Columbine Revisited

After the Columbine school shooting in 1999, concern about bullying crescendoed. A prominent belief emerged that bullying causes school shootings. However, many of the beliefs about bullying constitute myths—that is, empirically unverified assumptions. These beliefs ignore critical conceptual issues that attend to efforts to understand the bullying-school shootings connection. In so doing, they likely inhibit progress toward a more accurate understanding of the causes of school shootings and what can be done to prevent them. In this paper, we present this argument and identify recommendations for research and policy.