Behavioral threat assessment is a widely used violence prevention strategy in schools, but there is little research on how frequently a student attempts to carry out a threat of violence after a threat assessment and whether schools accurately recognize and classify these cases. This study investigated: 1) how often students attempted violence and…

The criminalization of school discipline and its resulting consequences for students, particularly students of color, has been widely studied. While results from previous research have shown racial and gender differences in punitive school experiences like suspension, school-based arrest, and school-based referrals to juvenile justice systems,…

While the philosophy of deterrence has long been rooted in the criminal justice system and has informed policy and programming, the results of such strategies have been mixed. A handful of research efforts have focused on the relationship between various deterrence perspectives and cyberbullying; however, few address this issue in a non-Western…

Most studies of school bullying in China are atheoretical. To fill the gap in the literature, we introduce criminological theories in an attempt to test propositions broadly derived from these perspectives in the study of physical bullying. Relying on data collected from 12 middle schools (Grades 7 to 9) in three cities with information on both…

Teasing is a prevalent behavior in schools that can result in both positive and negative outcomes for students. This article presents an exploratory investigation into teachers' perceptions of teasing in schools, an underrepresented perspective in the literature. Semistructured interviews with 28 teachers of grades 4-8 revealed complex…

This study reports preliminary findings of a national survey on student violence against teachers in Taiwanese schools; 14,022 students from elementary to high school (grades 4 to 12) participate in this study. Students were given a structured and anonymous questionnaire including a scale for reporting their violent behavior against teachers.…

Surveyed and interviewed secondary school teachers and their students to examine the incidence of teachers' feeling unsafe, describing the extent to which those feelings related either to students' antisocial behavior, teachers' profiles, and school profiles. Teachers' feelings of unsafety were rarely affected by the incidence of students'…

As increasing numbers of youth embrace computer-mediated communication to meet academic and social needs, interpersonal violence directly and indirectly related to the Internet is occurring more often. Cyberbullying in particular has shot to the forefront of agendas in schools and communities due to the emotional, psychological, and even physical…

This exploratory study uses observations of the aggressive behavior of elementary school boys during three successive recess periods to test the hypothesis that aggressive behavior can spread between recess periods through peer contagion. If this hypothesis is correct, aggressive behaviors during the second recess period should mediate any…

Why are some students not willing to tell adults about a possibly violent situation in their school? In this study, 1,100 students in the Mid-South were surveyed on their knowledge of, and willingness to tell about, a possibly violent situation, their involvement in behaviors that are related to school violence, and their school's climate. About…

The present study examined the effectiveness of a bullying prevention program. The responses of 270 fifth grade students on the Peer Relations Questionnaire, the Children's Depression Inventory (CDI), and the Pro-social Tendencies Scale were examined before and after participating in the program. Students in the Bully, Bully-Victim, and Neither…

The present study was aimed at investigating the narrative strategies bullies and victims use to interpret social incongruence and the extent to which these strategies vary across the two European countries of Italy and Spain. A peer nomination questionnaire on bullying was used to select 12-14-year-old children from both countries. The children…

Sexual harassment is commonplace in schools, particularly among adolescents. Although information on this topic is typically gathered from students and teachers, this study collected information from school bus drivers. Based on feedback from 58 school bus drivers, 39 (67%) reported observing students making sexual comments or jokes. Almost half…

The purpose of this article is to advocate for proactive content in discipline codes of conduct. Proactive discipline codes integrate Positive Behavior Support (PBS) strategies (Sugai & Horner, 2002) and attend to the academic needs of students (McEvoy & Welker, 2000). Proactive discipline codes of conduct have meaningful participation by key…

This article presents a case study of a single incident involving a high school student who brought a "tennis ball" bomb to school. Although the district had recently created a safety plan, with a specific protocol for the discovery of a bomb in the building, the principal and the crises team ignored it. The principal did not refer to…