activities. We saw that children with lower socioeconomic status devote more time to work and sleep and less time to academic tasks than their peers with a higher status," "What we found is that child labor provides a strong explanation for both poorer language development and mental health in lower SES-children. We discovered that the relationship between the linguistic results and academic time is stronger in children with lower socioeconomic status, suggesting that especially these children would benefit if they could invest more time in school and less in other work." This research is the only time-use study conducted in the Indian state of Maharashtra. It is also the only Indian study that uses the time spending methodology with youth represented from a very diverse range of socio-economic classes, including minimally literate school-going youth. Until now we knew little about this, because this group is difficult to reach. Show less
