Attribution of meanings to terms related to bullying: A comparison between teacher's and pupil's perspectives in Italy

Abstract

We compared how teachers and pupils in Italy take into account different dimensions of bullying behaviour, such as intentionality, imbalance of power, repetition and typology of aggression, in relation to bullying behaviours, and investigated the attribution of meaning that teachers and pupils give to a set of terms frequently used to connote this problem. 20 teachers and 87 students in two primary schools, and 40 teachers and 47 students in one middle school, participated. Following a methodology previously developed at a cross-national level (Sharp, 1999;Smith, Cowie, Olafsson, & Liefooghe, and colleagues, 2002), five target terms were selected using focus groups of children. Participants were presented with 25 stick-figure cartoons showing different types and contexts of bullying and related behaviours, and asked to evaluate whether or not the cartoons could be described by one of the target terms. Cluster analysis identified 6 clusters of cartoons characterised by specific behaviours: non-aggressive, fighting, severe physical aggression, verbal aggression, gender exclusion, and severe exclusion. Clear differences were found between teachers and pupils in the extent of use of the five terms in relation to these clusters. From multi-dimensional scaling and descriptive analysis, the clusters of social exclusion, gender exclusion, verbal bullying and fighting emerged as those where the discrepancy between the two groups was highest; teachers systematically applied the five terms less to these clusters, compared to pupils. Results are discussed in terms of implications for intervention policies against bullying.

Violência escolar: Metodologias de identificação dos alunos agressores e/ou vítimas

“…Por último encontramos opções metodológi-cas ao nível da aplicação de instrumentos de auto-preenchimento aos professores, sendo-lhes solicitado que identifiquem ou caracterizem os alunos que melhor correspondam ao perfil ou descrição referida nesses instrumentos. A desvantagem da utilização desta metodologia advém do facto de muitos comportamentos de bullying ocorrerem fora da sala de aula, de modo que os professores não se encontram em posição privilegiada para estarem atentos a todos os fenómenos de interacção interpessoal entre pares que ocorrem nos espaços exteriores à sala de aula, sendo as suas identificações o resultado das suas experiências com os alunos em contextos específicos (Crothers & Levinson, 2004;Menesini, Fonzi & Smith, 2002;Pellegrini & Bartini, 2000). Não obstante, assumem-se como uma fonte de informação adicional sobre competências sociais, alguns indicadores de ajustamento social, ou outros problemas de comportamento dos seus alunos.…”

Estonian Students’ Perception and Definition of Cyberbullying

“…Several studies on traditional bullying highlight how, for young participants, the definition is not always consistent with the scientific one (Menesini et al 2002, Vaillancourt et al 2008. One of the differences seems to relate to terms used to denote the problem in different languages, another relates to different perspectives of the problem (children vs. adolescents, adults vs. young participants) , Smorti et al 2003.…”

Monitoring bullying behaviours may not enhance principal's awareness of the prevalence

“…The discrepancy in pupil-perceived and Principal-estimated bullying may to some extent be due to different definitions of bullying as understood by teachers and pupils (Naylor et al 2006;Menesini, Fonzi and Smith 2002;Pakaslahti and Keltikangas-Järvinen 2000). In the present pupil survey, bullying was defined as repeated negative behaviour towards a peer (saying or doing nasty things, teasing repeatedly in a way she or he does not like).…”