Beyond Bullying Primary Schools Program : implementing an effective whole-school program to manage bullying, enhance prosocial behaviour, and boost student well-being in the upper primary grades

Abstract

A well-developed, theoretically grounded, and thoroughly tested whole-school intervention to combat bullying is critical in assisting schools to effectively prevent, address, and manage school bullying. This thesis aims to: (a) assess the psychometric properties of instruments used to measure bullying and related psychosocial constructs for upper primary aged students; and (b) to comprehensively evaluate a new anti-bullying program, the 'Beyond Bullying Primary Schools Program' using a quantitative research methodology to elucidate the program's impact on bullying, prosocial participant roles, and related psychosocial constructs. This thesis capitalises on advances in bullying theory and research by utilising: (a) a multi-cohort multi-occasion control-group research design to test the impact of a theoretically grounded anti-bullying program for upper primary school aged children; (b) rigorous methodological approaches; and (c) advanced statistical analysis techniques. The present investigation comprises two studies. Study 1 is a thorough psychometric analysis of the questionnaires used to measure bullying and its psycho-social correlates. Study 2 is designed to test the impact of the Beyond Bullying Primary Schools Program empirically in relation to the latent constructs investigated. A total of 897 upper primary school students from grades 5 and 6 were recruited from eight Catholic primary schools within the Greater Western Sydney region, Australia. A longitudinal multi-cohort-multi-occasion research design was employed and conducted in two stages: (1) a baseline-control year where the development of bullying and related psychosocial constructs were tracked over the course of one year on two occasions "" at the beginning of the school year (W1) and middle of the school year (W2) of the school year; and (2) the following year which served as the experimental and intervention year, where bullying and related student psychosocial constructs were assessed on three occasions "" pre-intervention at the beginning of the year (W3), at the conclusion of the intervention (W4), and 3 months after the conclusion of the intervention (W5). The psychometric properties of each instrument were assessed with Cronbach's alpha reliability estimates; confirmatory factor analysis for construct, convergent and discriminant validity; and factorial invariance testing across critical groups. In order to evaluate the impact of the Beyond Bullying Primary Schools Program quantitatively on target constructs, multilevel modelling was used. Results showed psychometric support for the instruments utilised, for both males and females from the upper primary cohort. Multilevel modelling resulted in support for the Beyond Bullying Primary Schools Program in reducing the rates of total bullying and total target experiences, social forms of bullying and target experiences, decreasing passive and ignoring behaviours of participant roles as well as increasing advocacy for students who are targeted, and producing further flow-on impacts to areas of related student psychosocial constructs (e.g., enhancing peer, opposite-sex, and same-sex relations self concepts; increasing students use of support seeking coping strategies; enhancing students sense of school belonging; and reducing depression among students). These results support the efficacy of the Beyond Bullying Primary Schools Program; whole-school intervention approaches; curriculum-based activities for students; specific teacher training; and easy-to-use strategies to empower primary students to address bullying.

Date of Award	2009
Original language	English