Bullying and The Human Stress Response

Bullying can leave targets of it confused, emotionally numb, and put the fight-or-flight response into overdrive. These reactions will happen, as this response is always associated with traumatic stress. After bullies have bullied a target for so long, adverse changes in the victim’s brain began to occur, causing a decline in certain parts of the human mind.

Decision making and emotional control are most affected. Loss of cognitive abilities and a severely diminished ability to control emotions and think clearly and rationally blinds the target to any alternatives to their current situation.
This is why victims often snap and do irrational things when the pressure builds to the breaking point.

Because children’s brains are still developing, kids stand a higher chance of this happening. Relentless bullying can cause a child or teen to lose the ability to discern and make choices to get them to safety due to their brains’ negative changes.

If you’re a parent and you know your child is a target of bullying at school, you must help them leave that environment and get them into a new school so that their minds can begin healing and their abilities to make good decisions and reason can be restored!

0 thoughts on “Bullying and The Human Stress Response

  1. bullyingisnotariteofpassage says:

    Yes, this is a good one! The body always has a reaction to bullying that unless things are resolved can occur a lifetime. Some people do change and mature but let’s face it. If we run into that old high school bully we have a body reaction even ten years later. The only way that gets resolved is with some true resolution either within yourself or the bully apologizing. Some do, many do not.

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