I Teach You to Quarrel - Empathy and Mediation: Tools for Preventing Bullying

Bullying is a very common, complex and important public health problem among school students. Dovigo describes the school as a place where the conflict can emerge among relational dynamics and involve students, teachers and families. Through the description of an Italian pilot project “Mediamente Bullo,” this chapter examines two tools for preventing bullying: empathy, the ability to share and understand emotional states of others, and mediation, useful to cope interpersonal conflicts. Using the mediation tool, students can learn that many forms of conflicts, including violence, can be solved by identifying the causes, discussing them and practicing nonviolent methods and behaviors. This process helps students to become more aware of positive aspects during the conflict and the power that they have in making important and positive choices. In addition, using the empathy tool, they can better understand the experience of social exclusion. In fact, several studies show that children with higher levels of empathy show less aggressive and more prosocial behaviors and they are more able to regulate their emotions. The goal of this chapter is to provide a contribution about integrated application of two important tools, mediation and empathy, in bullying among school-aged youth for future directions and intervention efforts

Vulnerability and Social Exclusion: Risk in Adolescence and Old Age

Vulnerability can be defined as the quality or state of being exposed to the possibility of being attacked or harmed, either physically or emotionally. In this chapter, it is defined as a possible ability of an individual or a group to face, manage, and anticipate a possible problem. This concept of vulnerability is associated with that of risk factor for social isolation, and therefore to situations that can also lead to illness and lack of mental and physical health. It can have its roots in poverty, in social exclusion, in ethnicity, in disability or simply in disease or specific developmental phases in life. All these aspects reflect very important vulnerability factors among biological, psychological, social, and behavioral variables. To date, no one has highlighted together two critical moments in life in which this brain area undergoes important variations: adolescence, in which its development occurs, and old age, in which this area goes into cognitive decline with the relative loss of many higher cognitive functions. This knowledge can help to better understand the forms of exclusion due to vulnerability in order to develop new forms of social inclusion