Paul Eastwick

So that's kind of a factor, right?

What is the context that can play a role?

And then I guess another thing we see as being important is the power balance between the people involved, right?

If someone is teasing you, do you feel comfortable that you can tease them back, right?

Is that this kind of back and forth reciprocal thing where you're teasing me, I'm teasing you?

Or is it this really one-sided, I'm getting teased and no one's sticking up for me and I'm really feeling harmed by it?

It is.

Yeah.

And, you know, we think about teasing sometimes in comparison to bullying and partially because people confuse it.

Sometimes when people talk about bullying, they use the word teasing and they are different, except that that power imbalance is really what typifies bullying, right?

Bullying involves having that power imbalance between the perpetrator and the victim of bullying.

And that is what we see in teasing that feels really harmful is that it's much closer to bullying, right?

Because of that power imbalance, because the person who's being targeted doesn't feel like they have agency or capacity to ask for it to stop or to say something back, right?

If they feel powerless in the situation because of whatever that power difference is, that can be where it feels really hurtful.

Yeah, it's really difficult, right?

It's a fine line.

And what some of our participants talk about is that it really takes a high level of social skills to figure it out, right?

So when we're teasing, we can be aware of that, right?

If the goal is to not cross the line, right?

If this is fun, we're with our friends, we don't want to make them feel bad.