Current Research

Project Duration
2005-2007

Funding body
Healthway

Investigators
Principal Investigators
Professor Donna Cross
Dr Margaret Hall
Mrs Stacey Waters
Dr Greg Hamilton

Associate Investigators
Ms Therese Shaw
Dr Clare Roberts

Project Director
Melanie Epstein

Outline and Rationale
In Australia bullying tends to peak twice in a school student’s life – firstly between the ages of 10 to 12, then during the two years following a student’s transition to secondary school. Thistransition to secondary school is therefore considered a critical period to intervene on bullying. The effects of bullying can be severe; mentally, socially, physically and academically, and often persist into adulthood. While interventions to counter bullying in schools are currently considered a high priority in Australia, examples of successful secondary school bullying interventions are limited.

The Transition to Secondary School and Bullying project responds to the expressed needs of Australian secondary schools for evidence-based interventions to reduce bullying and other aggressive behaviour among their students. Our aim is to enhance the capacity of secondary schools to implement a whole-of-school bullying reduction intervention (including strategies to enhance student transition to secondary school) and compare this intervention using a randomised (cluster) control trial to the standard behaviour management practices currently used in Western Australian Catholic Education schools. This will be achieved through a three-year randomised control trial. The study will specifically target and track a cohort of Year 7 students (aged 12), from October 2005 to September 2007.

Objectives
The objectives of this study are:

To reduce the prevalence of frequent bullying behaviour (bullying and/or being bullied at least weekly) among secondary students receiving the whole-of-school intervention
To increase students’ understanding of the negative social outcomes of bullying others.
To increase students’ use of positive cognitive strategies and attributions if involved in a bullying situation and perception of support from school staff and peers if they are involved in a bullying.
To increase intervention students’ sense of social competence, number of friends, and reduce their feelings of loneliness at school.
To reduce intervention student absenteeism associated with ongoing bullying behaviour and increase these and others students’ feelings of safety, as well as feelings of happiness at and connectedness to the school.
To reduce among intervention students who are bullying, their involvement in other problem behaviours (eg: fighting, cigarette smoking, cannabis use).
To decrease reported mental ‘unwellness’ among those intervention students who either bully others and/or are bullied frequently.
To enhance the self-efficacy of intervention school staff to provide strategies to enhance the social and physical environment of their school to reduce bullying and other aggressive behaviour.
For staff to identify critical success factors for building secondary school capacity to reduce bullying among their students.

Key Outcomes / Findings
The Transition to Secondary School and Bullying Project is currently in its first year and as such, no data have been collected. The intervention is currently being developed using the Principles ofSuccessful Practice for Bullying Reduction in Schools previously developed by this research team.

These whole-of-school principles were derived from a synthesis of published theoretical and empirical evidence and validated by international expert opinion. The intervention will target four levels: the school, the classroom, the individual and the home. It will comprise three key components to address each of these levels: i) whole school capacity building via formal and individualised informal training and staff coaching and mentorship; ii) formal teaching and learning curriculum targeting health education teachers and tutor /pastoral care teachers; and iii) strategies to engage parents (school newsletter items and parent booklet).

Benefits of the Research
The research builds on previously successful bullying intervention research conducted by this research group in primary schools. It aims to provide benefits at three levels: to secondary school students, secondary school staff (especially those involved in behaviour management) as well as school health promotion researchers. If successful the benefits of this intervention to secondary school students, especially those who bully and or are bullied frequently, are likely to include positive academic (eg: improved attendance), social, mental and physical health outcomes.

This study will be one of the first to test a variety of whole-of-school strategies designed to enable and build secondary school staff capacity to reduce student bullying, and enhance the transition from primary to secondary school. If these are found to be successful, this project will be one of the first randomised comparison trials in a secondary school environment to show evidence of strategies to reduce aggressive behaviour among students. For school health promotion researchers this research will provide an improved understanding of the dissemination, implementation and evaluation of whole-of-school secondary bullying prevention strategies as well as evidence of critical success factors for conducting these interventions