Preventing Bullying Through Science, Policy, and Practice (2016) / Chapter Skim
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5 Preventive Interventions
5 Preventive Interventions
Pages 179-252
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From page 179... ...
The focus of that research has typically been on broader concepts, such as aggression, violence, delinquency, externalizing problems, etc. Therefore, it is quite possible that there are several violence or aggression prevention programs that have substantial effects on bullying, but there is currently too little data available from most violence prevention studies that employ RCT designs to formulate a conclusion regarding impacts on bullying specifically (Bradshaw, 2015)
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From page 180... ...
. Although the committee was intentionally inclusive of the larger body of prevention programming literature, it acknowledges the caveats of such a broad focus, as findings from other violence prevention programs may not always generalize to bullying-specific outcomes (e.g., Espelage et al., 2013)
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From page 181... ...
. Although prevention programming can occur in multiple settings and ecological contexts (see Figure 5-2; also Espelage and Swearer, 2004; Swearer
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From page 182... ...
MULTI-TIERED PREVENTION FRAMEWORK An increasingly common approach to the prevention of emotional and behavioral disorders is the three-tiered public health model that includes universal, selective, and indicated preventive interventions, as illustrated in Figure 5-1 (Institute of Medicine, 1994; National Research Council and Institute of Medicine, 2009; Weisz et al., 2005)
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From page 183... ...
. Most school-based bullying prevention programs would fall under the universal category of largely preventive interventions, with limited articulation of specific programs, activities, or supports for students not responding adequately to the universal model.
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From page 184... ...
. The third tier includes indicated preventive interventions, which are typically tailored to meet the youth's needs and are of greater intensity as compared to the two previous levels of prevention.
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From page 185... ...
. Although many researchers encourage the use of a multi-tiered approach to address bullying, and there is conceptual research supporting the full integration of preventive interventions (Bradshaw, 2013, 2015; Espelage and Swearer, 2008; Hawley and Williford, 2015; Hong and Espelage, 2012; Swearer et al., 2012)
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From page 186... ...
PREVENTION PROGRAMS SPECIFICALLY IMPLEMENTED TO REDUCE BULLYING AND RELATED BEHAVIOR PROBLEMS The sections that follow focus on the available efficacy and effectiveness research that has examined different bullying prevention programs, the vast majority of which have been implemented at the universal level and within schools. The committee first considers the evidence for the effectiveness of universal programs, many of which are whole-school efforts that may include some elements directed to youth at risk for bullying or those already engaged in bullying behaviors.1 The committee also reviews the effectiveness of specific selective or indicated prevention programs, many of which were designed more broadly for youth with behavioral or mental health problems, rather than specifically for bullying.
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From page 187... ...
, and the risk factors targeted through preventive interventions are often interrelated. For example,
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From page 188... ...
. Further, many preventive interventions seek to enhance positive or prosocial behaviors or improve social competence, in addition to reducing negative behaviors such as aggression and fighting (Embry et al., 1996; Flannery et al., 2003)
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FIGURE 5-3 Forest graph showing the measure of program effect sizes in logarithm of odds ratio (LOR) for bullying perpetration.
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From page 190... ...
FIGURE 5-4 Forest graph showing the measure of program effect sizes in logarithm of odds ratio (LOR) for victimization.
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From page 191... ...
concluded that parent training, improved playground supervision, disciplinary methods, school conferences, videos, information for parents, classroom rules, and classroom management were program components associated with a decrease in students being bullied. The whole-school bullying prevention programs (mostly based on or modeled after the extensively studied Olweus Bullying Prevention Program model, which aims at reducing bullying through components at multiple levels)
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From page 192... ...
. Another important finding from the Ttofi and Farrington review was that, generally speaking, there are more school-based bullying prevention programs that involve middle-school youth than those that target youth of high school age.
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From page 193... ...
Yet these effects are averaged across a full population of youth; selective and indicated prevention approaches, which focus on youth more directly involved in bullying, will likely yield larger effect sizes, as has been seen in other studies of violence prevention programming (discussed later in this chapter)
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From page 194... ...
; I 2= 0% Test for overall effect: Z = 3.40 (P = 0.0007) -1 -0.5 0 0.5 1 SCHOOL CLIMATE Brown 2011 - 0.09 [-0.29, 0.11]
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From page 195... ...
. Systematic reviews and meta-analyses of school-based violence prevention programs (most that did not specifically address bullying behaviors)
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From page 196... ...
It aims to reduce bullying through components at multiple levels, including schoolwide components; classroom activities and meetings; targeted interventions for individuals identified as perpetrators or targets; and activities aimed to increase involvement by parents, mental health workers, and others. Some studies of the Olweus Bullying Prevention Program have reported significant reductions in students' reports of bullying and antisocial behaviors (e.g., fighting, truancy)
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From page 197... ...
, as well as school climate (effect sizes from 0.16 to 0.29; see Bradshaw et al., 2008; Horner et al., 2009) , and discipline problems (effect sizes from 0.11 to 0.27; see Bradshaw et al., 2010, 2012, 2015)
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From page 198... ...
One such model is Second Step: A Violence Prevention Curriculum. This classroom-based curriculum for children of ages 4-14 aims to reduce impulsive, high-risk, and aggressive behaviors while increasing social-emotional competence and protective factors.
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From page 199... ...
The Good Behavior Game is an elementary school-based prevention program that targets antecedents of youth delinquency and violence. It uses classroom behavior management as a primary strategy to improve ontask behavior and decrease aggressive behavior (Baughman Sladky et al., 2015)
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From page 200... ...
also showed significant improvements in student self-reports of positive school climate, increases in student and teacher/staff bullying prevention and intervention, and increases in positive bystander behavior for students in intervention schools compared to students in control schools (effect sizes ranged from 0.115 for student bullying intervention to 0.187 for student climate)
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From page 201... ...
Fast Track provides a continuum of developmentally sequenced preventive intervention spanning grades 1 through 10. It includes some of the program elements and frameworks mentioned above, such as a socialemotional learning curriculum developed in elementary school called Promoting Alternative Thinking Strategies, as well as a version of the Coping Power program for higher-risk students.
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From page 202... ...
The ecological contexts in which these programs operate are summarized in Table 5-2. TABLE 5-1 Summary of Selected Universal Multicomponent Prevention Programs that Address Bullying or Related Behavior Typical Delivery Program Origin Program Type Setting Olweus Bullying Norway Bullying prevention, School Prevention school, school climate, Program environmental strategies Positive Behavioral School climate, academic School Interventions and engagement, behavioral Supports (PBIS)
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From page 203... ...
• To increase children's skills in coping when they are bullied. Children in preschool/ 5-12 • To reduce impulsive, high-risk, kindergarten, elementary school, and aggressive behaviors while and middle school increasing social-emotional competence and protective factors.
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From page 204... ...
interpersonal skills, parent training, school/ classroom environment, children exposed to violence, alcohol and drug abuse prevention Raising Healthy U.S. Academic engagement, Home, School Children conflict resolution/ interpersonal skills, parent training, school/ classroom environment, alcohol and drug abuse prevention Fast Track U.S.
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From page 205... ...
• To teach social-emotional skills to counter bullying and to promote healthy relationships. Children in kindergarten, 6-10 • To improve on-task behavior and elementary school decrease aggressive behavior.
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From page 206... ...
reported that school counseling was an effective intervention for middle school students who had been bullied when the counseling focused on improving peer relationships. In their study, they collected longitudinal data from 202 students (mean age = 12.5)
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From page 207... ...
Students were selected for intervention based on their high levels of aggressive behavior rather than bullying specifically, but the author did find that after 2 years of the intervention, students reported a decrease in reactive aggression but not proactive aggression.
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From page 208... ...
. There are also a number of preventive interventions that aim to address mental health problems but may also prove to be helpful for youth who are involved in bullying.
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From page 209... ...
. Examples of Family-Focused Preventive Interventions to Address Bullying A few family-focused preventive interventions have been developed that may also demonstrate promising effects on bullying.
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From page 210... ...
. Although these programs focus more generally on violence and aggression prevention, they may also produce effects on bullying related behaviors, such as conduct problems for perpetrators or those at risk for perpetration, or they may address the behavioral and mental health consequences of being bullied.
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From page 211... ...
. A recent meta-analysis of the effectiveness of MST across 22 studies containing 322 effect sizes found small but statistically significant treatment effects for its primary outcome of delinquent behavior, but the meta-analysis also found secondary outcomes such as psychopathology, substance use, family factors, out-of-home placements, and peer factors.
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From page 212... ...
Based on communitywide data on risk and protective factors, schools may select from a menu of evidence-based programs, which includes some of TABLE 5-3 Summary of Selective and Indicated Prevention Programs that Address Bullying or Related Behavior Typical Delivery Program Origin Program Type Setting Coping Power U.S. Cognitive behavioral School Program treatment, parent training, social-emotional learning Incredible Years U.S.
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From page 213... ...
. Descriptions of a subset of selective and indicated prevention programs that address bullying or related behavior and their tiered level of prevention are summarized in Table 5-3.
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The table is not intended to be an exhaustive list of all prevention programs.
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From page 215... ...
Infant, early childhood- 0-18 • To create a "community prevention preschool, late childhood, board" comprising public officials and kindergarten-elementary community leaders to identify and reduce school, early adolescence, risk factors while promoting protective middle school, late factors by selecting and implementing adolescence, high school, early tested interventions throughout the adulthood community. SOURCE: Program information was obtained from Blueprints for Healthy Youth Development at http://www.blueprintsprograms.com/programs and CrimeSolutons.gov at http://www.crimesolutions.gov/ [June 2016]
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From page 216... ...
Triple P ● ● ● ● Cognitive Behavioral Intervention for ● ● ● Trauma in Schools Trauma Focused Cognitive ● ● ● Behavioral Therapy Functional Family Therapy ● ● ● ● Brief Strategic Family Therapy ● ● ● Wraparound/Case Management ● ● ● ● Multisystemic Therapy ● ● ● ● ● Communities that Care ● ● ● ● NOTE: The information provided in Table 5-4 is meant to illustrate core features of program elements and focus rather than provide a detailed assessment of all aspects of a program or its demonstrated effects. The table is not intended to be an exhaustive list of all prevention programs.
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From page 217... ...
. Some recent research, predominantly in Europe, has examined the effectiveness of preventive interventions specifically on cyberbullying.
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From page 218... ...
. The Viennese Social Competence Program is a primary preventive program that includes secondary preventive elements to reduce aggressive behavior and bullying and to foster social and intercultural competencies in schools (Gradinger et al., 2015)
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From page 219... ...
Although few studies were appropriately designed to discern particular effective components or elements of an entire model, separate from other elements, the following frameworks and core components are among the most promising within the extant research. As noted above, there is a growing emphasis on the use of multi-tiered approaches -- those which leverage universal, selective, and indicated prevention programs and activities.
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From page 220... ...
Such efforts would address multiple competencies and skills in order to prevent bullying, while helping students cope and respond appropriately when bullying does occur. Programs should include efforts to enhance resilience and positive behaviors and not just focus on reductions in bullying perpetration.
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From page 221... ...
With regard to selective and indicated prevention programs, the focus of the model tends to be more generally on other behavioral concerns, with relatively few programs at these levels being tested using RCT designs to determine impacts on bullying specifically. Additional research is clearly needed to better understand the impacts of programs across all three tiers, as well as the combined impacts of such programs.
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From page 222... ...
In these situations, a contagion process likely occurs, whereby the youth learn more aggressive and bullying behaviors from each other and are reinforced for their aggressive behavior. Furthermore, conflict resolution approaches, even when facilitated by adults, are not typically recommended in situations of bullying, as they suggest a disagreement between two peers of equal status or power, rather than an instance of peer abuse.
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From page 223... ...
. Bullying prevention programming could also benefit from adopting practices and principles from the field of implementation science (Fixsen et al., 2005)
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From page 224... ...
Within group-based interventions, which is often a modality used for selective and some indicated preventive interventions, studies show that there is the potential for deviance training and a shift in attitudes that actually favor aggression and deviant behavior (Dodge et al., 2006)
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From page 225... ...
. Similarly, there is increasing interest in the use of restorative practice-based models with the goal of preventing bullying and providing more equitable disciplinary practices in response to other behavioral violations (Bradshaw, 2013)
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From page 226... ...
youth) to inform bullying prevention programming.
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The meta-analysis by Ttofi and Farrington (2009) found that several family factors were important elements of effective bullying prevention programs, including parent training and informing parents about bullying.
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From page 228... ...
. The National Education Association has developed training materials and other resources for educators as well as a toolkit, Bully Free: It Starts With Me, aimed at all ESPs including bus drivers, custodial, food service, and clerical staff, among others.c Violence Prevention Works provides a 2-day committee training for the Olweus Bullying Prevention Program conducted by a certified Olweus trainer.
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From page 229... ...
For example, Girl Scouts of the USA offers the Be a Friend First Program aimed at preventing bullying among girls but it does not currently offer training for adult volunteers on how to intervene or prevent bullying.f As mentioned in Chapter 3, 80 percent of American youth ages 6-17 par ticipate in extracurricular activities, which include sports and clubs (Riese et al., 2015)
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From page 230... ...
Evidence of the physical, mental, and behavioral health issues of children who bully, are bullied, or observe bullying incidents (Borowsky et al., 2013; Vessey et al., 2013; Wolke and Lereya, 2015) provides child health and mental health clinicians in community and acute care settings with knowledge to engage in bullying prevention interventions.
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From page 231... ...
. Health care professionals might also consider protective factors for youth involved with bullying and could provide guidance to parents and children regarding the importance of certain supports.
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From page 232... ...
Other challenges reside in integrating bullying prevention intervention into the daily responsibilities and realities of health care professionals, regardless of setting. Mechanisms to compensate for time spent on screening, referral, counseling, follow-up of bullying incidents among patients and school or community education may lack public or private sources of financing and reimbursement.
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From page 233... ...
Social Media Social media offers both intervention challenges and opportunities for cyberbullying. A challenge is that social media provides a platform on which bullying can occur.
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From page 234... ...
The effects of preventive interventions tend to be greatest for the highest-risk youth, even for interventions in early elementary school (Bradshaw et al., 2015; Limbos et al., 2007; Petras et al., 2008)
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From page 235... ...
Schools may want to consider implementing a multicomponent program that focuses on school climate, positive behavior support, social and emotional learning, or violence prevention more generally, rather than implementing a bullying-specific preventive intervention, as these more inclusive programs may reach a broader set of outcomes for students and the school environment. Tiered preventive interventions appear to be a promising model for schools, but the lack of rigorously tested selective and indicated preventive interventions focused specifically on bullying means that other violence and mental health prevention models should be leveraged and integrated to increase efficiency.
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From page 236... ...
, and the studies examin ing impacts of bullying prevention programs for these subpopulations are rare. Finding 5.5: Few of the selective and indicated preventive interventions for identified perpetrators (aggressive youth)
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From page 237... ...
Conclusion 5.4: The extant, empirically supported selective and in dicated preventive interventions for violence and delinquency should also be leveraged to meet the needs of students involved in bullying, or those experiencing the mental and behavioral health consequences of bullying. These programs should be integrated into a multi-tiered system of supports for students at risk for engaging in or experiencing the consequences of bullying.
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From page 238... ...
. Early elementary school intervention to reduce conduct problems: A randomized trial with Hispanic and non-Hispanic children.
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From page 239... ...
. Longitudinal impact of two universal preventive interventions in first grade on educational outcomes in high school.
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From page 240... ...
. Outcomes from a school randomized controlled trial of Steps to Respect: A bullying prevention program.
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From page 241... ...
. Evaluation of a youth-led program for preventing bullying, sexual harassment, and dating aggression in middle schools.
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From page 242... ...
. Maximizing the implementation quality of evidence-based preventive interventions in schools: A concep tual framework.
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From page 243... ...
. The effectiveness of school-based bully ing prevention programs: A systematic review.
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From page 244... ...
. Effectiveness of a violence prevention curriculum among children in elementary school: A randomized controlled trial.
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From page 245... ...
. Implementing and evaluating school-based primary prevention programs and the importance of differential effects on outcomes.
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From page 246... ...
. A systematic meta-review of evaluations of youth violence prevention pro grams: Common and divergent findings from 25 years of meta-analyses and systematic reviews.
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From page 247... ...
. School-based violence prevention programs: Systematic review of secondary prevention trials.
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From page 248... ...
. A meta-analysis of school-based bully ing prevention programs' effects on bystander intervention behavior.
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From page 249... ...
. Bridging the research-practice gap in adolescent substance abuse treatment: The case of Brief Strategic Family Therapy.
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From page 250... ...
. What works in preventing bullying: Effective ele ments of anti-bullying programmes.
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From page 251... ...
. The impact of schoolwide positive behavioral interventions and supports on bullying and peer rejection: A randomized controlled effectiveness trial.
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From page 252... ...
Journal of Applied Developmental Psychology, 37, 36-51.
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