Ph.D. Sociologist Niă Andreea Mihaela STUDY ON PSYCHOLOGICAL VIOLENCE IN SCHOOLS

Contextual frame School is an institution that offers educational services, transmits knowledge, develops abilities, forms competencies, values, socially accepted norms. School violence is an extremely complex phenomenon, with multiple ramifications: in family, society, school, on ourselves and culture. Its different forms are interconnected and have a specific dynamics. In the last years violence has become more and more present in Romanian schools, having as effects school abandonment, decreased interest towards school, but also towards the social environment and increased number of crimes among students.

In schools, the most encountered forms of psychological violence are the ones regarding the physical or mental features of colleagues, behavior often determined due to students’ age, who become in adolescence more careful and more critical on these aspects. Teenagers use psychological violence on colleagues at school or on teachers to get either the attention of others, in order to become popular, or to gain control and authority. Psychologists believe that such behaviors have two causes:  internal causes, like anxiety, depression or problems in controlling negative emotions (anger, sorrow, envy);  external causes, like the impossibility to solve problems, cognitive rigidity, lack of the capacity to understand consequences.

Contextual frame Depending on the aggressor’s sex, the purpose of psychological violence on a person are diverse, thus:  if the aggressor is a boy, he exerts psychological violence for intimidation, control, domination and feeling of personal security, because he considers that the torturer cannot be aggressed, thus functioning as a strange defense system.  if the aggressor is a girl, she exerts psychological violence for manipulation, hurting feelings, victim’s marginalization/isolation or even cruelty.

Research objectives on psychological violence in schools for students  Learning the satisfaction degree of students regarding the education unit in which they study;  Investigating the social phenomena specific to teenagers, which happen in schools;  Learning the frequency with which conflicts and violent situations appear in the respondents’ schools;  Investigating the phenomenon of psychological violence and the manners in which it appears;  Investigating the manner in which psychological and physical violence influence the development of students;  Investigating the students’ opinion regarding the activity of the teaching personnel;  Learning the students’ opinion regarding who can solve the conflicts appeared in schools;  Investigating the trust that respondent students give parents when it comes to violent conflicts appeared in schools;

 Investigating the frequency with which physical aggressions appear on teachers;  Investigating the manner in which psychological violence is exerted within education institutions;  Investigating the relationship between teachers and students and their parents;  Learning the teachers’ opinion regarding violence acts (physical and psychological of students);  Investigating the manner in which some teachers can lose their objectivity in giving grades or sanctions in class;  Learning the teachers’ opinion regarding the reasons of the situations of psychological violence between students and teachers;  Investigating the teachers’ opinion regarding the diminishment of psychological violence in Romanian schools. Research objectives on psychological violence in schools for teachers

Research methodology  Research method: opinion investigation, based on administered questionnaire  Investigation technique: questionnaire under the form of a Likert sheet (two questionnaires were applied - one for teachers and the second for students)  Period for data collection: January 15 th - 31 st 2014  Volume and structure of sample: 879 respondents, distributed as it follows:  Questionnaire for the students respondents;  Questionnaire for the teachers respondents;

Results of the questionnaire applied to the students on psychological violence in schools Three quarters of the students included in the sample of this research stated that their expression opportunities are rarely or even never restricted, while 20.1% believe that their expression is sometimes prevented.

Yells are part of the psychological violence cases, pretty frequent in school units in Romania. Asked if they were in the situation of someone yelling at them, 72.7 percent in the total respondents chose the variants never and rarely.

71.4% of the interviewed students stated that it rarely or even never happens to be yelled at on a raised tone, while 21.7% indicated that this happens sometimes. At the same time, 6.9 percent in the total respondents stated that they are often or even always yelled at on a raised tone.

88.3% of the respondents stated that they never feel humiliated or mocked at, while 8.4% undergo this rarely and 2.6% sometimes. Only 0.7% of the interviewed students stated that they are often humiliated or mocked at.

Each teenager needs a person to go to when in trouble, when he/she is in a situation they consider critical. Thus, each 22.9 percent of the interviewed students go to their parents or one of the teachers when a conflict situation appears.

Results of the questionnaire applied to the teachers on psychological violence in schools Rumors are spread within an education unit, like a virus, whose carrier can be teachers, students or auxiliary personnel. At the same time, several researches have shown that adults gossip more and debate that rumor for a longer period of time.

Intimidation means: ”to make become or become timid, to instill someone or feel fear.” 97.6 percent of the total interviewed people stated that they have never been submitted to physical aggressions. Thus, only 2.4% of respondents have admitted that once every few months or few times a month it happens they are mildly aggressed physically to be intimidated.

Aggressive, ignorant or careless behaviors of students seem to appear more and more in schools in Romania, thus 15.2 percent of the respondents of this research stated that once every few months the class is intrerrupted due to an inappropriate behavior of students, while 7.1% stated that this happens few times a months, while for 2 percent of the teachers questioned this happens weekly.

86.3% of the interviewed teachers stated that they haven’t been confronted with the situation in which their decisions might be critized and contested. However, 13.1 percent of the respondents stated that it happens once every few months that their decisions are critized and contested.

Reasons for situations of psychological violence between students and teachers from the teachers’ point of view

Conclusions Violence in education institutions becomes a worrying phenomenon, because it can affect the very basis of a society, with the prejudice brought directly to the education process. Physical violence, but also the psychological one creates a harmful environment to the purposes sought by school, creating a climate of insecurity and totally inefficient. The cases of psychological violence from students appear also from their insatisfaction on the studied subjects, their content, didactic materials, material resources, equipment in laboratories and workshops, etc. Within our research, we could notice that only 71.9% of the interviewed students are fully satisfied with the school they study in and 76.1% would rather go to the same education unit.

According to this study, physical and/or verbal threats are rare in Romanian schools, 96.2% of the respondents stated that they rarely or even never receive threats of this kind, while 2.6 percent are threatened sometimes physically or verbally and only 1.2% repeatedly. Also, three quarters of the respondents say that psychological violence between students and teachers appears very rarely or even never, while 16% consider this happens sometimes. Regarding teachers, 85.5% of them stated that they never lost their objectivity in grading students for fear of conflicts with their parents. Conclusions

In the opinion of the interviewed teachers, the necessary measures to diminish violence in schools are: a stricter education of the child inside the family (17.3%), strictly following the regulations of the education institution (16.4%), partnership with the students’ families and the community (15.6%), but also a better communication with students (15%). Conclusions