Children Exposed To Bullying Are More Likey To Hallucinate And Hear Voices

A new study has shown that children who are exposed to bullying have an increased risk of developing psychotic experiences in their adulthood.

Researchers at the University of Warwick and the University of Bristol found that victims, perpetrators, and those who are both bullies and victims are likely to hear voices and hallucinate have when they are older.

"The results show that interventions against bullying should start early, in primary school, to prevent long term serious effects on children's mental health. This clearly isn't something that can wait until secondary school to be resolved; the damage may already have been done," Dieter Wolke, a psychology professor at the University of Warwick said in a statement."We want to eradicate the myth that bullying at a young age could be viewed as a harmless rite of passage that everyone goes through."

The study, published in Psychological Medicine, examined a cohort of UK children from birth to fully understand the extent of bullying on psychosis in later life -- with some groups showing to be almost five times more likely to suffer from episodes at the age of 18.

Based on the study, children who were bullied over a number of years and bullies themselves were already showing long term effects of bullying as soon as primary school. Researchers found that they were up to four and a half times more likely to have suffered from psychotic experiences by the age of 18. Equally concerning is that those children who only experienced bullying for brief periods were at increased risk for psychotic experiences.

"These numbers show exactly how much childhood bullying can impact on psychosis in adult life," Wolke said. "It strengthens on the evidence base that reducing bullying in childhood could substantially reduce mental health problems. The benefit to society would be huge, but of course, the greatest benefit would be to the individual."

Researchers explained that if psychotic experiences are persistent in adulthood, they could become highly distressing and disruptive to everyday life. They might even be diagnosed with "psychotic disorders" such as schizophrenia.

In a previous study, Wolke's team looked at the impact of bullying on psychotic symptoms in 12 year olds, and there have been a range of short term studies that confirm the relation between being a victim of bullying and psychotic symptoms.