School bullying has existed since formal education began and our efforts to understand it have not always been as successful as we would like. However, over the last 50 years there has been a considerable amount of research on bullying and in more recent years our understanding of the complexity of the issue and how it relates to social norms has increased. Furthermore, while we have some knowledge of the emotional and developmental impact of bullying on individuals, we are only coming to see that there is also an economic cost that arises from this human phenomenon.
