Relevance of Motor Skill Problems in Victims of Bullying

To the Editor .— We were pleased to see that bullying again was discussed in the July issue of Pediatrics .1 The authors showed that bully victimization is associated with the prevalence of headache, stomachache, sleeping problems, nervousness, and more frequent use of medication. Previous longitudinal studies have confirmed that bullying leads to increased risk of physical symptoms, whereas the direction of causality for psychological factors remains uncertain. Unfortunately, the results from this study shed no additional light on this complex issue. Although the directionality of bullying and emotional problems is complicated, it is, according to our view, essential to prevent bullying. As adult psychiatrists we know that exposure to severe bullying in childhood will continue to influence the person's self-image and trust in others in adulthood. Also, those who have only been afflicted by milder forms of bullying will probably remember this humiliation all through their lives. A relationship between bully victimization and having poor social skills has been shown,2,3 but to determine if poor social …