Peer violence, school environment and developmental contexts: its effects on well-beingThe scope of this study is to analyze the implications of peer violence in the school context, the school environment and the perceived developmental contexts on the subjective well-being of children and adolescents. The sample is comprised of 910 students in Years 6 and 7 of primary school in 27 urban and rural public and private schools in Ceará. It is a quantitative cross-sectional study and the following tools were used: scales measuring victimization and aggression among peers and the school environment; three indices on perceptions of developmental contexts (home, school, neighborhood); and three well-being scales (Students’ Life Satisfaction Scale, Personal Well-being Index and Single item on Overall Life Satisfaction). Data were analyzed using multivariate variance analysis, with a significance level below 0, 01. Results indicate that bullying, alone or in interaction with the variables analyzed, is the variable that has the greatest impact on the well-being of the population studied, whereby those involved in bullying have the lowest well-being averages. Low levels of perception regarding the contexts of home, school and neighborhood and the school environment, as well as attending a public school and/or living in rural areas, are all also associated with low subjective well-being.
Key words
Violence; Bullying; Quality of life; Child; Adolescent