Comparison of Self-Report, Peer-Report, and Principal-Report in Bullying Victimization and Perpetration Among Iranian Students

Bullying among adolescences is known as a public health abnormality and studying the prevalence of bullying behaviors reported using different methods of data gathering can help researchers in surveillance and planning preventions. The objective of this study was to compare the prevalence of perpetration and victimization of bullying reported by self-report, peer-report, and principle-report. In this cross-sectional study that was conducted in 2017 - 2018, a total of 1,540 students from 42 schools throughout Mazandaran province completed self- and peer-report questionnaires and 42 principals of 42 schools completed principal-report questionnaire. The chi-square test was used to compare the association between these methods and gender, school types, and grade levels. The prevalence of bullies and victims in self-, peer-, and principal-report groups were different (20.2% as victim and 7.8% as a bully for self-report, 9.4% as victim and 8.9% as a bully for peer-report, and 4.3% as victim and 3.1% as a bully for principal-report). This study showed the discrepancy in the prevalence of perpetration and victimization of bullying reported in three measurement methods (self-, peer-, and principal-report) in Iranian schools and suggests the use of multiple assessment methods for bullying behaviors.