Children and youth victimization: detection and reporting from school staff members
- Autores: Ana Martina Greco
- Directores de la Tesis: Noemí Pereda Beltrán (dir. tes.), Georgina Guilera Ferré (codir. tes.)
- Lectura: En la Universitat de Barcelona ( España ) en 2021
- Idioma: inglés
- Tribunal Calificador de la Tesis: Izabela Zych (presid.), M. Teresa Barrios Cerrejón (secret.), Ingrid Obsuth (voc.)
- Programa de doctorado: Programa de Doctorado en Cerebro, Cognición y Conducta por la Universidad de Barcelona
- Materias:
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- Resumen
Interpersonal violence affects a large proportion of children and youth globally, causing devastating effects not only for the victim’s health and development but also to society as a whole. Schools are in an ideal position to prevent, detect and report potential victimization cases, as they are in contact with most children for many hours a day and have access to their family and environment. Yet, this potential has been challenging to develop. Studies have found several limitations among school staff to detect and report potential victimization cases, like misconceptions or lack of knowledge and resources. Besides, the empirical evidence of the effect of each of these variables in the actual detection and reporting experience is limited. Studies tend to either focus on only one type of violence (e.g., bullying, child sexual abuse) or in the role of a specific school worker (e.g., teachers or principals).
The present thesis is composed by three original empirical studies addressing the experience of school staff members with children and youth victimization, its detection and the reporting of potential cases, as well as their level of knowledge. All three studies have been published in journals indexed in the Journal Citation Reports (JCR), as follows: • Article 1: Greco, A.M., Guilera, G., & Pereda, N. (2017). School staff members experience and knowledge in the reporting of potential child and youth Victimization. Child Abuse & Neglect, 72, 22-31. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.chiabu.2017.07.004 • Article 2: Greco, A. M., Pereda, N., & Guilera, G. (2020). Detection and reporting potential victimization cases from school: The role of knowledge. Children & Youth Services Review, 119, 105499. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.childyouth.2020.105499 • Article 3: Greco, A. M., Gómez- Pérez, E., Pereda, N., Guilera, G., & Santos, I. (2020). Why do school staff sometimes fail to report potential victimization cases? A mixed-methods study. Journal of Interpersonal Violence, 1-26. https://doi.org/10.1177/0886260520969243 As furtherly detailed in this thesis, the sample for studies 1 and 2 was composed by 184 staff members between 22 and 64 years old (84.04% females, M = 43.40, SD = 10.37). Sample for study 3 included 453 school staff members (83.53% females) between 22 and 65 years old (M = 42.23, SD = 9.46). All participants answered a self-administered questionnaire created ad·hoc for the current research, available both in Catalan and Spanish and in an online or printed version to meet school preferences. The instrument included questions about experience with victimization (e.g., “Have you received any training regarding child victimization?”), its detection (e.g., “How many times during your career did you suspect that a minor might be being victimized?”) and its reporting (e.g., “Have you ever you report a child abuse suspicion to an external agency outside school (e.g., social services)?”). The level of knowledge was tested through statements about victimization (e.g., “Child victimization affects less than 10% of minors in Spain”) , its detection (e.g., “A minor growing up in a one-parent family is more likely to experience victimization”) and its reporting (e.g., “If a suspicions turns out not to be true, the family is entitled to sue the informant”) that participants had to classify as true, false or unknown. Descriptive statistics (i.e., frequencies, percentages, proportions, means and standard deviations), bivariate (i.e., Chi-square and Kruskal-Wallis test with their corresponding effect sizes) multivariate (i.e., logistic regression) and qualitative analysis were used to respond to each study’s specific aims.
Findings show that only a small proportion of school staff (around 10%) has ever been trained regarding childhood and youth victimization. Most of them (over 70%) has suspected that a student might be being victimized at least once since they started working within the school settings. However, only around 40% of those who ever detected a potential case had at least one reporting experience. Out of those who reported, the majority perceived the intervention that followed the report as beneficial for the child’s well-being. The majority of those who never reported a suspicion declared they made this decision based on what happened once they shared their concerns with colleagues or superiors within the school. Other reasons not to report were thinking that their suspicions needed to fulfill certain standards (e.g., being serious enough or being certain that the victimization was actually happening), unclear definitions, feeling they were not entitled, lack of knowledge and fears of the controversy that it may entail. With each year of experience, the likelihood to detect a potential case increased by one time. The likelihood of reporting was significantly higher among school staff with accurate knowledge in very concrete aspects of reporting procedures (e.g., anonymity, need for the principal’s consent). Reporter’s characteristics like gender (i.e., males were more likely to report than females) or the role they performed in school (i.e., workers who only came into contact with children specifically or sporadically reported significantly less than those who spent at least for hours a day in charge of groups of students) were also relevant.
Results found by the studies that compose this thesis replicated previous findings in a different sample with a particular theoretical framework. But this thesis also complements previous research on the subject by quantifying the proportion of suspicions of potential victimization cases that go underreported from school. Findings also contribute to dispel misconceptions about the efficiency of social services interventions and suggests ways in which early report can be increased. The current research also provided empirical evidence of the effect of specific aspects of knowledge to increase report from school. The analysis of the reasons not to report shed light on internal school dynamics that might prevent some concerns to reach external agencies. In sum, the findings of this research are relevant to broaden the understanding of child and youth protection from school, but it also exposes crucial information for the development of practical interventions.
Keywords: children and youth victimization; violence; school; school staff; detection; report.
