Three main models were created and compared. The first model was the Bystander Model, the second was the Frally Model, and the third was the Force Field Model.
Variables The variables are the students, bully, frally, bystander, self-esteem, environment, and force field.
Assumptions The starting population for each model was 36 students with low self-esteem of 40, 122 students with high self-esteem of 60, and 5 bullies with self-esteem of 35. The Bystander Model had 1 bystander and the Frally and Force Field Models started with 1 frally having self-esteem of 65. The bullies and frallies both seek out students with low self-esteem.
Students will drop out of the simulation when their self-esteem is less than or equal to 30. A student turns into a frally when its self-esteem is greater than or equal to 65. A bully will turn into a student when its self-esteem is greater than or equal to 40. Students will group together based on their common self-esteem.
Model Based on Piñon Elementary This model was based on numbers from Piñon Elementary School. Mrs. Cort, the school counselor, works at Piñon Elementary and provided the data. We interviewed her to see how many students there are in the 4th-6th grades and how many bullies there are. We also asked Mrs. Cort for estimates of how many students she thought had high self-esteem (75%) and how many had lower self-esteem (25%). She also thought that a bully would have fairly low self-esteem. Mrs. Cort’s interview questions can be found in Appendix A. Therefore, we set up our model to have 164 students, 5 which are bullies and one bystander. The bully’s self-esteem started at 35, and the frally’s self-esteem started at 65. Seventy-five percent of the students start at self-esteem of 60 and twenty-five percent at self-esteem of 40.
We also interviewed Dr. Tom Csanadi, to see how much bullies can affect students, and to learn his point of view of bullying from a health perspective. He mentioned an incident about these boys who were bullying. There were bystanders, who did nothing but stand there, some even thought it was funny! He mentioned that the bystander plays an important part. Before this interview, we were not really thinking about the significant role of the bystander, but once he brought it up, it really changed our thinking, so we decided to add the bystander to our model. Dr. Csanadi’s interview questions can be found in Appendix A.