Linda Wänström

Peer victimisation and its relation to class relational climate and class moral disengagement among school children

The aim of the present study was to examine whether class climate and class moral disengagement each contribute to explain different levels of victimisation among classes. Eight-hundred-and-ninety-nine children from 43 Swedish elementary school classes participated in the current study. Class moral disengagement, class relational climate and peer victimisation were assessed by a self-report questionnaire. In order to account for the clustered nature of the data with students nested within school classes, a multilevel regression model was analysed. Consistent with our hypotheses, and after controlling for age, gender and ethnic background at the individual level and class size and the proportion of boys at the class level, both class relational climate and class moral disengagement uniquely contributed to explaining the between-class variance in victimisation. Thus, the findings suggested that victimisation is less likely to occur in classes characterised by a positive, warm, fair and supportive relational pattern between children and between teachers and children, and by lower levels of class moral disengagement.

Classroom relationship qualities and social-cognitive correlates of defending and passive bystanding in school bullying in Sweden: A multilevel analysis

Using the social-ecological and social cognitive theories as integrated guiding frameworks, the present study examined whether moral disengagement and defender self-efficacy at the individual level, and moral disengagement, quality of teacher-student relationships and quality of student-student relationships at the classroom level were associated with passive bystanding and defending in bullying situations. Participants were 900 Swedish students from 43 classrooms, ranging in age from 9 to 13years. Multilevel regression analyses revealed that passive reactions by bystanders were associated with greater moral disengagement and less defender self-efficacy. Defending, in turn, was associated with less moral disengagement and greater defender self-efficacy and classroom student-student relationship quality. Furthermore, students who scored high in moral disengagement were even less prone to defend victims when the classroom student-student relationship quality was low, but more prone to act as defenders when the classroom student-student relationship quality was high. In addition, the negative association between defender self-efficacy and passive bystanding was stronger both in classrooms with higher student-student relationship quality and in those with lower class moral disengagement. Implications for prevention are discussed.

Midlife outcomes of educationally underachieving swedish adolescents with above average generalized intelligence

Some people will follow a different educational path despite having the intellectual ability to do well in school. This study explored how educational achievers and underachievers were different from each other in middle adulthood as well as examined which individual and contextual factors in adolescence were important to educational underachievement in middle adulthood. Participants are a school cohort followed from age 10 to middle adulthood (N = 1,326) and are from the Swedish longitudinal research program entitled Individual Development and Adaptation. This study focuses on a subgroup of Individual Development and Adaptation participants (n = 304) with above average intelligence (Mean IQ = 119.39, SD = 5.97). Study findings showed that a minority of adolescents in the study focal group (26%) did not complete high school, and women were more likely to educationally underachieve than men. A simultaneous multilevel logistic regression, with school class accounted for in the analysis, showed that for those of above average intelligence parents’ socioeconomic status and school grades were the strongest predictors of educational attainment. Finally, in midlife, underachievers had lower incomes and occupational levels, drank less frequently, and rated their health as worse than achievers. Study implications are discussed in terms of ways to advance the field of gifted underachievement and in relation to Swedish gifted educational policy.

Victim prevalence in bullying and its association with teacher–student and student–student relationships and class moral disengagement: a class-level path analysis

Abstract The aim of the present study was to test whether teacher–student relationship (TSR) quality and student–student relationship (SSR) quality at class level and class moral disengagement (CMD), considered together in a single model, were related to class prevalence of victims (CPV) of bullying. A sample of 899 Swedish children was recruited from 43 elementary school classes. The participants filled out a questionnaire. Because the focus of the present study was on class behaviours, all analyses were conducted on aggregated class-level data. A path analysis revealed that the prevalence of victims was likely to be lower in classes with more positive teacher–student and SSRs and lower levels of CMD. TSR quality was not directly linked to CPV, but indirectly through its direct association with SSR quality. SSR quality was negatively associated with CMD and both were directly related to CPV. Results suggest that caring, supportive and warm SSRs in the class should be considered as a crucial protective factor against bullying victimisation. Further, the findings suggest that CMD has to be addressed in bullying prevention.

Construction of minimax designs for the trinomial spike model in contingent valuation experiments

This paper concerns design of contingent valuation experiments when interest is in knowing whether respondents have positive willingness to pay and, if so, if they are willing to pay a certain amount for a specified good. A trinomial spike model is used to model the response. Locally D- and c-optimal designs are derived and it is shown that any locally optimal design can be deduced from the locally optimal design for the case when one of the model parameters is standardized. It is demonstrated how information about the parameters, e.g., from pilot studies, can be used to construct minimax and maximin efficient designs, for which the best guaranteed value of the criterion function or the efficiency function is sought under the assumption that the parameter values are within certain regions. The proposed methodology is illustrated on an application where the value of the environmentally friendly production of clothes is evaluated.

Perceived collective efficacy to stop aggression at school: A validation of an Italian and a Swedish version of a scale for adolescents

Abstract Collective efficacy to stop peer aggression in the school context refers to adolescents’ beliefs about the capability of students and teachers in their school to work together to counteract aggressive behaviours among peers. This study presents the Italian and Swedish versions of a recently developed scale to measure the construct. Factorial structure and measurement invariance of the scale were assessed in two samples of adolescents aged 10–15 years. The findings support both a two-dimensional and a three-dimensional scale across gender and countries, demonstrating the importance of making distinctions between different forms of aggression when measuring collective efficacy to stop aggression. A one-dimensional scale was only supported in the Swedish sample. The results support the use of the Collective Efficacy to Stop Aggression scale with both Italian and Swedish adolescents.

Minimax D-optimal designs of contingent valuation experiments: willingness to pay for environmentally friendly clothes

This paper demonstrates how to plan a contingent valuation experiment to assess the value of ecologically produced clothes. First, an appropriate statistical model (the trinomial spike model) that describes the probability that a randomly selected individual will accept any positive bid, and if so, will accept the bid A, is defined. Secondly, an optimization criterion that is a function of the variances of the parameter estimators is chosen. However, the variances of the parameter estimators in this model depend on the true parameter values. Pilot study data are therefore used to obtain estimates of the parameter values and a locally optimal design is found. Because this design is only optimal given that the estimated parameter values are correct, a design that minimizes the maximum of the criterion function over a plausable parameter region (i.e. a minimax design) is then found.