Tracy Evian Waasdorp

Effects of School-Wide Positive Behavioral Interventions and Supports on Child Behavior Problems

OBJECTIVE: School-Wide Positive Behavioral Interventions and Supports (SWPBIS) is a universal prevention strategy currently implemented in >16 000 schools across the United States. SWPBIS intends to reduce students’ behavior problems by altering staff behaviors and developing systems and supports to meet children’s behavioral needs. The current study reports intervention effects on child behaviors and adjustment from an effectiveness trial of SWPBIS. METHODS: The sample of 12 344 elementary school children was 52.9% male, 45.1% African American, and 46.1% Caucasian. Approximately 49% received free or reduced-priced meals, and 12.9% received special education services at baseline. The trial used a group randomized controlled effectiveness design implemented in 37 elementary schools. Multilevel analyses were conducted on teachers’ ratings of children’s behavior problems, concentration problems, social-emotional functioning, prosocial behavior, office discipline referrals, and suspensions at 5 time points over the course of 4 school years. RESULTS: The multilevel results indicated significant effects of SWPBIS on children’s behavior problems, concentration problems, social-emotional functioning, and prosocial behavior. Children in SWPBIS schools also were 33% less likely to receive an office discipline referral than those in the comparison schools. The effects tended to be strongest among children who were first exposed to SWPBIS in kindergarten. CONCLUSIONS: These findings provide support for the hypothesized reduction in behavior problems and improvements in prosocial behavior and effective emotion regulation after training in SWPBIS. The SWPBIS framework appears to be a promising approach for reducing problems and promoting adjustment among elementary school children.

Measuring School Climate in High Schools: A Focus on Safety, Engagement, and the Environment.

BACKGROUND School climate has been linked to multiple student behavioral, academic, health, and social-emotional outcomes. The US Department of Education (USDOE) developed a 3-factor model of school climate comprised of safety, engagement, and environment. This article examines the factor structure and measurement invariance of the USDOE model. METHODS Drawing upon 2 consecutive waves of data from over 25,000 high school students (46% minority), a series of exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses examined the fit of the Maryland Safe and Supportive Schools Climate Survey with the USDOE model. RESULTS The results indicated adequate model fit with the theorized 3-factor model of school climate, which included 13 subdomains: safety (perceived safety, bullying and aggression, and drug use); engagement (connection to teachers, student connectedness, academic engagement, school connectedness, equity, and parent engagement); environment (rules and consequences, physical comfort, and support, disorder). We also found consistent measurement invariance with regard to student sex, grade level, and ethnicity. School-level interclass correlation coefficients ranged from 0.04 to .10 for the scales. CONCLUSIONS Findings supported the USDOE 3-factor model of school climate and suggest measurement invariance and high internal consistency of the 3 scales and 13 subdomains. These results suggest the 56-item measure may be a potentially efficient, yet comprehensive measure of school climate.

Peer Victimization Among Urban, Predominantly African American Youth: Coping With Relational Aggression Between Friends

Although there is a growing body of research documenting the deleterious effect of experiencing relational aggression, few studies have explored how children cope with relational aggression, especially when it occurs between close friends. Moreover, relational aggression is understudied among urban African American children. Using data from a sample of 126 urban, low-income predominantly African American children we examined childrens beliefs concerning relational aggression and their use of coping strategies when faced with relational aggression in their close friendships. Findings suggested that relational aggression was perceived to be prevalent and harmful by both the boys and the girls. Both boys and girls reported they would use ruminative/avoidance coping strategies when experiencing relational aggression in a close friendship. Implications for future research and the development of gender-sensitive prevention programs are discussed.

Effect of Aggression and Bullying on Children and Adolescents: Implications for Prevention and Intervention

Peer aggression and bullying is of considerable importance given the large number of youth involved with or witnesses to this behavior and the association with maladjustment and other negative outcomes. This article reviews current literature on aggression and bullying among school-age youth, including subtypes and differentiating between aggression and bullying. We then highlight important considerations for intervening and preventing these behaviors. Finally, implications for psychiatrists, other mental health professionals, and providers are discussed in an effort to provide specific strategies to help youth, families, and schools more successfully navigate the challenges that aggression and bullying often cause.

The Role of Bystander Perceptions and School Climate in Influencing Victims' Responses to Bullying: To Retaliate or Seek Support?

In order to reduce aggressive responses to bullying, schools nationwide have begun to implement bullying prevention programs that advise students to tell an adult, walk away, or ask the bully to stop. While previous work has demonstrated that individual differences (e.g., gender) influence the likelihood of students choosing assertive responses in lieu of aggressive responses, there has been less research on understanding how aspects of the school climate affect students’ responses to bullying. This study explores how perceptions of teacher and student intervention as well as perceptions of school safety and connectedness influence students’ likelihood of responding aggressively (i.e., retaliating) or seeking support from an adult. These data come from an online school climate survey administered to 25,308 students in 58 high schools. Three-level hierarchical linear modeling was conducted on a subset of 6,493 students who reported being bullied in the past year. Results suggest that bystander perceptions and school climate play a role in influencing students’ responses to bullying, both by decreasing the likelihood of victims using an aggressive response and increasing their likelihood of seeking support from school staff. Interventions that focus more holistically on changing school climate may better interrupt the cycle of violence.

Social cognitions, distress, and leadership self-efficacy: associations with aggression for high-risk minority youth

Urban ethnic minority youth are often exposed to high levels of aggression and violence. As such, many aggression intervention programs that have been designed with suburban nonethnic minority youth have been used or slightly adapted in order to try and meet the needs of high-risk urban youth. The current study contributes to the literature base by examining how well a range of social-cognitive, emotional distress and victimization, and prosocial factors are related to youth aggression in a sample of urban youth. This study utilized data gathered from 109 9- to 15-year-old youth (36.7% male; 84.4% African American) and their parents or caregivers. A series of hierarchical multiple regressions were fit predicting youth aggression from social-cognitive variables, victimization and distress, and prosocial variables, controlling for youth gender and age. Each set of variables explained a significant and unique amount of the variance in youth aggressive behavior. The full model including all predictors accounted for 41% of the variance in aggression. Models suggest that youth with stronger beliefs supportive of violence, youth who experience more overt victimization, and youth who experience greater distress in overtly aggressive situations are likely to be more aggressive. In contrast, youth with higher self-esteem and youth who endorse greater leadership efficacy are likely to be less aggressive. Contrary to hypotheses, hostile attributional bias and knowledge of social information processing, experience of relational victimization, distress in relationally aggressive situations, and community engagement were not associated with aggression. Our study is one of the first to address these important questions for low-income, predominately ethnic minority urban youth, and it has clear implications for adapting aggression prevention programs to be culturally sensitive for urban African American youth.

Better Understanding and Intervening to Prevent Relational Aggression

There has been increased attention paid to the reduction of aggressive behaviors among youth since the Columbine High School massacre in 1999, an incident which reportedly occurred in response to the perpetrators’ victimization by peers (Larkin, 2009). The shocking display of extreme physical violence at Columbine influenced American researchers to focus on daily incidents of peer bullying and the implications of being an ongoing victim of peer bullying or abuse (Safran, 2007). More recently, harassment and bullying through nonphysical means (e.g., cyberbullying, relational aggression) has received media attention given the rash of suicides by youth who were being victimized by these forms of aggression. Although the media focus on nonphysical forms of aggression has only recently sparked the interest of the general public and lawmakers, research on these forms of aggression, particularly relational forms of aggression, is not a new phenomenon.

Ten-Year Trends in Bullying and Related Attitudes Among 4th- to 12th-Graders

The prevalence of bullying and related behaviors decreased significantly between 2005 and 2014; the most recent years showed the greatest improvements in school climate and reductions in bullying. BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVES: Bullying is a significant public health concern, and it has received considerable attention from the media and policymakers over the past decade, which has led some to believe that it is increasing. However, there are limited surveillance data on bullying to inform our understanding of such trends over the course of multiple years. The current study examined the prevalence of bullying and related behaviors between 2005 and 2014 and explored whether any such changes varied across schools or as a function of school-level covariates. METHODS: Youth self-reports of 13 indicators of bullying and related behaviors were collected from 246 306 students in 109 Maryland schools across 10 years. The data were weighted to reflect the school populations and were analyzed by using longitudinal hierarchical linear modeling to examine changes over time. RESULTS: The covariate-adjusted models indicated a significant improvement over bullying and related concerns in 10 out of 13 indicators (including a decrease in bullying and victimization) for in-person forms (ie, physical, verbal, relational) and cyberbullying. Results also showed an increase in the perceptions that adults do enough to stop bullying and students’ feelings of safety and belonging at school. CONCLUSIONS: Prevalence of bullying and related behaviors generally decreased over this 10-year period with the most recent years showing the greatest improvements in school climate and reductions in bullying. Additional research is needed to identify factors that contributed to this declining trend.

Friend to friend: A randomized trial for urban African American relationally aggressive girls.

Objective To determine the effectiveness of the Friend to Friend (F2F) aggression intervention through a clinical trial with urban African American girls. Method A randomized parallel-group study design was conducted comparing the effectiveness of F2F to an attention control condition (called Homework Study Skills and Organization, HSO) among relationally aggressive girls from six urban low-income elementary schools. Analyses of covariance were utilized for comparing post-test measurement between the two conditions while adjusting for pre-test measurement. For those outcomes with significant intervention effects between the two conditions at post-test, we examined whether the effects were maintained from post-test to follow-up among girls in the F2F group. Results Results suggest that aggressive girls in F2F decreased their levels of relational aggression and increased their knowledge of social problem solving skills as compared to similar girls randomized to HSO, both of which were maintained at the one-year follow up. Conclusion Programs developed through extensive partnership-based approaches, such as the F2F Program, may have promise for addressing the needs of urban high-risk girls in an acceptable and culturally-sensitive manner.

The Broader Impact of Friend to Friend (F2F): Effects on Teacher–Student Relationships, Prosocial Behaviors, and Relationally and Physically Aggressive Behaviors

Girls often harm others’ social standing by starting rumors about peers or by excluding others from peer group activities, which is called relational aggression. Although relational aggression is not a new phenomenon, there have been relatively few interventions designed to address this, especially for urban ethnic minority girls. The Friend to Friend (F2F) program, developed through an iterative participatory action research process, has proven to be effective in improving targeted relationally aggressive urban girls’ social problem-solving knowledge and decreasing levels of relational aggression, with effects being maintained 1 year after treatment. In the current article, we examine the broader effects of the F2F program. Findings suggest that the indicated F2F program has broader effects such as increasing prosocial behaviors, decreasing relational and physical aggression, and improving teacher–student relationships among non-targeted boys. In addition, the program demonstrated some effects for non-targeted girls including an increase in prosocial behaviors and improved teacher–student relationships. Implications for examining the cost-effectiveness of indicated interventions such as F2F are discussed.