Year of Award

2023

Document Type

Dissertation

Degree Type

Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)

Degree Name

School Psychology

Department or School/College

Department of Psychology

Committee Chair

Greg R. Machek

Commitee Members

Jacqueline Brown, Christine Fiore, Allen D. Szalda-Petree, Emily Sallee

Keywords

Affect, Attributions, Bullying, Intentions to Intervene, Peer aggression, Teachers

Publisher

University of Montana

Abstract

Teachers play a critical role in addressing peer aggression between students at school, but they are not always the most effective. However, without more research about how and when teachers choose to intervene during aggressive altercations, it will be difficult to address the factors hampering their effectiveness. The current study (n = 152) employed a mixed-method design and hypothetical vignettes of different types of peer aggression to determine if teachers perceived seriousness, self-efficacy with aggressors, attributions of responsibility, sympathy, and anger differed according to the types of aggression and students depicted in the vignettes. The same variables were included in multiple linear regressions to determine which ones most strongly predicted teachers’ intentions to intervene. Additionally, this study explored the strategies teachers thought to employ to immediately stop aggressive incidents and the interventions they believed would be helpful long-term for different types of students. Results showed that participants’ attributions of responsibility, sympathy, and anger significantly differed between students. Results also revealed that participants’ perceptions of seriousness and likelihood to intervene significantly differed by type of aggression. Relatedly, participants’ intentions to intervene were best predicted by different variables depending on the type of aggression. Lastly, the thematic analyses demonstrated that participants thought of different immediate responses to aggressive alterations depending on the vignette and different long-term support depending on the student. Overall, the results of the current study demonstrated that the context behind peer aggression can shape teachers’ perceptions, affect, and intentions. As for the qualitative findings, they suggested that teachers have at least some understanding of the different motives, cognitive biases, and skill deficits underlying the behavior of aggressors, victims, and defenders. Implications for this study’s results include several practical applications such as the recommendation that schools should have comprehensive policies and procedures to guide teachers’ responses to a breadth of aggressive behaviors.

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