The relationship between the level of bullying in primary schools and children’s views of their teachers’ attitudes to pupil behaviour

Abstract

It is known that the incidence of bullying reported by primary school children varies greatly between schools. It has also been shown that schools in which staff express a greater level of concern with managing the problem generally experience lower levels of bullying. This study examines the children's, rather than the teachers', views about the level of care and attention which the teachers pay to issues relating to behaviour and the social organisation of their school. It is shown that the children's views are a good indicator of the frequency of bullying that will be found in that school. IntroductionThere are a number of possible reasons why schools might differ in the amount of bullying that takes place within the school. These include factors such as the size of the school, the social or ethnic backgrounds of the children who attend the school and the attitudes and efforts of the teachers in addressing issues related to behaviour. There is some evidence that demographic factors and school size do not have a large influence on levels of bullying. Olweus (1993) found, in his study of Norwegian and Swedish schools, that the size of a school and its location in either a large city or a small town was not correlated with the amount of bullying that took place. Mellor (1999) found in a study of Scottish schools that there was no relationship between either socio-economic status or urban location and the levels of bullying. Similarly, in a study of German and English schools Wolke, Woods, Stanford, and Schultz (2001) did not find a statistically significant effect of school size on levels of bullying.There is, however, evidence that the attitudes of the teaching staff and the culture that they try to create in the school do have a significant influence. Stephenson and Smith (1991) looked at six schools in North Yorkshire and County Durham with severe bullying problems as well as six schools whose bullying problems were minimal. They found that the key difference between the two sets of six schools was the attitude of the teaching staff. In the schools in which bullying was less frequent the teachers were more likely to speak about bullying problems which they had come across and they were more highly involved with preventing and managing bullying when it occurred. These schools also had headteachers who expressed clear and well thought out views on bullying, and placed importance on monitoring, controlling and stopping bullying. Payne, Gottfredson, and Gottfredson (2003)