IFOP, Marion la main tendue and Head and Shoulders unveil a ground-breaking study that looks beyond the victims, analyzing the phenomenon in all its complexity – harassers, stalkers, witnesses – and revealing the continuum of violence that links them all.
Based on a quantitative survey of an exceptional sample of 3,000 middle and high school students – three times the size usually used in surveys on the subject – this study follows on from an initial pioneering study carried out in 2023. This year, it includes an innovative qualitative component involving 80 parents of harassed children, conducted using an intelligent conversational agent.
This comprehensive, systemic approach documents the invisible mechanisms of harassment: how some young people switch from victim to perpetrator, how witnesses become unwilling accomplices, and how families feel powerless. By bringing together the views of victims, perpetrators, witnesses and parents, the study reveals what fragmented approaches had masked: bullying as a complex system in which roles are not fixed and violence is reproduced.
Bullying at school is a widespread phenomenon, affecting one in five young people: according to this new IFOP study, 17% of secondary school students have experienced bullying during their school career, while 7% admit to having been the perpetrators. These indicators, obtained from a strict, objective measurement – repeated exposure to verbal, physical or psychological violence for victims, or repeated infliction of such violence for perpetrators – reveal the true scale of a phenomenon that goes far beyond media coverage.
The study deconstructs the simplistic opposition between “victims” and “perpetrators” by revealing two realities: a majority of harassers have themselves been victims, and the sociodemographic and psychological profiles of harassers and harassed overlap: marked shyness, disability, grade repetition, boarding school life. These convergences suggest that harassment does not circulate between two distinct populations, but spreads within the same vulnerable group.
The survey also establishes a strong correlation with family violence, which functions both as a breeding ground and consequence of harassment: young people reproduce at school what they observe at home, while the trauma of harassment destabilizes the family balance. A chain of reproduction in which violence circulates between spheres and statuses, feeding on itself.
Harassment as a group phenomenon
Harassment is above all a group phenomenon, structured by a complex dynamic of domination and drive. 74% of victims report having been harassed by several people at once, and 89% identify the presence of a leader who orchestrates and legitimizes the violence. This leader plays a central role: he or she designates the target, initiates the first acts, and creates a social permission system that draws in young people who, taken individually, might never have taken the plunge. The data from the stalkers’ side confirms this mechanism: 61% admit that they would not have acted alone, 58% were encouraged by the laughter or approval of their peers, 54% stalked out of conformism (“everyone was doing it”), and 46% out of fear of being rejected themselves if they didn’t participate. Harassment thus functions as defensive and mimetic violence: we attack to belong to the group, so as not to become the next target. The group finds negative cohesion in the exclusion of a scapegoat, and the more it rallies around this violence, the more perilous it becomes for a witness to oppose it without risking exclusion in turn.
The after-effects of harassment don’t go away once the violence is over
The study reveals that 62% of victims say they are still suffering psychological after-effects, a proportion that rises to 85% for those who have been harassed for more than 2 years. These figures illustrate that harassment not only destroys the present, but also mortgages the future: loss of self-confidence, social withdrawal, chronic anxiety, sleep disorders, dropping out of school. Some victims take years, even decades, to rebuild their lives – if they manage at all. But bullying also devastates families. The 84 interviews with parents reveal a deep sense of helplessness: feelings of abandonment in the face of an institution that minimizes or denies, radical decisions (moving house, dropping out of school). Testimonies describe situations where the child no longer sleeps, no longer eats, talks about dying – and where the school replies that “these are children’s games”. Harassment doesn’t just destroy an individual pupil: it shatters entire families and permanently shatters confidence in the school institution.
The institutional response: between obvious shortcomings and local successes
School responses to bullying reveal a mixed picture. One figure in particular stands out: 60% of harassers say they have never been punished. This figure reflects a worrying reality: in 6 out of 10 cases, violence goes unaddressed by the institution. The 84 interviews with parents documented the mechanisms behind this inaction: minimization of seriousness (“they’re just games”), empowerment of the victim rather than punishment of the group (“he must learn to defend himself”), refusal to use the term “harassment” in favor of “tensions between students”, lost reports, protocols never activated. These dysfunctions, when accumulated, aggravate the trauma and shatter the trust of families. But the study also reveals the existence of schools that manage situations effectively: rapid reaction at the first sign of trouble, clear sanctions, activation of structured protocols, team training and work on the school climate. In these cases, some situations are resolved in a matter of days, before the after-effects take hold. These success stories confirm a central observation: early, systematic intervention makes all the difference. When the institution assumes its responsibilities immediately, it limits the damage considerably and can stop the group dynamic dead in its tracks.
