Bullying is commonplace in schools, but in recent years cyber-bullying, suicides, and school shootings have shown bullying to be a very serious issue. On this week’s Please Explain we’ll find out what constitutes bullying and aggression among children (and adults), its repercussions, and how parents, children, and schools should address it. We’re joined by Elizabeth Englander, Professor of Psychology and Director of the Massachusetts Aggression Reduction Center at Bridgewater State University, and Jessie Klein, Assistant Professor of Sociology and Criminal Justice at Adelphi University, and author of The Bully Society: School Shootings and the Crisis of Bullying in America’s Schools.

From cell phones to Facebook and Twitter to YouTube, the ubiquitous social technology that children and young adults have at their disposal make them both accessible and vulnerable in ways that we could have never imagined just a generation ago. The president and first lady Michelle Obama want to make Americans aware of the new and persistent threat that bullying poses to the our nation's children. Later today, the White House hosts a conference on the prevention of bullying and cyber-bullying. We know that technology is changing the ways that America's young are capable of bullying their peers, but are the ways in which people become participants also changing?