There is a lot of "buzz" out there on bullying. Is it getting worse? Is there more of it? Or, has the kind of bullying just changed? A common solution is often "martial arts" for bully prevention. Intuitively, this makes sense. Teach a child to defend himself or herself and he or she will be bullied less. Makes sense, right? But, what about the bully? If we teach him or her martial arts will we be just arming the bully with more tools?
In either case, is there any actual evidence that martial arts can help with the bully epidemic? Or, do we have to just settle for the anecdotes and our intuition?
Well, you're in luck. we've found some actual research, from a Tier 1 university no less!
The study is linked below, but here are some highlights:
"The data confirms our initial hypothesis that martial arts does have the effect of decreasing how much a child is bullied. It also provides some support for the second hypothesis that martial arts training decreases the likelihood a child will bully others. All of the data appears to be in the direction that doing martial arts training in the format presented does indeed reduce all indicated bullying behaviors, in particular a 64% reduction in the amount the child is bullied by the time they achieve black belt."
"Regarding the questions regarding the child being bullied, the parents tended to poorly recognize how much their child was bullied. The parents of the beginner students only thought their child was bullied regularly in 4% of the cases (it was reported in 27% of the students reports) "
"Children who earned their black belt are more likely to defend other kids when they see them being bullied."
"Children who earned their black belt report far less fear of being bullied."
http://repository.asu.edu/attachments/93906/content/tmp/package-_1CWzr/Moody_asu_0010E_11930.pdf
If you are interested in enrolling your child in a martial arts program, visit our children's page here or send us an email: ChangeYourLife@dragongym.com
