The relationship between psychological distress and bullying victimisation among school-going adolescents in Ghana: a cross-sectional study.

One hundred and ninety-eight (198) male and female students completed a series of self-report questionnaires measuring psychological distress (anxiety, stress and depression) and bullying victimisation in a cross-sectional survey. Pearson product-moment correlation coefficient and standard multiple regression were used to analyse the data. Findings revealed that bullying victimisation was positively associated with all the domains of psychological distress: depression (r = 0.35, p < 0.001), anxiety (r = 0.30, p < 0.001) and stress (r = 0.35, p < 0.001). Further analysis found depression to be the only significant predictor of bullying victimisation (β = 0.20; t = 2.01; p < 0.05). Taking into consideration that bullying victimization is a major problem among adolescents in schools, anti-bullying programmes should be implemented as this may promote improved wellbeing of school-going adolescents in Ghana.