OECD Education Working Paper No. 341 Bullying in education: prevalence, impactand responses across countries OECD EDUCATION WORKING PAPERS SERIES This work ispublished under the responsibility of the Secretary-General of the OECD. The opinionsexpressed and arguments employed herein do not necessarily reflect the official views of the Membercountries of the OECD. Working Papers describe preliminary results or research in progress by theauthor(s) and are published to stimulate discussion on a broad range of issues on which the OECD works. This document, as well as any data and map included herein, are without prejudice to the status of orsovereignty over any territory, to the delimitation of international frontiers and boundaries and to the name ©OECD 2026 Attribution4.0 International (CCBY4.0) This work is made available under the Creative Commons Attribution4.0 International licence. By using this work, youaccept to be bound by the terms of this licence (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). Attribution–you must cite the work. Translations–you must cite the original work, identify changes to the original and add the following text:In the event of any discrepancy between the original work and the translation, only the text of original work should be consideredvalid. Adaptations–you must cite the original work and add the following text:This is an adaptation of an original work bythe OECD. The opinions expressed and arguments employed in this adaptation should not be reported as representing Third-party material–the licence does not apply to third-party material in the work. If using such material, you areresponsible for obtaining permission from the third party and for any claims of infringement. You must not use the Any dispute arising under this licence shall be settled by arbitration in accordance with the Permanent Court ofArbitration (PCA) Arbitration Rules2012. The seat ofarbitration shall be Paris (France). The number of arbitrators Abstract Bullying, whether inperson or online, isa barrier to inclusive, high-quality education and to cohesivesocieties. This OECD working paper documents bullying prevalence and trends across OECD andaccession countries between 2015 and 2022,using PISA data.Regression analyses point to markeddisparities in bullying exposure across student groups, with socio-economically advantaged boys with animmigrant background facing particularly elevated risks.The paperalsosynthesises evidence on howbullyingcanharmindividual students, and how these individual effects can spill over to schoolsand, over Acknowledgments This paper was prepared byJulie Pereira(OECD) as part of the Education for Inclusive Societies projectin the context of theProgramme of Work ofOECD’s Education Policy Committee.The author would liketo thankLucie Cerna,Francesca Gottschalk,Cecilia Mezzanotte,James O’Higgins Norman,PauloSantiago,Liva Stockenbergaand Samo Varsikfor their valuable feedback and comments.Thanks also to Table of contents Abstract Acknowledgments4 1. Introduction7 2. Bullying prevalence 2.1. Measuring bullying intensity2.2. Bullying prevalence between 2015 and 20222.3. Heterogeneity in the intensity of bullying exposure2.4. Student groups at higher risk of experiencing bullying2.5. Other risk and protective factors 3. Impacts of bullying 3.1. The impacts of bullying on individuals, schools and society: a conceptual framework3.2. Methodological challenges to causal inference3.3. Individual-level consequences of bullying3.4. School-level consequences of bullying3.5. Society-level consequences of bullying 4. Policies and strategies to address bullying 4.1. Governance4.2. Capacity development4.3. Educational interventions4.4. Monitoring and evaluation 26293034 5. Conclusion36 5.1. Research and measurement gaps5.2. Policy implications 3637 References Annex A.54 Notes56 FIGURES Figure2.1.Bullying intensity index across OECD and accession countries11Figure2.2. Change in bullying intensity index between 2015 and 202212Figure2.3. Change in bullying intensity index between 2018 and 2022 (PISA), and 2019 and 2023 (TIMSS)13Figure2.4. Average bullying intensity index distribution (OECD average)14Figure2.5. Predicted differences in bullying intensity index by gender, immigrant background and socio- Figure3.1. From individual harm to societal costs: mapping the potential impacts of bullyingFigure3.2. Relationship between bullying and truancy (OECD average 2022)Figure3.3.Relationship between bullying intensity and other indicators at the school level (OECD average2022) TABLES Table1.1. Estimates of global bullying prevalenceTable4.1. OBPP’s suggested actions at the individual, school, classroom and community levels TableA1. Linear regression of the score on the bullying intensity index, OECD averageTableA2. Building a second bullying intensity index from TIMSS BOXES Box2.1. School bullying and the COVID-19 pandemicBox2.2. Focus on cyberbullyingBox4.1. Bullying