Overcoming Bullyingthrough Assertive Training Technique As Group Counseling Services
Sucipto
Guidance and Counseling Study Program Muria University, Kudus
ciptoumk@gmail.com
ABSTRACT
Bullying is the negative behavior that lately became a serious problem that must be resolved in both the school and the neighborhood. Riauksina et al as cited by Wiyani (2012) define bullying is aggressive behavior that is done repeatedly by a student or a group of students who have the power to other students who are weaker, with the goal of hurting the victims. Students who are victims of bullying will spend a lot of time to think about the various ways to avoid disruptions in school, so that they just have a little energy to learn. Bullier will also have difficulty in social relationships and if the behavior occurs until they are adult, absolutely it can make a wider impact.
Many phenomena of bullying that occur with the students lately, it happened because of a lack of courage to refuse misbehavior, ridicule, humiliation, and other negative behavior to express what they feel and what they think about. The courage to clarify themselves in order to refuse of the bullies misbehavior will make the bullies afraid and do not bully nor not doing aggressive behavior again.
Group counseling through assertive training techniques is the way out that can be used to resolve bullying problem. Assertive training is a technique that can be used to train students in order to be able to explicitly clarify feelings, attitudes and beliefs that they considered true. The characteristics of the assertive training technique are free to express thoughts and opinions either through words or actions; it can communicate directly and openly. Students are able to start, to continue, and to end a conversation, refuse and express disagreement with the others, students are able to submit a request pleasantly or unpleasant. Moreover, students will have positive attitudes and outlook on life and can accept their limitations. This technique was applied by utilizing group dynamics within group counseling services. The goal of the application of the assertive training techniques in a group counseling service is to enable students to behave assertively with boldly expressing their discomfort for the misbehavior of the bullies and also to prevent further incidents of bullying among students and certainly reduce the probability that the bullies to bully the other students.
Background of the Problem
School is an educational institution with the task to educate the nation. School is supposed to be a safe, comfortable and dignified for the students so they can grow and develop optimally. With the existence of the task, schools are also required to create a constructive learning atmosphere, safe, and comfortable in the learning process in order to be able to shape the character of the students.
But in reality the facts at this time indicate that not all schools are able to create conditions as conducive environment for the implementation process of good education. It can be seen from the various problems that occur in the school environment lately. One of the problems is rampant, there are cases of violence or aggressiveness in school (bullying) is done by the students at school. Bullying is not only done physically but also psychologically. Involving aggressive behavior among students and students could be called misbehavior because it causes unrest, violating legal norms and customs, as well as the disruption of the security of the community. Bullying is the verbal misbehavior or physical misbehavior that is meant to disturb others who are weaker. Bullying is a form of school violence committed by students to someone who is weaker for the benefit or satisfaction of the doer.
Bullying happens in schools, including the acts of violence that harm others. Violence called for actions carried out aiming to harm another person or it could be with a specific purpose, for example, wanting power in schools, showrooms, and sometimes bullying is done only to obtain designation as a bully at school. Bullying is a nightmare for every student. All schools all over the world have almost the same form of bullying. Bullying is not much different from falling in love, often occurs without any logical reason. Today, a student could be bullied because he has merit, attractive, or even trivial. Sometimes, there are some bullies or what we refer to as bullies, doing the bullying to his friend only intended for fun or teasing.
aggression that reflects the overwhelming anger and rough assault of a person who fails. Whereas another opinion expressed by Asikin (2009) that bullying is a form of child abuse conducted by peer to another child whose position is lower or weaker to gain an advantage or a specific decision.
So it can be concluded that bullying is a negative behavior, which can be either violence or aggression reflecting anger overflowing person does freely with actions such as pushing even hitting, and also can do the bullying with words in a way that is intended as insulting, sneering, jeering and also insinuating that aims to suppress the victim in order to suffer from mental down. Campusmagz (2013) declares that;
Victims of bullying in general are a newcomer or someone who has a striking difference with the environment or with bullies themselves. Not only people who tend to be passive and have physical limitations, they are popular because they have a high social status, achievement riveting, or physical shape that envy can also be victims of bullying. In fact, sometimes the victims of bullying are people close to the actors. The condition of the victims will get worse if they do not dare to fight or lose when fighting.
From observations and interviews during homeroom, teachers and students at several schools in Kudus, obtained information that often receives reports about violence or harassment (bullying). Students are teasing other students, scornful, humiliating and degrading other students, give a call as inappropriate (sarcasm) to other students, displaying facial expressions of cynical and condescending, spreading rumors, ignoring the other person, showing body gesture movements insulting others, silence and exclude another student, damaging belongings of others, hitting, pushing, kicking, berate their friends on social networks, hide belongings of other students, making fun of other students while teaching-learning process takes place, intimidate other students. Also obtained information that victims of bullying have low self-esteem, too quiet, very shy, awkward, difficult to express something and social relationships with peers in class is not very good. This happens every day without any serious action carried out from the school authority. In fact, not infrequently, there is physical contact between students of the class. Then the victims become quiet, withdrawn, anxious, trauma, heartache, physical pain, even hurt, but they remained silent.
Bullies have an underlying problem either with the family or by themselves, especially in terms of communication and psychological background. In essence, they have personal problems. Do not expect the bullies have a sense of regret or guilt over their behavior. They do not have the emotional maturity, irritable, and often catch other people's communication with a wrong perception.
Given these facts, it can be said that students do not know about bullying, which they have done to friends at school. Therefore students need a deep understanding of bullying, how their characteristics, what impact resulting from the bullying behavior, what should be done when they bully, and others. With enough knowledge about bullying, the students are expected to be able to change negative behaviors so that students who are victims of bullying do not have to undergo the pressure again in the learning process and the process of socialization at school.
Group counseling, deemed appropriate in addressing bullying because in accordance with the purpose of counseling groups described by Prayitno (2012) states that the group counseling aims at developing students' social skills, especially communication skills of participants and group counseling services focused on the discussion of personal problems of individual participants in problem-solving efforts. With counseling group of students were given the opportunity to discuss the problems experienced by students as well as members of other groups to be able to participate in the group. With the problems faced by the student, the counselor as leader of the group will work closely with members of the group to alleviate the problems experienced by victims and perpetrators of bullying in schools.
Group counseling services with assertivetraining techniques supports in dealing bullying seems right therefore in accordance with the purpose of training their own assertive techniques. Lazarus (1971, in Nursalim, 2005) argues that the purpose of assertive training is to correct improper behavior by changing responses and eliminate any emotional thinking. Suranata (2010) states assertive training techniques used to train clients who find difficulties in expressing themselves that their actions or true worth.
Based on the description of the problem of bullying in the school, then it was formulated as an analytic thinking (conceptual ideas) as an effort to tackle bullying in schools, through group counseling services with assertive training techniques. By using group counseling services with assertive training techniques in the process of providing the services students can practice behaving assertively so that they boldly are able to state what he feels and what he was to think about.
Through behaving assertively students can also interact well with the members of the group and can unify opinions through thinking of various backgrounds that underlie both the knowledge, experience and thinking skills that bring a sense of empathy between individuals and bring up new ideas. The new ideas that will provide solutions that are positive and the solutions applied in the form of exercise firmness (assertive training) to students.
Forms of Bullying Behavior
Bullying is a negative behavior that has a variety of categories.Riauskina, et al (in Wiyani, 2012) classifies bullying into five categories as follows: (1) direct physical contact (hitting, pushing, biting), (2) direct verbal contact (threatening, humiliating, degrading), (3) direct non-verbal misbehavior (see the cynical, stuck out his tongue, showing facial expressions derogatory, mocking, threatening usually accompanied by physical or verbal bullying), (4) indirect non-verbal misbehavior (silence someone, manipulating friendships until cracks, deliberately exclude or ignore, sent anonymous letters), and (5) sexual harassment (sometimes categorized as physical or verbal aggressive behavior).
Campusmagz (2013) explains that there are five types of bullying that often occur in schools, namely; (1) Verbal: berate, insult, sarcastic, profanity, quietly put negative posts on the victim's back, and spreading verbally gossip as a form of bullying, (2) Emotional; being too hate victims, deliberately made victims of bullies sometimes intimidated in the social environment. Influence others to bully victim unintentionally, (3) Physic: hitting, pushing, kicking, sexual harassment, bumping, pulling the collar, choke the casualties, (4) Cyber; cyber attack carried out by attacking the victim in social networks and posting videos, *
identifies two forms of bullying, namely; (1) The behavior directly (Direct Bullying), for example, physical assault, (2) Behavior indirectly (Indirect Bullying), such as social exclusion.
From the above opinion, it can be concluded that the forms of bullying include direct physical contact such as pushing, hitting, crashing, even sexual abuse, forms of verbal bullying such berate, ridicule, berate, non-verbal forms of bullying such as seeing the victim with a cynical gaze and gaze degrading the victim. The fourth form of bullying is cyber attack which is a form of bullying which made the virtual world by uploading photos, videos. Another form of bullying often happens in school; usually the bullies are stealing, hiding victim goods. Things like this should not be continued because it affects the victim's life in the future.
The Characteristics of the Bullies
The characteristics of the bullies stated by Sugijokanto (2014) as follows, the individuals are desperate, their emotions are uncontrollable, and they are impulsive or dominant and showing violence in various ways. Campusmagz (2013) characterizes the bullies as follows: 1) Have psychological and communication problems with the family. 2) Have problems with themselves. 3) Do not have the emotional maturity. 4) are easy to get angry. 5) Often misunderstand other people's communication with a wrong perception. Meanwhile, according to Rudi (2010) that the characteristics of the bullies are namely. 1) Trying to control others. 2) Only concerned with their desires. 3) Difficult to see things from the viewpoint of others and less empathize for the feelings of others. 4) The pattern of their behavior is impulsive, aggressive, intimidating and abusive. 5) The motivation for someone to do the bullying can be based on hatred, envy and resentment. It could be to hide the shame and anxiety, or to encourage self-confidence without regard to others feelings.
Victims of Bullying
Symptoms that appear on the victims of bullying are easily understood, as expressed by Sugijokanto (2014), who reveals that the signs of change in the attitude of children who experience bullying are: 1) the wounds, bruising, swelling, scratches on the body. 2) Fear to go to school. 3) Shy and withdrawn from friends. 4) Loner. 5) Emotionally unstable. 6) A face that seemed depressed when returning home from school. 7) Crying for no reason. 8) Turned into a silent and aggressive. 9) Complains of frequent headaches and stomach aches. 10) No appetite. 11) Often delirious in the night. 12) Difficulty to sleep soundly. 13) The desire to end his life.
From the above statements can be concluded that the symptoms experienced by the victims are easy enough to be known, due to the changes experienced before and after the bully was very striking. Like the wounds, bruises, scratches, do not want to go to school, often feel dizziness, difficulty in sleeping soundly, turn away from friends who previously close to him, even had thoughts of ending his life after the bullying occurred. So if we see that bullying happens around us, we have to help the victims as soon as possible in order to avoid the unwanted consequences. We should motivate the victims to open and tell what happened to them.
Impact of Bullying
Bullying can certainly have a considerable impact for the perpetrators and the victims. One of the figures that, Elliot (in Mudjijanti, 2011) say that bullying has a negative impact on the development of student's character for both the victim and the perpetrator. As a result of bullying on the victims' distress arises because the actors dominate the victims. The victims suffered physical and psychological pain, their confidence slumped, feel shame, trauma, unable to strike back, feeling alone or feel nothing helped, awry and school fear, alienation, suffering from social fears, suicidal.
If left unchecked, bullies will learn that there will be not any risk for them when they commit violence, aggression, or threaten another child. As an adult, the offenders will have greater potential to become criminals and will be problematic in their social functioning.
adjustment in which the victim are afraid to school, withdraw from the association, their academic achievement decreased because of having difficulty on concentrating, and even willing to commit suicide rather than face the pressures of the form humiliation and punishment. Bullying must be overcome even stopped, because it would have a fatal impact on victims who experience it.
From the description, the authors can conclude that bullying has a negative impact for bullies, victims and the spectator. From the side of the bullies when no party reprimand bad deeds will shape the character on the bullies who continue to do repression and even conduct violence which can later develop into a crime that would be detriment for himself. From the side of the victim, bullying may cause the victim to suffer because of emotional and behavioral problems. Bullying can cause feelings of insecurity, isolation, feelings of low self-esteem, depression or suffer from stress that can end in suicide. The victims will be very depressed, tormented, even traumatized because too often be bullied either verbally or physically.
From the side of the spectators, or persons who witness the bullying happens, they will feel sad, frightened, and steps taken by the spectator are just keep silent, and let the bullying that happens because they fear that if they act, they will be the target of bullying by the actors, who will be excited when they find out that there are responded their behavior.
Group Counseling
Group counseling is one of guidance and counseling services which are quite popular lately. Asmani (2010) states the group counseling gives learners (clients) an opportunity for discussion to alleviate the problems experienced through group dynamics. The dynamics of the group is developing a lively atmosphere and characterized by the interaction between group members in expressing suggestions and even responses in the implementation of the group counseling. And also, with the development of group dynamics in a group counseling would be very helpful in solving the problem discussed in the group.
In contrast to group guidance counseling, group counseling does not address a topic, but problems faced by each member. This statement is in accordance with Sukiman (2011) who stated that the issues discussed in group counseling were the personal problems experienced by each member of the group. It can be concluded that group counseling is a service that addresses and solves problems faced by members of the group that aims to provide assistance to the persons' using group dynamics involving all members.
Assertive Training
Assertive training is intended for people who are unable to express selfhood. According to Asmani (2010) assertive training is a technique used to train clients who find it difficult to express him that his actions are feasible or true. The means used is to play the role of the guidance counselor. Assertiveness training is primarily therapeutic strategies in behavioral approach used to develop assertive behavior on the clients. Bruno (1983, in Nursalim 2005), stated that the assertive training is fundamentally a learning program designed to develop human competence in relation to others.
Wolpe (in Purnamasari, 2005) argues that assertive training is conditioned on maladaptive habits, which responds to the behavior of others with anxiety. The conditioned done in two ways, namely; debilitating fear of clients and changing the way of talk and in action. It can be concluded that assertive training is a program designed to recondition the maladaptive habits by learning to respond to the behavior of others with anxiety and unable to get out of the difficulty experienced by the persons so that they can state and assert themselves with decent action and real. Related research is addressing bullying with assertive training is used as a tool to change the bullies in order to reduce the misbehavior by the rejection of the victim who started confidently with them by not only silent when the bullying occurred but are able to fight and reinforce by rejecting what are done by bullies.
Assertive training aim to change non-assertive behavior. Lazarus (1971, in Nursalim, 2005) argues that the purpose of the assertive training is to correct inappropriate behavior by changing emotional responses and eliminate any emotional thinking. Thus the purpose of assertive training is that individuals learn how to response that does not comply with the
*
Assertive training procedures in the opinion of some experts, namely Tosi, 1974; Wolpe, 1958; Lazarus, 1971; Eisler, 1973, in Nursalim, 2005) are carried out with such steps, namely: 1) Confirms the special conditions in which the assertive behavior occurs. 2). Identify the target behavior and goals. 3) Establish proper and improper behavior. 4) Assist the client to distinguish appropriate and inappropriate behavior. 5) Exploring ideas, attitudes and irrational concept. 6). Demonstrating an appropriate response. 7) Implement training (behavior rehearsal). 8) Practicing assertive behavior. 9) Give homework (homework assignment). 10). Provide amplifier.
Overcoming Bullying throughAssertive Training Technique
Bullying become serious problems that must be alleviated. Riauksina et al (in Wiyani, 2012) define school bullying as aggressive behaviors that are done repeatedly by a student or a group of students who have the power to other students who are weaker, with the aim of hurting the victims. Students who are victims of bullying will spend a lot of time thinking about various ways to avoid disruptions in school so that they have little energy to learn. Bullies will also have difficulty in social relationships and when this behavior occurs until they are adults certainly will cause a wider impact.
Many phenomena that occur on students' bullying lately happen because of lack of courage amongst students to resist mistreatment, ridicule, humiliation, and other negative treatments boldly express what they feel and what they think about. With the courage to learn to reinforce them with denial of treatment bullies will make the bullies back off and later on do not commit the bully or aggressive misbehavior.
technique so that students are expected to tackle bullying in schools after they receive o
assertiveness training.
Group counseling services with assertive training techniques is guidance and counseling services that take advantage of group dynamics which are attempted to solve problems by using the assertive training techniques. Several steps implemented by the counselors to help solve and alleviate the students' problems in overcoming bullying at school. Then, students are supposed to take action After following the counseling services in terms of commitments that have been made and agreed upon to actually perform the positive assertive behavior outside the group. Hopefully students are able to assert their rights and show their desire to fight bullying behavior.
References
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