School bullying, spatiality, and the school built environment

School bullying is a widespread public health concern, and recent research suggests that prevalence rates are increasing in Sweden.

While a great deal of research has been conducted into the problem of school bullying, it has tended to focus overwhelmingly on the behaviour and social interactions of individuals.

Research has demonstrated that bullying often occurs in particular spaces, but there has been little consideration of the importance of those spaces or how the school built environment impacts school bullying and antibullying work.

In this qualitative research project, I focus specifically on the relations between school bullying, spatiality, and the school built environment by investigating not only where school bullying most commonly occurs, but also how the construction and design of spaces impacts its occurrence, how these spaces might be redesigned to reduce bullying, and what possibilities and challenges there are to improving the school built environment.

The project will run for three years, at nine different schools, and will be based on situation plans, floor plans, photographs, analysis of school plans against discrimination and degrading treatment, observations of breaktimes, and interviews with school staff, school pupils, architects and builders.

The project will provide important information about the school built environment that can be used to inform antibullying work and the future planning, design, and construction of socially sustainable schools.