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Time Trends in Adolescent School Absences and Associated Bullying Involvement Between 2000 and 2019: A Nationwide
K Alanko1, K Melander2, K Ranta3
1Faculty of Humanities, Psychology and Theology, Åbo Akademi University, Turku, Finland. Katarina.alanko@abo.fi.
Child Psychiatry and Human Development
|August 26, 2023
Summary
Adolescent school absences, particularly illness absences (IA), increased over two decades, while truancy declined. Bullying involvement significantly elevates risks for both types of school absenteeism, impacting student wellbeing and academic success.
Area of Science:
- Public Health
- Adolescent Health
- Educational Psychology
Background:
- Education is a key factor in adolescent health outcomes.
- School absences and bullying involvement negatively impact student wellbeing, mental health, and academic achievement.
- Understanding trends in absenteeism and its links to bullying is crucial for targeted interventions.
Purpose of the Study:
- To analyze time trends in school absenteeism (illness absences and truancy) over two decades in Finnish middle school students.
- To examine the association between various forms of bullying involvement (victimization, perpetration, and combined) and school absenteeism.
- To identify potential reasons for observed changes in absenteeism patterns.
Main Methods:
- Utilized self-reported data from the nationwide School Health Promotion study, including 1,000,970 Finnish middle school students (grades 8-9).
- Assessed frequency of illness absences (IA), truancy, bullying victimization, bullying perpetration, and combined victimization-perpetration.
- Defined frequent school absences as >3 days/month (2000-2015) or weekly (2017-2019).
- Employed logistic regression to analyze the relationship between bullying involvement and absenteeism.
Main Results:
- Frequent IA increased from 12% (2000) to 22% (2015), then decreased to 3.5% (2017-2019).
- Frequent truancy decreased from 9% (2000) to 4% (2015-2019).
- Bullying victimization, perpetration, and combined involvement were significantly associated with increased odds of both IA and truancy.
Conclusions:
- Adolescents involved in bullying face heightened risks for both illness absences and truancy, impacting their social and educational trajectories.
- The observed shift from declining truancy to increasing IA may indicate destigmatization of mental health issues or changes in absence reporting.
- Interventions addressing bullying are essential to mitigate school absenteeism and support adolescent wellbeing and educational attainment.
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