Five-decade UK study finds that aggression at school leads to better-paying jobs, while those with emotional instability went on to earn less

Five-decade UK study finds that aggression at school leads to better-paying jobs, while those with emotional instability went on to earn less

Children who displayed aggressive behaviour at school, such as bullying or temper outbursts, are likely to earn more money in middle age, according to a five-decade study that upends the maxim that bullies do not prosper.

They are also more likely to have higher job satisfaction and be in more desirable jobs, say researchers from the Institute for Social and Economic Research at the University of Essex.

The paper, published today, used data about almost 7,000 people born in 1970 whose lives have been tracked by the British Cohort Study. The research team examined data from primary school teachers who assessed the children’s social and emotional skills when they were 10 years old in 1980, and matched it to their lives at the age of 46 in 2016.

“We found that those children who teachers felt had problems with attention, peer relationships and emotional instability did end up earning less in the future, as we expected, but we were surprised to find a strong link between aggressive behaviour at school and higher earnings in later life,” said Prof Emilia Del Bono, one of the study’s authors.

  • owen
    155·
    9 months ago

    Makes sense. If you’re willing to take advantage of others, you can get advantages.

    And these days, retaliation against adult bullies is not so straight forward.

    • floofloofEnglish
      66·
      9 months ago

      Adult bullies are often idolized in our culture. They’re certainly rewarded in corporate workplaces where abusing others and not caring is seen as a sign of purposefulness and strength.

      • owen
        45·
        9 months ago

        Exactly… and on the flip side, standing up for workplace injustice is a sign of insubordination and is punished. Even objectively discussing power dynamics gets a negative/uncomfortable reaction in my experience.

    • Transporter Room 3@startrek.website
      204·
      9 months ago

      What I’m gathering from this is I should become some sort of crazed vigilante, who goes and punches bullies in the face at playgrounds

      And I completely disagree about handling adult bullies. It’s quite straightforward. Just illegal.

      Apparently punching children and assaulting adults with tire irons is “wrong” and “against the law”

      • entropicdrift@lemmy.sdf.org
        121·
        9 months ago

        Bullying bullies doesn’t teach them that bullying isn’t a path to power. It just teaches them that you’re higher up in the chain than they are, for now.

      • Carrolade@lemmy.worldEnglish
        101·
        9 months ago

        I can understand putting a subjective word like “wrong” in air quotes, since that’s a matter of judgement, not objectivity. But whether something is legal or illegal is usually pretty straightforward, and not subject to interpretation outside of a courtroom, and specifically by a judge or jury.

        Average joe is not permitted to interpret the law however he thinks it ought to be interpreted, that would just be chaos.