Development and validation of a new self-report assessment measure of bullying

Bullying is a highly topical issue, appearing with some frequency in the mass media, especially in extreme circumstances. It is a difficult problem to address, but in order to do so we must first evaluate it. Yet even its assessment poses a major challenge. Following a review of the self-report instruments available for dealing with bullying today, we decided to build a new one due largely to the shortcomings inherent to many of them. This paper concludes the research that began several years ago for the development of a new measure of bullying and presents the final version of the Multimodal Questionnaire of School Interactions (MQSI-IV), consisting of 36 items and five factors: a) Intimidating behaviors (bullying), b) Bullying victimization (bullied), c) Active bystander defending the victim, d) Extreme bullying/Cyber bullying, and e) Passive bystander. The paper presents other psychometric characteristics of the instrument, as well as the differences between girls and boys and between different age groups (ages 10 to 15) in the five dimensions of bullying.