Fact of the day: School bullying has decreased over the past 20 years

Last night I wrote a post that made an offhand reference to school bullying. That prompted a Twitter comment, which in turn has prompted me to present the data we have on school bullying. Here it is for all bullying and separately for cyberbulling:

It would be nice to have data going back further, but the survey methodology before 2005 was so different that it's impossible to make comparisons before then. This is the best we've got.

However, we do have data going back a little further that shows the percentage of students who are afraid of "attack or harm" when they attend school. Here it is:

It's worth noting a few things:

• The most common types of bullying were "made fun of" and "subject of rumors."
• Classrooms and hallways were the location of most school bullying. In all of these surveys, "school" includes both outside grounds and the trip to and from school.
• Perhaps surprisingly, cyberbullying hasn't increased since 2011. It's stayed rock steady.
• These numbers probably represent the ceiling of bullying estimates. The numbers for "direct" bullying—which is just what it sounds like—are probably 50-60% lower.
• There are other sources of data on school bullying. However, they mostly don't go back even to 2005 and don't use consistent methodologies.
• Teen bullying is worst in 6th grade and goes down steadily throughout high school. The numbers for high school sophomores, for example, are about 10-15% lower than the overall numbers.

Contrary to widespread belief, the evidence suggests that our schools have gotten quite a bit safer and more tolerant over the past few decades. I'm willing to bet that this trend started around 1990.