In Brazil, four out of ten students aged 13 to 17 say they have already been victims of bullying, and 27.2 percent in this age group have suffered some form of humiliation two or more times.

The data, released this week, are based on testimonies collected in 2024 in schools across Brazil by the Brazilian government’s statistics agency IBGE as part of the National School Health Survey (PeNSE).

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Compared to the previous survey, conducted in 2019, there was a 0.7 percentage point increase in the total number of students who reported having suffered bullying. The proportion of students who experienced it at least twice rose by more than 4 percentage points, Marco Andreazzi, the research manager, emphasized.

“Bullying is already characterized as something persistent, intermittent… And here we observe an upward trend, indicating that more students have begun to experience repeated situations of violence,” Andreazzi said.

The researcher stressed that “the number of those who suffer bullying remains practically the same; however, the persistence and intensity of the episodes have increased.”

Appearance, race, gender

Bullied students told researchers that their facial features or hair were the main targets of bullying, accounting for 30.2 percent of cases.

Next is body appearance, accounting for 24.7 percent, followed by bullying related to color or race, reported by 10.6 percent.

“There is also a high percentage - 26.3 percent - of students who say the bullying had no reason. That is, many of those who suffer do not know why, and this is natural, since bullying occurs collectively and the victim does not necessarily perceive a reason for it. On the contrary, they feel completely wronged,” the research manager noted.

The research found that girls are the most affected - 43.3 percent have experienced bullying, compared to 37.3 percent of boys.

Furthermore, 30.1 percent of female adolescent students reported feeling humiliated by teasing from classmates two or more times. This proportion is nearly 6 percentage points higher than among male students.

Profile of the aggressors

Data on those who commit bullying show an inverse pattern: 13.7 percent of students reported having engaged in some form of violence - 16.5 percent of boys and 10.9 percent of girls.

IBGE also asked about the reasons for the aggression, and once again, facial features, hair, body type, and skin color or race were the most frequently cited.

However, some significant differences emerged in relation to victims’ reports. For example, 12.1 percent of perpetrators said they engaged in bullying because of their classmates’ gender or sexual orientation, while only 6.4 percent of victims identified this as a motive for the violence.

A similar pattern emerged regarding disability: while 7.6 percent of perpetrators acknowledged engaging in bullying for this reason, only 2.6 percent of victims associated the attacks with this characteristic.

For researchers, this may indicate that many victims prefer to remain silent about the circumstances for fear of being stigmatized.

Physical and virtual aggression

The research also found that, in some cases, conflicts between students are escalating: 16.6 percent of students reported being physically assaulted by classmates, rising to 18.6 percent specifically for boys.

IBGE also highlighted an increase in the proportion of students assaulted two or more times, rising from 6.5 percent to 9.6 percent.

Cases of cyberbullying, carried out via social networks or apps, decreased from 13.2 percent to 12.7 percent. In this case, girls are more often victims: 15.2 percent reported feeling humiliated or threatened by content posted on these platforms, compared to 10.3 percent of boys.

Preventive actions

IBGE also surveyed school administrators to gather information on the support offered to adolescents and found that only 53.4 percent of students attended schools that adhered to the School Health Program (PSE), which implements a range of actions to promote student well-being.

Considering the initiatives included in the PSE, only 43.2 percent of students attended schools that carried out actions to prevent bullying, and only 37.2 percent attended schools that implemented measures under the program to prevent fights on their premises.