Session Information
05 SES 16 A, Symposium: Deviant Behaviour as an Interactive and Contextual Process
Symposium
Contribution
We are interested in the development of deviant student careers. We refer to an interactionist approach of social reaction to rule‐transgression by students which assumes that being labelled for prior rule-transgressing behaviour may turn into a “master status” of the student overshadowing other characteristics of the person in the perception of the teacher (Cicourel 2020/1968; Caprara/Zimbado 1996; Lehman/David/Gruber 2017). We examine the beginning of this process among first-year pupils in the first months of the school year. Research questions: Which kind of rule transgressing behaviour can be observed among pupils and which behaviour is perceived and sanctioned as rule breaking by teachers? (1) To what extent do teachers differentiate in their reactions and interpretations between individual pupils? Method: We combine quantitative and qualitative methods. We observed the rule-transgressing behaviour of pupils (Volpe/Hintze 2005) and the reactions of teachers in 10 first classrooms during four consecutive lessons. 1999 observations from 199 children were recorded, analysed by using bivariate statistics. Short interviews were then conducted with 10 teachers, referring to the interpretation of the behaviour of 14 pupils with less than six and 21 pupils with more than ten observations. The interviews were analysed in an inductive-deductive procedure (Strauss/Corbin 1990) in which we elaborate theoretical concepts that can more precisely capture the interactions towards a deviant career. Results: Most of students’ rule-transgressing is not severe (45% “verbal” (e.g. chattering), 35% “motor” (e.g. walking around), 15% “passive” (e.g. staring out of the window)). Controlling for type of behaviour, teachers do not react to about half of the incidents, and if they react, they mostly mildly admonish. Children with many and children with few incidents are treated equally. Hence, these results suggest that the interpretation of rule-breaking by teachers is rather arbitrary, and not yet ascribed as an individual characteristic to pupils. However, the analysis of the teacher interviews indicates that they see the behaviour of pupils with few incidents mostly as "normal" and "childlike", while they interpret the behaviour of children with many incidents in a "long story", as contextualized in a family situation and as intentional. Conclusion: Although teachers might not yet treat pupils differently, they make clear differences between children at the level of interpretations. This could lead to increasing differences in the type of sanctions applied by teachers (Yeager/Lee 2021; Okonofua/Eberhardt 2015). Future research will show the extent to which this may induce a deviant career for some children.
References
Cicourel, A. V. (1968/2020). Die soziale Organisation der Schule. In U. Bauer et al. (Hrsg.), Handbuch der Bildungs- und Erziehungssoziologie. Wiesbaden: Springer (Original in: E. Rubington & M. S. Weinberg (Eds.), Deviance. The interactionist Perspective (pp. 124-135). New York: MacMillan. Dodge, K. A. & Pettit, G. S. (2003). A biopsychosocial model of the development of chronic conduct problems in adolescence. Developmental Psychology, 39 (2), 349. Lehmann, B.J., David, D. M. & Gruber, J. A. (2017). Rethinking the biopsychosocial model of health: Understanding health as a dynamic system. Soc Personal Psychol Compass, 11. https://doi.org/10.1111/spc3.12328. Okonofua, J. A. & Eberhardt, J. L. (2015). Two Strikes: Race and the Disciplining of Young Students. Psychological Science, 26 (5), 617–624. https://doi.org/10.1177/0956797615570365 Strauss, A. L. & Corbin, J. M. (1990). Basics of qualitative research: Grounded theory procedures and techniques. Sage. Volpe, R. J., & Hintze, J. (2005). Observing students in classroom settings: A review of seven coding schemes. School Psychology Review, 34 (4), 454‐474. Yeager, D. S. & Lee, H. Y. (2021). The Incremental Theory of Personality Intervention. In G. M. Walton & A. J. Crum (Eds.), Handbook of wise interventions: How social psychology can help people change (pp. 305–323). The Guilford Press.
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