case study on misbehavior of students

What does the research say about how to reduce student misbehavior in schools?

Subscribe to the brown center on education policy newsletter, rachel m. perera and rachel m. perera fellow - the brookings institution, governance studies , brown center on education policy melissa kay diliberti melissa kay diliberti assistant policy researcher - rand, ph.d. candidate - pardee rand graduate school @mkdiliberti.

September 21, 2023

• In response to concerning reports of increasing student misbehavior, lawmakers in at least eight states are working to make it easier for teachers and principals to suspend misbehaving students from school.
• However, research indicates that suspension-promoting policies do not reduce student misbehavior, nor do they make schools safer.
• Research on the effectiveness of alternative discipline practices like restorative justice programs and Positive Behavioral Interventions and Supports suggests both are promising alternatives to punishment-based approaches.
• 12 min read

This blog is part of the  “School Discipline in America”  series. In this series, experts from Brookings and RAND explore how U.S. public schools approach student discipline and educators’ perspectives on disciplinary approaches and challenges, providing key insights into contemporary debates over student discipline practices and policies.

Schools across the U.S. have been reporting increased student misbehavior ever since students returned to in-person schooling following the COVID-19 pandemic-related school closures. While much about the heightened student behavioral challenges facing schools remains unknown, experts suspect students are still recovering from the trauma of the pandemic and struggling from missed social and emotional development opportunities.

In response to these concerning trends, lawmakers in at least eight states are working to make it easier for teachers and principals to remove misbehaving students from school. The policy proposals put forth by these lawmakers represent a stunning about-face after 10+ years of state- and district- led reforms to promote less-punitive approaches like restorative justice practices as alternatives to suspensions. These reforms were intended to replace the types of strict discipline policies that proliferated in the 1990s and early 2000s, which emphasized suspensions and expulsions as the solution to schools’ discipline problems. But heightened student misbehavior is now raising questions about the effectiveness of these reform efforts.

Supporters of these more punitive proposals argue that recent reforms have made schools too lenient and that less-punitive approaches aren’t effectively curbing disruptions. Opponents argue that reform efforts were stymied by a variety of factors—inadequate resources for implementation, educator buy-in, and ultimately pandemic disruptions—and that a return to strict discipline policies will wrongly punish kids who are dealing with lingering mental health issues and struggling to readjust to the norms of in-person schooling.

Have schools become too lenient when it comes to student misbehavior? Can less-punitive approaches to student discipline work, especially in the context of pandemic recovery?

Over the last year, we’ve used survey data from principals to understand the current landscape of school discipline policies and practices , principals’ perspectives on suspensions , and what principals say they need to reduce student misbehavior . In this post—the final installment in this series—we use findings from this work and a review of student discipline research to reflect on school discipline in the context of pandemic recovery. We also discuss what else state and district leaders can do to reduce student misbehavior and improve school climate.

More than a half dozen states are considering a return to stricter student discipline policies, including four that have already done so

In 2023 state legislative sessions, at least eight states introduced policy proposals related to school discipline, including four states (Arizona, Kentucky, Nevada, and West Virginia) where the bills have already become law. Although the specifics differ (see Table 1), these bills broadly aim to give educators more discretion to suspend and expel misbehaving students. This includes more discretion over which types of misbehaviors can be punished (e.g., a North Carolina bill would allow suspensions for cursing and dress code violations); the conditions under which schools can suspend students and for how long (e.g., Nevada’s new law removes a requirement that schools first attempt restorative justice practices); and which students can be suspended (e.g., a new Arizona law lowers the minimum suspension grade from 5th grade to kindergarten). Two states (Florida and Nebraska) would also loosen rules guiding when educators are allowed to physically restrain students.

Table 1. State legislation related to student discipline introduced in 2023

What does the research say about these policy ideas?

Based on our review of the research, we believe a return to stricter discipline policies (such as those described in detail in Table 1) would sacrifice the learning, development, and well-being of one group of kids for the potential benefit of another. And the groups most likely to bear the burden of a return to stricter discipline policies are the same groups who were most harmed by similar policies the last time around—Black students and other students of color, as well as students with disabilities. Making matters worse, these groups are still recovering from being among those most negatively affected by the pandemic and pandemic-related disruptions to schooling.

Here’s how we came to this conclusion:

An abundance of research indicates that strict discipline policies that promote the use of suspensions as punishment—like the types of discipline policies that proliferated in the 1990s/2000s and the ones proposed in the 2023 legislative sessions— do not reduce student misbehavior , nor do they make schools safer . What’s more, suspension-promoting policies often led to sharp increases in suspension rates, especially for students of color. In fact, research on the ineffectiveness of strict discipline policies and the resulting over-suspension of Black, Native American, and Latino students was used as motivation for the discipline reform efforts that these new policy proposals aim to reverse.

The research identifies at least three reasons why strict discipline policies don’t work for misbehaving students:

• The theory of change is deeply flawed. These policies are based on a model of deterrence that assumes that students are rational decisionmakers who will take into account the known harsh consequences associated with breaking school rules (like getting suspended or expelled) before taking an action in violation of school rules. But kids’ brains aren’t capable of the type of reasoned thinking that a deterrence model of discipline requires. Experts also stress that “ behavior is skill, not will ,” meaning that relying on punishment to improve student behavior wrongly assumes that students have the skills (e.g., frustration tolerance and emotional regulation ) to meet school’s behavioral expectations in the first place.
• Increased discretion over who to remove from the classroom, for what reason, and how to punish them only leaves more room for conscious and unconscious biases to factor into educators’ decision-making. Discipline reforms of the 2010s sought to limit the impact of biases by defining, in law or policy, when students could not be suspended or expelled. They did so amid research documenting the prevalence of racial discrimination in educators’ disciplinary decision-making , and other work showing that racial disparities are larger for infractions that rely on subjective assessments (e.g., infractions like disruption, disobedience, and willful defiance). For example, in 2011, North Carolina lawmakers formalized guidance outlining the types of infractions that could merit long-term suspensions that explicitly excluded subjective, nonviolent infractions like inappropriate or disrespectful language and “noncompliance” with staff directions.
• Suspensions harm students academically, in both the short and long run. Suspensions are associated with lower subsequent test scores , and lower rates of high school and college graduation . And research suggests that the more students struggle academically, the more likely they are to act out, creating a vicious cycle that won’t end until the student is pushed out of school altogether.

How strict discipline policies benefit non-misbehaving students—if at all—is far less clear. Proponents of recent bills (including local teachers’ unions in some states) argue that increased suspensions for misbehaving students are necessary to preserve the learning environment for non-misbehaving students. Some studies have found that non-misbehaving students’ outcomes improve when their misbehaving peers are removed. However, if suspensions do not improve the behavior of suspended students over the long run, this benefit to the learning environment could be short-lived. Indeed, other research finds a negative relationship between non-misbehaving students’ test scores and peers’ suspensions. Still others find no effect. All told, the question of how suspension-promoting policies affect non-misbehaving students remains unsettled in the research literature.

What can policymakers do to support schools in their efforts to address heightened student misbehavior instead of returning to strict discipline policies?

Principals have consistently said they need two things to reduce student misbehavior: better training for teachers and more funding . In a November 2021 survey, for example, only one-third of a nationally representative sample of principals said their teachers had been adequately trained by their teacher preparation programs to deal with student misbehavior and discipline. Similarly, when asked in a May 2022 federal survey what their schools need to better support student behavior and socioemotional development, trainings on supporting students’ socioemotional development (70%) and classroom management strategies (51%) were among principals’ top answers.

Beyond teacher training, principals also say they need more support for student and staff mental health (79%) and to hire more teachers and/or other staff (60%) to better support student behavior. More funding for mental health supports, in particular, stands out as an area where policymakers could offer schools support. Schools needed more mental health supports before the COVID-19 pandemic—and that need has only intensified since then.

Inadequate training and resources are also likely why reform efforts, including those aimed at promoting alternative practices like restorative justice (RJ) programs or Positive Behavioral Interventions and Supports (PBIS) , have stalled in some places. Research on the effectiveness of these two popular approaches—which our work shows became widespread in U.S. public schools over the last decade—suggests both are promising alternatives. A large body of research suggests that PBIS (a schoolwide program and set of practices that aim to make behavioral expectations clear and positively rewards students for following behavioral norms) reduce behavioral incidents and suspensions and improves school climate. While the literature on RJ programs—which aim to promote conflict resolution skills in lieu of punishment—is more nascent, early studies suggest similar positive effects on behavior and school climate. This is especially true in places where sufficient time and resources were dedicated to implementing either PBIS or RJ.

When proponents of stricter discipline policies argue that schools have become too lenient on student misbehavior, it’s possible they’re describing a real dynamic driven by inadequate implementation of alternative approaches. Put another way, if these programs haven’t been implemented well (or at all) and schools have done away with traditional forms of consequences, then students’ misbehaviors may in fact be going unchecked.

Students need more caring and supportive schooling environments, not more punitive ones

Figuring out how to prevent student misbehavior and improve school climate should be a top priority for state lawmakers. Instead of falling back on old approaches to student discipline that research has largely shown to be ineffective, policymakers should listen to what the vast majority of school leaders say they need: more resources for teacher-trainings, hiring of additional teachers and staff, and mental health supports. And given the promising track record of alternative approaches like PBIS and restorative justice—and the fact that implementation of these programs is already underway in a large share of K–12 public schools—policymakers should invest more resources to ensure their success.

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The authors thank Ayanna Platt for excellent research assistance for this blog post.

Rachel M. Perera is an alumna of the Pardee RAND Graduate School and a past employee of the RAND Corporation during which time she completed the majority of her contribution to this project. Perera remains an adjunct policy researcher with the RAND Corporation and received financial support from RAND to complete this project. The findings, interpretations, and conclusions in this report are solely those of the authors and do not represent positions or policies of the RAND Corporation, Brookings Institution, its officers, employees, or other donors. Brookings is committed to quality, independence, and impact in all its work.

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Comparing Teachers’ and Students’ Perspectives on the Treatment of Student Misbehavior

• Open access
• Published: 03 September 2022
• Volume 35 , pages 344–365, ( 2022 )

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• Mathias Twardawski   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0003-0543-277X 1 &
• Benjamin E. Hilbig 2  

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The treatment of student misbehavior is both a major challenge for teachers and a potential source of students’ perceptions of injustice in school. By implication, it is vital to understand teachers’ treatment of student misbehavior vis-à-vis students’ perceptions. One key dimension of punishment behavior reflects the underlying motives and goals of the punishment. In the present research, we investigated the perspectives of both teachers and students concerning the purposes of punishment. Specifically, we were interested in the extent to which teachers and students show preferences for either retribution (i.e., evening out the harm caused), special prevention (i.e., preventing recidivism of the offender), or general prevention (i.e., preventing imitation of others) as punishment goals. Therefore, teachers ( N  = 260) and school students around the age of 10 ( N  = 238) were provided with a scenario depicting a specific student misbehavior. Participants were asked to indicate their endorsement of the three goals as well as to evaluate different punishment practices that were perceived (in pretests) to primarily achieve one specific goal but not the other two. Results show that teachers largely prefer general prevention, whereas students rather prefer special prevention and retribution. This discrepancy was particularly large in participants’ evaluation of specific punishment practices, whereas differences between teachers’ and students’ direct endorsement of punishment goals were relatively small. Overall, the present research may contribute to the development of classroom intervention strategies that reduce conflicts in student–teacher-interactions.

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Introduction

In everyday school life, teachers are tasked not only with preparing or giving lessons, but also with handling a wide range of student misbehaviors (Kulinna et al., 2006 ; Wheldall & Merrett, 1988 ). These situations harbor the risk of severe consequences for both teachers and students: For teachers, the extent of student misbehavior has found to be strongly linked to their well-being and health, and it has been identified as the most salient stressor related to burnout syndrome in teachers (Aloe et al., 2014 ; Brouwers & Tomic, 2000 ; McCormick & Barnett, 2011 ). Finding suitable and effective classroom intervention strategies for such incidents is thus a crucial challenge and major concern for teachers (Melnick & Meister, 2008 ). In the best case, student misbehavior can be prevented by positive and proactive classroom management approaches (Sugai & Horner, 2006 ). However, sometimes such misbehavior simply cannot be prevented by a well-prepared lesson (e.g., if it occurs during break). In such instances, the classroom may bear some resemblance to a courtroom, with the teacher representing the judge who is in charge of finding an appropriate response to misbehavior (Weiner, 2003 ).

For students, teachers’ treatment of student misbehavior is equally essential, as it is a fundamental cause of their perception of injustice in school (Fan & Chan, 1999 ; Israelashvili, 1997 ). Crucially, such injustice perceptions have a strong impact on students’ lives, both within the school (e.g., on students’ academic self-concept, motivation, and achievements; Peter et al., 2012 ) and beyond (e.g., on students’ attitudes toward democracy; Pretsch & Ehrhardt-Madapathi, 2018 ). Importantly, students’ perceptions of injustice in school are not limited to and indeed are only marginally influenced by the grading or evaluation of students’ performances. Instead, it is the treatment of student misbehavior that appears to be an important factor (Israelashvili, 1997 ). Research suggests that such situations are among the most frequently reported situations of students’ injustice experiences, even excluding situations of false allegations (Fan & Chan, 1999 ). In other words, even if the incident of student misbehavior appears to be clear (e.g., when it is obvious who the offender or victim is), students frequently feel treated unfairly by their teachers. Eventually, the “wrong” treatment of student misbehavior may cause severe negative outcomes, such as a negative classroom climate (Peter & Dalbert, 2010 ) or a strained relationship between most or even all students and teachers (Avtgis & Rancer, 2008 ; Ratcliff et al., 2010 ). In turn, a tense student–teacher relationship and the students’ perceptions of low support from the teacher may increase conflict and, eventually, the occurrence of further classroom misbehavior (Boyle et al., 1995 ; Bru et al., 2001 , 2002 ; Ertesvåg & Vaaland, 2007 ).

Consequently, it is vital to understand and study teachers’ responses to student misbehavior to identify characteristics that do not help but harm learning and instruction. This is the endeavor of the present research. More precisely, we examine teachers’ approaches to respond to student misbehavior and compare these with students’ preferences for how this misbehavior should be treated. We particularly scrutinize one aspect of teachers’ decision-making process that has not been analyzed from both the teachers’ and students’ perspectives in the past: the goals teachers intend to achieve when reacting to student misbehavior. That is, when punishing students for misbehavior, teachers may pursue a variety of different goals as described in detail below. Importantly, students may agree or disagree with these goals and, consequently, may perceive the punishment as more or less appropriate and just (Gollwitzer & Okimoto, 2021 ).

Retribution, Special Prevention, and General Prevention as Punishment Goals

There is a considerable body of literature discussing the goals individuals generally pursue when engaging in punishment (Carlsmith et al., 2002 ; Cushman, 2015 ; Goodwin & Gromet, 2014 ; Twardawski et al., 2020b ). On the broadest level, one can differentiate between two goals that are associated with the philosophical works by Immanuel Kant and Jeremy Bentham. According to Kant ( 1952 ) punishment should follow a deontological justice principle: An offender harms a victim, a society, and its rules, and causes an imbalance to the scales of justice. Consequently, punishment is legitimate and justified to rebalance the (moral) wrong that has been caused by the offense, paying back harm doers for their misconduct and, thus, restore justice (Gerber & Jackson, 2013 ). This is typically achieved by finding a proportionate punishment that “fits” the crime (Goodwin & Gromet, 2014 ). Accordingly, a justified punishment is primarily backward-oriented and concerned with the harm caused but not about future developments (Carlsmith et al., 2002 ). The punishment goal associated with this deontological justice principle is referred to as retribution (Carlsmith & Darley, 2008 ; Carlsmith et al., 2002 ) .

According to Bentham ( 1962 ), on the other hand, punishment should follow a utilitarian justice principle. Correspondingly, the intrinsically damaging act of punishment is justifiable if it leads to positive future consequences—in particular, by preventing future misbehavior (McCullough et al., 2013 ). That is, punishment should primarily be forward-oriented and used as an instrument to facilitate compliance with social norms and reducing norm violations (Rucker et al., 2004 ). This utilitarian perspective on people’s punishment behavior can further be differentiated into special prevention and general prevention (Twardawski et al., 2020b ) . A special preventive punishment is primarily concerned with offenders themselves and intends to prevent future recidivism (Keller et al., 2010 ). A general preventive punishment, in turn, is primarily concerned with other members of the community that might have learned of the offense and, therefore, may imitate the misbehavior if it remains unpunished (Goodwin & Benforado, 2015 ).

Teachers’ and Students’ Punishment Goals

Decades of research examined laypeople’s relative endorsement of these punishment goals (for an overview, see e.g., Carlsmith & Darley, 2008 ). Of particular relevance for the present research, recent literature suggests that the endorsement of punishment goals is subject to power and hierarchy, that is, people differing in power differ in their preferences for specific goals (Mooijman & Graham, 2018 ). Particularly, after observing misbehavior, powerful people respond with distrust and increased concerns about losing their power (Mooijman et al., 2015 ). To prevent the loss of power, they use punishment as an instrument to deter observers from imitating the misbehavior. Consequently, general prevention (i.e., deterring observers from imitating the misbehavior) is the preferred goal of punishment among people in powerful positions. Whereas, people who do not occupy leadership positions show a preference for retribution (i.e., to even out the wrong that has been done) rather than for special or general prevention (Mooijman et al., 2015 ). Importantly, teachers generally occupy an inherently powerful position in school (Reeve, 2009 ), suggesting that their punishment may be similarly designed to assert control (over the classroom). More precisely, teachers may acknowledge punishment as an instrument to communicate behavioral norms and such communication is, by definition, central to utilitarian (i.e., general preventive, but also special preventive) punishment.

Moreover, and in line with this reasoning, teachers’ behavior is generally led by educational goals, above and beyond delivering academic curricula. More precisely, professionals in education ultimately pursue the goal of shaping learners and help them developing to empowered, independent, and righteous individuals. This translates into teachers creating a pedagogical environment that helps educating fundamental social values and norms, both during lecturing and beyond (Husu & Tirri, 2007 ). Importantly, teachers also follow such educational principles in the face of student misbehavior (Coverdale, 2020 ; Goodman, 2020 ; Hand, 2020 ; Liu, 2017 ). For example, it has been suggested that teachers respond in such situations “for a myriad of reasons, including but not limited to moral education of students, maintaining safety, and creating an environment conducive to learning” (Thompson et al., 2020 , p. 79). Notably, all of these reasons can be subsumed under the umbrella of special and general prevention.

In sum, based on the above reasoning, it can be theorized that teachers’ endorsement of punishment in schools particularly follows utilitarian principles. Indeed, recent research suggests that teachers show a preference for general prevention (and special prevention) over retribution, at least when they attribute the misbehavior to controllable causes (Twardawski et al., 2020a ). In the present research, we follow up on this research by investigating which punishment goals teachers endorse in the face of a specific misbehavior and how they evaluate punishment practices that are perceived to serve different goals. We hypothesized that teachers show greater endorsement of general prevention compared to retribution. Given the natural overlap of special prevention and general prevention as two related, yet distinct aspects of utilitarian punishment, we also expected that teachers generally support special prevention over retribution, whereas we had no hypothesis regarding potential differences between special and general prevention. It should be noted that any hypotheses concerning the role of special prevention were necessarily more speculative, as past research only rarely considered the differences between general and special prevention and, often, did not explicitly examine special prevention.

As outlined above, it is not only vital to examine and understand the relative endorsement of punishment goals among teachers. Rather, it is equally important to consider the students’ perception of teachers’ punishment to identify potential characteristics of the punishment that may foster subjective injustice (Fan & Chan, 1999 ; Israelashvili, 1997 ). Differences between teachers’ and students’ relative endorsement of punishment goals may ultimately result in such undesirable outcomes (Mooijman et al., 2017 ). However, there is a lack of research on students’ endorsement of punishment goals and one could therefore derive contrary hypotheses for the students’ perspective: On the one hand, students are in a relatively less powerful position in the school context (Reeve, 2009 ) and, thus, should show less endorsement of general prevention than of retribution (Mooijman et al., 2015 ). On the other hand, this reasoning largely stems from research on adults, whereas evidence on children’s endorsement of punishment goals is scarce. In fact, the few existing insights into children’s punishment goals rather suggest that children value both retribution and prevention in their own punishment (Marshall et al., 2021 ; Twardawski & Hilbig, 2020 ). Therefore, it is unclear whether students show a relatively larger endorsement of retribution as compared to special and general prevention, especially when evaluating teachers’ reactions to student misbehavior. Consequently, investigating the extent to which students share teachers’ relative endorsement of punishment goals promises a fundamental contribution to the literature.

The Present Research

The primary goal of the present research is to examine and compare teachers’ and students’ relative endorsement of punishment goals. Therefore, we provided teachers and school students with a scenario describing a specific case of student misbehavior and tested whether teachers and students show similar preferences in punishment goals (i.e., retribution, special prevention, and general prevention) when directly asked to indicate their endorsement of these goals (Mooijman et al., 2015 ). That is, teachers were asked to imagine being in charge of reacting to this incident of student misbehavior and to indicate the degree to which they would want to achieve either of the three punishment goals. Similarly, students indicated their endorsement of the three goals when thinking about punishment of the offender in a structurally equivalent case of student misbehavior. We refer to this approach as the direct endorsement measure of teachers’ and students’ punishment goals.

In addition to analyzing teachers’ and students’ direct endorsement of the goals punishment ought to achieve in a specific case of student misbehavior, it is important to examine teachers’ assessment of concrete punishment practices vis-à-vis students’ perceptions of these practices. Specifically, research has shown that people’s direct endorsement of punishment goals is only weakly correlated with their actual punishment of a specific case of misbehavior (Crockett et al., 2014 ). This also applies to teachers, as their assessment of concrete punishment practices and the goals they purportedly endorse are similarly misaligned (Twardawski et al., 2020a ). For everyday school life, however, examining the perception of concrete and specific punishment practices may be equally important as the endorsement of rather abstract punishment goals—in particular if the evaluation of practices and abstract endorsement do not correspond perfectly. More specifically, teachers and students may agree on the endorsement of abstract punishment goals that may be pursued in response to a student misbehavior, but nonetheless disagree on a particular punishment practice designed to achieve these goals (or vice versa). Consequently, besides measuring teachers’ and students’ direct endorsement of abstract punishment goals in the case of a student misbehavior, we additionally measured teachers’ punishment goal preferences in a more indirect way, asking them to rate the appropriateness of three punishment practices that were perceived (in pretests) as primarily serving one of the goals. Vitally, we provided students with the same punishment practices and asked them to indicate the extent to which they evaluated these practices as fair, appropriate, and just, if shown by a teacher. We refer to this approach as the punishment practice evaluation measure of teachers’ and students’ punishment goal preferences.

Most critically, the core focus of the present research is to strictly examine whether teachers and students differ in their relative endorsement of various punishment goals and in how they evaluate corresponding punishment practices. More precisely, we examine the degree to which teachers and students show preferences with regard to the three punishment goals and compare these intra-individual preferences (i.e., the rank order of goals) between the two groups. Our hypothesis as stated above was that teachers indicate a preference for general (and special) prevention over retribution. For students’ punishment goal preferences, in turn, we had no strong a priori expectation, but deemed a preference for retribution most likely given the literature.

As recommended, we report how we determined our sample size, all data exclusions (if any), all manipulations, and all measures (Simmons et al., 2012 ). Furthermore, all materials (including instructions and materials of the pretest study; all materials are translated from German to English), along with all data, analyses scripts, and supplementary analyses are available on the OSF and can be accessed via the following link:  https://osf.io/r5d8v/ .

Data were collected from both pre-service (that is university students becoming teachers) and in-service teachers in conjunction with a project on other research questions (Twardawski et al., 2020a ). In-service and pre-service teachers were recruited through mailing lists, social media platforms, personal contacts, and recruitment in schools to participate in a study lasting 10–15 min. For in-service teachers, 103 participants started an online-version of the questionnaire, with n  = 74 (72%) completing it. Additionally, n  = 67 teachers opted for completing a paper and pencil version of the questionnaire. The total sample of in-service teachers therefore comprised N  = 141 participants. Around two thirds of these participants (i.e., n  = 92; 65%) were female (two participants did not indicate their gender), and ages ranged between 23 and 70 years ( M  = 40.77, SD  = 11.13). For pre-service teachers, 160 participants started the questionnaire (all of them participated online), of which N  = 119 (74%) completed it. In this final sample of pre-service teachers, ages ranged between 18 and 36 years ( M  = 23.38, SD  = 3.09) and 84% ( n  = 100) of participants were female. These pre-service teachers were in their sixth semester of studies on average ( M  = 5.61, SD  = 3.23) and mostly studied teaching on high school level (35%), teaching for primary schools (28%), or special education (22%). In total, we collected complete data sets from N  = 260 pre-service and in-service teachers, of whom n  = 192 were female (74%).

Data from students were collected in the fifth and sixth grade of three public German schools, again, in conjunction with projects on other research questions (Twardawski et al., 2020a ). In total, N  = 238 children from twelve school classes participated in the study. Around 45% of participants (i.e., n  = 106) were female, most children’s mother language was German (92%), and ages ranged between 9 and 12 ( M  = 10.46, SD  = 0.61; one child did not indicate her age).

To evaluate the sample sizes of the teachers ( N  = 260) and students ( N  = 238) with regard to the planned within-subjects comparisons of teachers’ and students’ support for the three punishment goals (retribution, special prevention, and general prevention), two separate sensitivity power analyses were conducted using G*Power (Faul et al., 2007 , 2009 ). One of these power analyses was specified to detect within-subjects differences in participants’ assessment of the three punishment goals (i.e., as an estimate of teachers’ and students’ punishment goal preferences). Assuming a conventional α = 0.05, a nonsphericity correction of ε = 1, and a standard power criterion of 1 − β = .90, this resulted in a detectable effect size of f  = .16 for the teacher and f  = .15 for the student sample in a repeated measures ANOVA. We further evaluated the collective sample sizes of teachers and students (total N  = 498) with regard to our main test of whether teachers and students differ in their relative endorsement of punishment goals. We therefore calculated a sensitivity power analysis to detect a within-between interaction in a mixed model with two groups (teachers and students) as between-subjects factor and the three punishment goals (retribution, special prevention, and general prevention) as within-subjects factor. Given a standard power criterion of 1 − β = .90, α = .05, number of groups = 2, number of measurements = 3, and nonsphericity correction ε = 1, this resulted in a detectable effect size of f  = .11 in a mixed-model ANOVA. Thus, there was high statistical power for even relatively small effect sizes throughout.

Measures and Procedures

The teacher perspective.

Teachers had the chance to participate in the study online or via a paper and pencil version of the questionnaire. After providing informed consent, participants received a scenario describing a student destroying a recently prepared hand drum of another student. This scenario read as follows:

Within the past lessons, you manufactured hand drums with your students that you plan to use today. You briefly turn to the board. Once you face the class again, you see how Florin causes a hole in Maxi’s drum . As a result, the drum is broken. Footnote 1

Participants were then asked to provide answers on several control variables regarding the perception of the misbehavior, starting with (i.) the stability and (ii.) controllability of the cause of the student’s misbehavior. Furthermore, participants were asked to indicate (iii.) the student’s responsibility for what occurred, how much (iv.) anger and (v.) sympathy they would feel toward the misbehaving student as well as (vi.) to what degree it is possible to influence the student’s future behavior. Each response was rated on a 6-point scale ranging from 0 = “not at all” to 5 = “completely.” Next, they answered the punishment practice evaluation measure and rated the appropriateness of three punishment practices that teachers may use as a response to the displayed student misbehavior. Punishment practices are provided in Table 1 . These practices were designed based on the results of a thorough pretest (in an independent sample) and therein judged as serving predominantly one of the punishment goals. Footnote 2 Appropriateness of each practice was indicated on a 6-point scale ranging from 0 = “not at all appropriate” to 5 = “completely appropriate.” Finally, participants provided their direct endorsement of the three punishment goals in the specified situation of student misbehavior, indicating the goals they would want to accomplish if presented a chance or obliged to react to the misbehaving student. To this end, we adapted one item for each punishment goal (retribution, special prevention, and general prevention) from Orth ( 2003 ) and Weiner et al. ( 1997 ). The item measuring direct endorsement of retribution read as follows: “To what extent would you like to react to even out the wrong that Florin has done?”; the item measuring endorsement of special prevention read “To what extent would you like to react to prevent recidivism by Florin?”; and the item measuring endorsement of general prevention read “To what extent would you like to react to prevent other students of showing similar behavior in the future?” Each item was answered on a 6-point scale ranging from 0 = “not at all” to 5 = “completely,” with higher values indicating stronger endorsement of a particular punishment goal. After answering all questions, participants worked on several other tasks that pertained to a different research question (Twardawski et al., 2020a ). Thus, this part of the material will not be further discussed in the present article. Finally, participants provided demographic information, before they were fully debriefed and thanked.

The Student Perspective

Data from students were collected in schools. On arrival in the classroom, students provided the experimenters with the consent form signed by their parents or legal guardians. Then, students were seated individually in front of computers. Two experimenters welcomed the class and gave them verbal instructions on the subsequent tasks. The first task was on an unrelated research question (Twardawski & Hilbig, 2020 ) and will therefore not be further discussed in the present article. Subsequently, students provided demographic information before they were introduced to the main task. Therein, students were asked to indicate their perceptions of a misbehavior and different teacher responses to it. This misbehavior and the responses were presented in short comic strips. Using an exemplary misbehavior, students received comprehensive instructions on the procedure of the task, before working on the task individually. They were provided with a comic strip depicting one student destroying the recently prepared hand drum of the other student (i.e., a structurally equivalent scenario that teachers received). The gender of the misbehaving student and the victim were counterbalanced (i.e., it was either the boy destroying the drum of the girl or vice versa). Next, students received three comic strips depicting potential punishment responses of the teacher (either female or male; counterbalanced) in the comic—reflecting the punishment practice evaluation measure . Students were asked to rate the extent to which they perceived these practices as just , appropriate , and fair on 6-point scales ranging from 0 = “not at all” to 5 = “completely.” These three items per punishment practice were aggregated (that is, averaged) and showed high internal consistencies (retributive reaction: α = .92; special preventive reaction: α = .90; general preventive reaction: α = .93). Footnote 3 Similar to teachers, students further answered all of the control questions outlined above (i.e., the stability and controllability of the cause of the student’s misbehavior, the student’s responsibility for what occurred, how much anger and sympathy they would feel toward the misbehaving student, and to what degree it is possible to influence the student’s future behavior), as well as their direct endorsement of the three punishment goals in the specified situation. Mirroring the teachers’ materials, the item measuring direct endorsement of retribution read as follows: “Florin should be punished for their behavior to even out the wrong committed”; the item measuring endorsement of special prevention read “Florin should be punished for their behavior to prevent them from doing something like this again”; and the item measuring endorsement of general prevention read “Florin should be punished for their behavior to prevent others from imitating them.” Again, scales ranged from 0 = “not at all” to 5 = “completely.” Finally, students were fully debriefed and thanked.

Preliminary Data Analyses

Before conducting our main analyses, we first ensured that we could treat pre-service and in-service teachers as one homogeneous group. Therefore, we tested whether pre-service and in-service teachers differed systematically in their endorsement of punishment goals for both the direct endorsement and the punishment practice evaluation measure. For each measure of endorsement of punishment goals, we conducted a separate mixed model ANOVA predicting the endorsement of the three punishment goals (retribution, special prevention, and general prevention) as within-subjects factor and the sample (pre-service and in-service teachers) as between-subjects factor. It turned out that there were only negligible differences between pre-service and in-service teachers (the detailed results of these tests, including test statistics, are available online at the OSF). Thus, we considered it reasonable to combine the two groups to one group of teachers.

Additionally, we considered it vital to determine whether teachers and students perceived the student misbehavior itself in a similar manner. We therefore calculated a Spearman correlation between the mean ratings of all control variables we collected on participants’ perception of the scenario (i.e., the stability and controllability of the cause of the student’s misbehavior, the student’s responsibility for what occurred, how much anger and sympathy they would feel toward the misbehaving student, and to what degree it is possible to influence the student’s future behavior). This analysis revealed a very high correlation, r s  = .83. Correspondingly, differences in punishment goal preferences between teachers and students cannot be ascribed to different perceptions of the student misbehavior itself and can therefore be reasonably be attributed to different preferences for how to deal with this misbehavior.

Main Analyses

For the main analyses, we first conducted in-depth within-subjects comparisons on teachers’ and students’ ratings per punishment goal measurement approach to examine their groups’ punishment goal preferences (i.e., the intra-individual rank order in the endorsement of the three punishment goals). Subsequently, we directly compared teachers’ and students’ preferences (i.e., the rank order) of punishment goals, again separately for each punishment goal measurement approach.

Direct Endorsement of Punishment Goals

As shown in Fig.  1 (left panel), teachers indicated a generally higher direct endorsement of utilitarian punishment goals as compared to retribution. Specifically, special prevention was the most endorsed goal ( M  = 4.42, SD  = 0.79), closely followed by general prevention ( M  = 4.26, SD  = 0.98). Notably, in line with our hypotheses, retribution received substantially lower endorsement ratings from teachers ( M  = 3.29, SD  = 1.30). To statistically test this pattern, we used a repeated measures ANOVA predicting the endorsement of the three punishment goals (retribution, special prevention, and general prevention) as within-subjects factor, followed by pairwise post-hoc t -tests. The analysis of variance confirmed significant differences between direct endorsement ratings of punishment goals, F (2, 518) = 109.20, p  < .001, \({\hat{\upeta }}_{\mathrm{G}}^{2}\) = .19. As hypothesized, follow-up t -tests directly examining our hypothesis revealed significantly greater endorsement of general prevention compared to retribution, t (259) = 9.96, p  < .001, d  = 0.59. Likewise, special prevention received significantly greater endorsement than retribution, t (259) = 12.61, p  < .001, d  = 0.73. Interestingly, special prevention also received significantly higher ratings than general prevention, albeit yielding only a miniscule effect size, t (259) = 2.82, p  = .005, d  = 0.12.

Results. Comparison of teachers’ and students’ direct endorsement of the three punishment goals (left panel) and their evaluation of different punishment practices (right panel, i.e., teachers’ appropriateness ratings of the practices, and students’ evaluation of how fair, appropriate, and just the teachers’ punishment practices are). Error bars represent one standard error of the mean

Moreover, data revealed notable differences for students’ direct endorsement of the three punishment goals. That is, students indicated highest endorsement ratings for special prevention ( M  = 3.70, SD  = 1.44), whereas general prevention ( M  = 3.23, SD  = 1.74) and retribution ( M  = 3.24, SD  = 1.62) were equally supported. A repeated measures analysis of variance confirmed significant differences between endorsement ratings of punishment goals of students, F (2, 474) = 12.73, p  < .001, \({\hat{\upeta }}_{\mathrm{G}}^{2}\) = .02. Follow-up t -tests revealed that special prevention was most endorsed and received slightly higher ratings than retribution, t (237) = 5.23, p  < .001, d  = 0.21, and general prevention, t (237) = 4.17, p  < .001, d  = 0.20. Differences between retribution and general prevention were negligible, t (237) = 0.07, p  = .943, d  = 0.003.

The core focus of the present research is a direct comparison of teachers’ and students’ punishment goal preferences (i.e., the rank order in punishment goals of the two groups). As can be seen in Fig.  1 (left panel), teachers’ and students’ direct endorsement of the three punishment goals particularly differed regarding the relative degree of endorsement of retribution. Specifically, whereas retribution received endorsement ratings descriptively comparable to special prevention and general prevention in students, it received substantially lower endorsement ratings compared to the other goals from teachers. To statistically test whether teachers and students actually differed in their preferences of punishment goals using this measurement approach, we conducted a mixed model ANOVA predicting the direct endorsement of the three punishment goals (retribution, special prevention, and general prevention) as within-subjects factor and the sample (teachers and students) as between-subjects factor. Most importantly, this analysis revealed a significant interaction of the goal to be rated and the sample, F (2, 992) = 27.88, p  < .001, \({\hat{\upeta }}_{\mathrm{G}}^{2}\) = .02.

Punishment Practice Evaluation Measure of Punishment Goals

For the punishment practice evaluation measure, contrary to the direct endorsement measure of punishment goals, teachers rated the general preventive punishment practice as most appropriate ( M  = 2.65, SD  = 1.50), closely followed by the retributive practice ( M  = 2.48, SD  = 1.57). Importantly, the special preventive practice was rated as least appropriate ( M  = 1.73, SD  = 1.46). These patterns are also shown in Fig.  1 (right panel). Again, we conducted a repeated measures ANOVA to compare teachers’ appropriateness ratings of the three punishment practices, followed by pairwise post-hoc t -tests. The analysis of variance confirmed significant differences between appropriateness ratings of the three punishment practices, F (2, 518) = 29.12, p  < .001, \({\hat{\upeta }}_{\mathrm{G}}^{2}\) = 0.06. In contrast to the direct endorsement measure and contrary to our hypothesis, follow-up t -tests revealed no significant differences between the general preventive and retributive punishment practices, t (259) = 1.28, p  = .202, d  = 0.08. Interestingly, the special preventive practice was rated significantly less appropriate than both the retributive practice, t (259) = − 5.64, p  < .001, d  = − 0.34, and the general preventive practice, t (259) =  − 8.00, p  < .001, d  = − 0.43.

Similar to what we found for teachers, students’ evaluation of the three punishment practices also differed from students’ direct endorsement of punishment goals. That is, students indicated highest ratings for the retributive practice ( M  = 3.84, SD  = 1.30), closely followed by the special preventive practice ( M  = 3.59, SD  = 1.22). The general preventive practice received the lowest ratings ( M  = 2.85, SD  = 1.55). Again, we conducted a repeated measures ANOVA to compare students’ perceptions of the three punishment practices, followed by pairwise post-hoc t -tests. The analysis of variance confirmed significant differences between the evaluation of the three punishment practices, F (2, 474) = 49.42, p  < .001, \({\hat{\upeta }}_{\mathrm{G}}^{2}\) = .09. Follow-up t -tests revealed that the retributive practice received significantly higher ratings than the general preventive practice, t (237) = 9.31, p  < .001, d  = 0.46, and the special preventive practice, t (237) = 2.58, p  = .010, d  = 0.14. However, the effect size of the latter was rather small. Furthermore, the special preventive practice received higher ratings than the general preventive practice, t (237) = 7.01, p  < .001, d  = 0.36.

Again, we directly compared teachers’ and students’ evaluations of the three punishment practices. As depicted in Fig.  1 (right panel), teachers and students differed substantially regarding their evaluations of the two preventive punishment practices. That is, both teachers and students rated the retributive practice in a comparable manner (i.e., both perceived it as relatively suitable). At the same time, the special preventive practice received the lowest appropriateness ratings from teachers, whereas students perceived this practice as relatively suitable (i.e., fair, just, and appropriate). Likewise, the general preventive practice yielded differences in that it received highest appropriateness ratings from teachers, but lowest ratings from students. Again, we tested whether teachers and students differed in their preferences for the three punishment practices (i.e., the group-level rank order) using a mixed model ANOVA with the three punishment practices (retributive practice, special preventive practice, and general preventive practice) as within-subjects factor and the sample (teachers and students) as between-subjects factor. This analysis again revealed a significant interaction of the punishment practice and the sample, F (2, 992) = 52.26, p  < .001, \({\hat{\upeta }}_{\mathrm{G}}^{2}\) = .05.

Research suggests that teachers have to deal with student misbehavior on a daily basis (Kulinna et al., 2006 ; Wheldall & Merrett, 1988 ). This is not only particularly challenging for teachers (Aloe et al., 2014 ; Brouwers & Tomic, 2000 ), but also threatens to lead to perceived injustice among students (Fan & Chan, 1999 ; Israelashvili, 1997 ). Correspondingly, it is vital to investigate and analyze teachers’ classroom intervention strategies to understand the factors enhancing students’ perceptions of injustice. One key dimension of punishment behavior reflects the underlying motives and goals of the punishment (Carlsmith et al., 2002 ; Gromet & Darley, 2009 ). This aspect of the teachers’ punishment is of particular interest, given that teachers and students are likely to differ in their relative endorsement of punishment goals and these differences may ultimately result in undesirable outcomes, such as a self-perpetuating cycle of student misconduct and teacher punishment that is perceived as unjust (Mooijman & Graham, 2018 ).

Herein, we examined the perspectives of both teachers and school students on the goals of punishment in a specific situation of student misbehavior. Specifically, we investigated the extent to which (pre-service and in-service) teachers endorse retribution (i.e., evening out the harm caused), special prevention (i.e., preventing recidivism of the offender), and general prevention (i.e., preventing imitation of others) as goals of (their) punishment. We therefore provided teachers with a scenario describing a student destroying the belongings of another student and asked them to indicate to what extent they endorse the three punishment goals in this situation. Furthermore, we measured teachers’ relative endorsement of punishment goals in a more indirect way, asking them to rate the appropriateness of different punishment practices that were perceived as primarily achieving either of the goals (as shown in a pretest). Importantly, students were asked to indicate their endorsement of the three punishment goals as a basis for a response to a structurally equivalent student misbehavior that was used to study teachers’ perspectives. Additionally, students rated how fair, appropriate, and just they perceived teachers’ punishment practices designed to achieve different goals. In total, we thus investigated teachers’ and students’ preferences for retribution, special prevention, and general prevention as punishment goals and whether these preferences are comparable.

As hypothesized, teachers indicated a general preference for general prevention and special prevention over retribution. This was particularly true for general prevention, whereas special prevention was only preferred over retribution in the direct endorsement measure of punishment goals. Students indicated a favorable evaluation of teachers’ punishment practice that was linked to retribution, especially when compared to a more general preventive practice. That is, evaluating teacher’s punishment practices that are perceived as achieving different goals, students rated the retributive practice more favorably than the general (and, to a lesser degree, special) preventive practices. Conversely, for the direct endorsement measure, students rated special prevention as the most endorsed goal of punishment. Notably, differences in students’ endorsement of the three punishment goals were relatively rather small in general, suggesting that students have no strong punishment goal preferences when asked directly (mirroring the literature on explicit support of punishment goals in adults; Applegate et al., 1996 ; Carlsmith, 2008 ).

In sum and most importantly, the present research provides the opportunity to directly compare teachers’ and students’ approaches on punishment given the same incident of misbehavior (although materials were adapted to the age of participants, as is discussed below). Analyses comparing students’ and teachers’ relative endorsement of punishment goals indeed revealed substantial differences between students’ and teachers’ punishment goal preferences, in particular for the endorsement of general prevention. Whereas general prevention was least endorsed by students both when asked to indicate their endorsement directly and when evaluating teachers’ punishment practices linked to different goals, it consistently received high support by teachers. This may be particularly problematic, given that the pursuit of general prevention as the goal of punishment may have undesirable consequences. In fact, research in organizational psychology has shown that an authority’s punishment for general preventive purposes is perceived as a signal of distrust and actually leads to a decrease in rule compliance by subordinates (Mooijman et al., 2017 ). Correspondingly, it could be suggested that this decrease in rule compliance is due to differing goals of people with different hierarchical positions. However, although the present research points to this hypothesis, future research is needed to illuminate this further, in particular given that one cannot necessarily generalize from leaders reacting to subordinate misbehavior in organizational teams to teachers reacting to student misbehavior in schools.

Interesting for the general punishment goal literature, in both teachers and students, we found notable inconsistencies between the direct endorsement of punishment goals and the evaluation of practices that were perceived as achieving these goals. For example, whereas special prevention was consistently of highest preference for both teachers and students when directly asking for their endorsement of the goals, the corresponding punishment practice received relatively low ratings. Furthermore, retribution received rather low direct endorsement scores, whereas the retributive punishment practice was evaluated particularly positively. This is in line with considerable research showing that individuals endorse other goals in the abstract than they support when translated to concrete punishment practices (Applegate et al., 1996 ). Once more, this also emphasizes that methodological considerations are crucial for the study of people’s endorsement of punishment goals (Twardawski et al., 2020b ).

The present results also have several practical implications for the treatment of misbehavior in schools. Given notable discrepancies between teachers’ endorsement of punishment goals and their support for corresponding punishment practices, one might encourage teachers and individuals involved in teacher education to reflect on the topic of punishment in the educational setting and the goals they ought to achieve when responding to misbehaving students. This is particularly important, given that teachers expressed a consistent preference for general prevention as the goal of their punishment, whereas students’ endorsement of this goal was rather low—especially for the general preventive punishment practice. However, students’ negative evaluation of the general preventive practice was arguably to be expected, as one key of actual punishment practices that are meant to prevent future misbehavior is the public display of the offender, the misbehavior, and the punishment (Carlsmith, 2006 ; Keller et al., 2010 ) and such a public reprimand has been found to be unacceptable for students (Elliott et al., 1986 ).

Then again, the consistencies between teachers’ and students’ punishment goal preferences when directly asked for their endorsement of the goals may be cause for optimism in that it should be possible in principle to respond to student misbehavior without triggering students’ perception of injustice—and even without giving up on the goal of general prevention in punishment. That is, agreement of teachers and students was higher when thinking about punishment (and its goals) in the abstract (i.e., the direct endorsement measure) as compared to the evaluation of concrete punishment practices ought to achieve these goals. In light of this finding, teachers may consider to explicitly discuss classroom policies in collaboration with their students to manage potentially emerging student misbehavior. Receiving students’ commitment to such policies based on an abstract support of general preventive punishment may decrease the likelihood of perceived injustice, in case the policy has to be applied to treat a concrete case of student misbehavior (however, see qualifying results from research on the Three Strikes Initiative; Applegate et al., 1996 ).

An alternative approach that may circumvent the problems arising from differences between students’ and teachers’ perspectives concerning rather punitive reactions to misbehavior (as examined in the present research) follows the principles of restorative justice (Bazemore, 1998 ; Braithwaite, 1998 ). This philosophy of dealing with misbehavior considers the perspectives of victims, offenders, and the community in which the offense occurred to assign a punishment. One key aspect of this approach is a face-to-face meeting involving all parties: the victim, the offender, and other community members (Wenzel et al., 2010 ). In this meeting, offender and victim present their perspectives on the misbehavior and, using a consensus decision-making approach, work out an appropriate punishment for the offender with participation from all parties. Potentially, such restorative justice procedures may resolve the otherwise existing differences in students’ and teachers’ views on an appropriate punishment. In fact, various schools have already introduced justice approaches inspired by restorative justice—such as peer mediation in the case of student conflict or school community conferencing—and although most programs are still in their infancy, there is first evidence for its success with decreasing rates of bullying between students and more positive teacher-student-relationships (Gregory et al., 2016 ).

However, such approaches also entail wide-ranging challenges (McCluskey et al., 2008 ). For example, the implementation of restorative justice processes requires deep changes in school climate and, therefore, takes several years to run smoothly (Gregory et al., 2016 ). Furthermore, not all misconducts can go through such comprehensive processes (Varnham, 2005 ). Therefore, it is nevertheless important to improve teachers’ ability to independently deal with student misbehavior, and to find punishments that are both appropriate for teachers and perceived as fair by students. The present findings may be helpful to achieve this.

Before concluding, potential limitations of the present research should be acknowledged. First off, the punishment practice evaluation measure, despite the additional insights if affords, does yield certain challenges. Specifically, the punishment practices we extracted from the pretest were perceived as primarily achieving one of the goals (while being equally severe). However, they still also achieved the other two goals to some extent. In fact, the practices may even differ on dimensions we did not consider (and test) in our pretest (e.g., reputational concerns among teachers). However, creating punishment practices that exclusively achieve one punishment goal but no others (while being parallel on any other dimension) may render the teacher responses somewhat artificial (at best), simply because every-day punishment often serves multiple goals at the same time (Gromet & Darley, 2009 ). Therefore, endorsement of these practices in our research cannot be interpreted as a direct measure of punishment goal preferences. Nonetheless, given the typically moderate correlations between endorsement of abstract punishment goals and preferred punishment practices (Crockett et al., 2014 ; Twardawski et al., 2020a ), it seemed vital to additionally examine preferences on this specific level, too.

Moreover, we used scenarios and comic strips to investigate teachers’ and students’ perspectives on punishment, respectively, rather than observing actual behavior in schools. Indeed, there is arguably an inherent difference between situations actually occurring in class and such hypothetical scenarios (Hughes & Huby, 2004 ; Schoenberg & Ravdal, 2000 ). Of note, in the present research, extensive care was taken to ensure that the material was suitable (e.g., by consulting teachers to evaluate and improve the material) and to increase the relevance and authenticity of the student misbehavior and the concrete punishment practices of the teachers used. Additionally, similar methodological approaches have been successfully used to investigate teachers’ evaluation and decision-making in other domains (Baudson & Preckel, 2013 ). Nonetheless, future research may consider studying actual student misbehavior and punishment practices by teachers in school settings using field observations (Klein, 2008 ; Klein et al., 1993 ; Lipshitz et al., 2001 ).

Further associated with the scenario and comic strip used, teachers and students were confronted with structurally equivalent descriptions of a student misbehavior. However, presentation of the scenario was adjusted to the sample: Teachers read a verbal description of the misbehavior, whereas the misbehavior was presented as a comic strip to students (i.e., to reduce the amount of text). Such an adjustment of material is typical for developmental psychological research comparing the perspectives of adults and children (e.g., McCrink et al., 2010 ; Powell et al., 2012 ). Importantly, several control measures on the perception of the misbehavior (rather than the reactions evaluated as main variables) show that teachers and students perceived the situation very similarly, despite its adaptation to different formats. Nevertheless, differences between teachers’ and students’ perspectives may, to some extent, also be a product of this adaptation process.

Relatedly, data from students were exclusively collected in the classroom during school time. By contrast, teachers were provided with the possibility to opt for answering a paper and pencil or online version of the questionnaire and may have answered the questionnaire outside their school environment. While a mixed-mode assessments (i.e., the combination of a variety of survey modes) is becoming increasingly popular and can already be considered common practice (e.g., Dumont et al., 2019 ; Hübner et al., 2017 ; von Keyserlingk et al., 2020 ), the context of study participation may have influenced responses and, thus, the results yielded. In line with this reasoning, recent literature shows that unsupervised web-based study participation is not strictly equivalent to other assessment modes; although biases introduced by web-based testing were generally small (Zinn et al., 2021 ).

Additionally, we only used one specific instance of student misbehavior (i.e., a student destroying the belongings of another student). Therefore, the results obtained here may be subject to unknown specifics of this scenario and the punishment practices offered (Twardawski et al., 2020b ). Indeed, it could be argued that teachers’ and students’ endorsement of punishment goals may be influenced by other aspects of the misbehavior not addressed herein, such as the magnitude of harm caused (Carlsmith, 2006 ). It is up to future research to replicate and extend the present findings to more diverse forms of student misbehavior. This research could, additionally, also make use of different forms of data collection, such as conducting interviews or collecting other more qualitative data (e.g., Penderi & Rekalidou, 2016 ). Likewise, we only collected student data from a very specific age group (children around the age of 10). Our theorizing herein is mostly concerned with the position in the school context (i.e., being a teacher vs. a student) rather than age. Consequently, we would not expect that age strongly determines individuals’ relative endorsement of punishment goals in school. However, this is rather speculative and past research reported age differences in evaluations of classroom intervention strategies in some domains (e.g., Bear & Fink, 1991 ). Hence, further research is needed to examine the role of age on students’ endorsement of punishment goals.

Lastly, it should be mentioned that, regarding the students’ view on the misbehavior and punishment, the results of the present research are limited to the role of an uninvolved observer. By contrast, in many situations of misbehavior, there are several other perspectives involved, such as from perpetrators or victims (Schmitt et al., 2005 ). Therefore, future work will need to examine the students’ perspective on misbehavior and a teacher’s response to it from different perspectives.

In conclusion, the present research is the first to directly compare teachers’ and students’ views on the purposes of punishment in the school context. In light of the findings and the observation that the approach, as a whole, is fruitful, other researchers are strongly encouraged to integrate all perspectives (i.e., the teachers’ and students’ views) on the psychological analysis of teaching and instruction. Finally, we hope the present findings contribute to the development of classroom intervention strategies that may reduce rather than enhance conflicts in student–teacher-interactions.

Availability of Data and Materials

All materials (including instructions and materials of a pretest study; all materials are translated from German to English), along with all data, analyses scripts, and supplementary analyses are available on the OSF:  https://osf.io/r5d8v/ .

Code Availability (Software Application or Custom Code)

All analyses code is made available on the OSF.

The names of the students in the scenario were chosen to be gender neutral.

To assess the degree to which the punishment practices served the three punishment goals, we provided participants ( N  = 122; convenience sample) of our pre-study with definitions of the goals retribution, special prevention, and general prevention. Participants then rated the degree to which several possible punishment practices achieve these three goals. Additionally, participants rated the severity of the punishment practices to ensure that practices would be comparable in severity (to rule out the common confound between punishment severity and punishment goals; Mooijman & Graham, 2018 ). As a result, we were able to extract three punishment practices (one for each punishment goal) that were perceived as primarily serving one of the goals but not the other two. At the same time, these practices were perceived as approximately equally severe. Full information on the pretest of the punishment practice evaluation measure (including instructions, materials, data, and analyses) can be found on the OSF.

We re-ran all analyses on students’ assessment of the teachers’ punishment practices (i.e., the punishment practice evaluation measure) with the appropriateness item only. This helps comparing students’ and teachers’ relative endorsement of punishment goals as assessed with the punishment practice evaluation measure more directly, given that teachers also provided appropriateness ratings. Importantly, these additional analyses yielded similar results to what we report in the following sections on the compound of the three items used to assess students’ evaluations. We report these additional analyses in the supplementary materials on the OSF.

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Twardawski, M., Hilbig, B.E. Comparing Teachers’ and Students’ Perspectives on the Treatment of Student Misbehavior. Soc Just Res 35 , 344–365 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11211-022-00399-y

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ORIGINAL RESEARCH article

Analysis of misbehaviors and satisfaction with school in secondary education according to student gender and teaching competence.

• 1 Faculty of Education Sciences, University of Almería, Almería, Spain
• 2 Health Research Center, University of Almería, Almería, Spain
• 3 Department of Physical Education and Sports Science, Autonomous University of Baja California, Ensenada, Mexico
• 4 Department of Didactic of Corporal Expression, Faculty of Education Sciences, Granada, Spain

Effective classroom management is a critical teaching skill and a key concern for educators. Disruptive behaviors disturb effective classroom management and can influence school satisfaction if the teacher does not have the competencies to control them. Two objectives were set in this work: to understand the differences that exist in school satisfaction, disruptive behaviors, and teaching competencies according to the gender of the students; and to analyze school satisfaction and disruptive student behaviors based on perceived teaching competence. A non-probabilistic and convenience sample selection process was employed, based on the subjects that we were able to access. 758 students participated (male = 45.8%) from seven public secondary schools in the Murcia Region (Spain). The age range was between 13 and 18 years ( M = 15.22; DT = 1.27). A questionnaire composed of the following scales was used: Competencies Evaluation Scale for Teachers in Physical Education, School Satisfaction and Disruptive Behaviors in Physical Education. Mixed Linear Models performed with the SPSS v.23 was used for statistical analyses. The results revealed statistically significant differences based on gender and physical education teaching competencies. In conclusion, the study highlights that physical education teacher skills influence disruptive behaviors in the classroom, and that this is also related to school satisfaction. Furthermore, it highlights that boys showed higher levels of negative behaviors than girls.

Introduction

Undisciplined behaviors in the classroom are a serious problem for the teaching and learning process during adolescence ( Medina and Reverte, 2019 ), and may have an impact on feelings regarding school satisfaction, the relationship with teachers or even on school failure ( Baños et al., 2017 ). These types of behaviors commonly occur in the Physical Education (PE) class, producing conflictive situations between peers (students) and even with the teacher himself/herself. It is therefore advisable to solve the problem in a rapid and effective fashion ( Müller et al., 2018 ). Faced with these situations, the competencies of the PE teaching staff play an important role ( Baños et al., 2017 ; Trigueros and Navarro, 2019 ; Granero-Gallegos et al., 2020 ); the way in which teachers design, organize and control their sessions can affect the students’ disruptive behaviors and class outcome.

As evidenced in research by authors such as Goyette et al. (2000) and Kulinna et al. (2006) , adolescents often show certain problematic behaviors in the classroom, such as idleness, disrespect, talking out of turn and/or avoiding or skipping classes, which have a negative impact on the learning environment. Even aggressive behaviors can sometimes arise in PE classes, such as bullying and peer fighting ( Weiss et al., 2008 ). Studies looking at inappropriate behaviors in PE have demonstrated that the students’ negative behavior not only affects the quality of teaching, but also interferes with peer learning ( Kulinna et al., 2006 ; Cothran et al., 2009 ). Moreover, disruptive behaviors are more common at the secondary school level than in primary education classes, as evidenced by various works (e.g., Kulinna et al., 2006 ; Cothran and Kulinna, 2007 ). Adolescence, in particular, is characterized by a rebellious, non-conformist stage, a fight against authority, irresponsibility and low personal self-control. At this age, a disengagement with the school can occur, with a decreased willingness to comply with the rules and with expected behavior ( Fredericks et al., 2004 ).

In addition, gender has been used to analyze these behaviors, both in students and in teachers. Specifically, the female gender (both teachers and students) are those who report the highest incidence of inappropriate behaviors ( Kulinna et al., 2006 ), with females being the ones likely to receive this negativity ( Cothran and Kulinna, 2007 ). There are several studies that have found higher levels of inappropriate behaviors among boys than among girls ( Beaman et al., 2006 ; Kulinna et al., 2006 ; Cothran and Kulinna, 2007 ; Driessen, 2011 ). Boys tend to be more boisterous and disruptive with their peers ( Glock and Kleen, 2017 ) whereas girls tend to be more proactive and less problematic ( Driessen, 2011 ), albeit with more shy and introverted behaviors ( Glock and Kleen, 2017 ). Furthermore, boys are often more influenced by their peers than girls are, resulting in higher levels of truancy, punishments and challenging behaviors that teachers have to face ( Hadjar and Buchmann, 2016 ; Geven et al., 2017 ). Other authors (i.e., Baños et al., 2018 ) found that students claimed to have more aggressive behaviors during PE sessions.

Among the attributions made by the students regarding inappropriate behaviors when doing PE, the boredom they experience stands out, finding the classes monotonous, as well as expressing a certain discontent with the teacher. However, it should be noted that these are students with usually disruptive behaviors ( Cothran and Kulinna, 2007 ). In relation to the teachers, some recent studies have linked disruptive behaviors to teacher competence as perceived by the students ( Baños et al., 2019 ; Granero-Gallegos et al., 2019 ; Granero-Gallegos et al., 2020 ). This research related the high levels of teaching competencies with low levels of negative behavior in PE classes although the study did not cover the effect of the teaching staff’s competence.

In addition, the scientific literature has stated that school satisfaction reduces student misbehavior, making it advisable to develop social and emotional skills, cognitive ability, behavioral and moral competencies, the recognition of positive behavior, belief in the future and prosocial norms ( Sun, 2016 ). In contrast, ineffective classroom management causes disarray and interruptions produced by a few adolescents, affecting both the anxiety and stress of their peers and that of the teachers ( Cothran et al., 2009 ).

In this way, the work of PE teachers plays a relevant part in developing good classroom behaviors. Depending on the skills that the teachers develop, they may increase or decrease negative behaviors ( Rasmussen et al., 2014 ). Thus, teachers who have a wide repertoire of teaching styles, and who know how to adapt them to different environments and learning content, manage to improve the students’ satisfaction with the school ( Invernizzi et al., 2019 ); this is also influenced by the orientations toward learning ( Agbuga et al., 2010 ).

Regarding the study of satisfaction, Diener’s theory of subjective well-being ( Diener, 2009 ) could be of great help. This theory consists of two dimensions, the cognitive dimension and the affective dimension. The cognitive dimension relates to the evaluative judgments of global satisfaction with life and its specific areas, while the affective dimension is identified with emotions and attachments such as fun, boredom and concern ( Diener and Emmons, 1985 ). In this vein, Baena-Extremera and Granero-Gallegos (2015) highlight the importance of the student being satisfied and at ease in school. An adolescent who is satisfied with the school is associated with higher levels of life satisfaction ( Scharenberg, 2016 ), with an adequate school climate managed by the teacher ( Varela et al., 2018 ) and with better social relationships among his/her peers ( Persson et al., 2016 ). However, a student who gets bored at school decreases the efficiency of any learning style ( Ahmed et al., 2013 ). This is associated with higher school dropout rates ( Takakura et al., 2010 ), and with low teacher competencies ( Sun, 2016 ), which in turn relates to greater disruptive behavior ( Baños et al., 2019 ).

Scientific evidence has demonstrated the impact of negative behaviors and student satisfaction on both the learning and teaching processes. However, there is not enough literature that links the skills of the PE teacher with either student satisfaction with the school or with classroom misbehavior. Therefore, this work sets out two important objectives: (1) to understand the differences that exist in terms of school satisfaction, disruptive behaviors and teaching competencies according to the gender of the students; and (2) to analyze school satisfaction and disruptive student behaviors based on perceived teaching competence. From a review of the literature, the following hypotheses are made:

(1) There will be a significant and positive correlation between school satisfaction, disruptive student behaviors and the perceived competencies of the PE teacher; however, there will be a significant and negative correlation between boredom with school, disruptive student behaviors, and the perceived competencies of the PE teacher.

(2) Boys will show more negative behaviors than girls although girls will score higher in school satisfaction and in the perception of teaching competencies.

(3) Students who perceive that PE teachers are competent will show less disruptive behavior and greater school satisfaction.

Materials and Methods

Participants.

The design of this cross-sectional study was observational and descriptive selecting a non-probabilistic convenience sample according to the people that could be accessed from public high schools located in areas of medium socioeconomic level (from Murcia and Cartagena cities). No educational center is included in the program of Teaching Compensatory, program that allocates specific, material and human resources to guarantee access, permanence and promotion in the educational system for socially disadvantaged students. A total of 758 students participated (males = 45.8%) from seven public secondary schools in the Murcia region of Spain (94% Spanish, Caucasian; 4% Arab origin; 1% East European, Caucasian; 1% South American). All students of these educational centers from 2 nd , 3 rd , 4 th of ESO and 1 st of Baccalaureate (PE is also subject compulsory) were requested to participate in this research. Incomplete answers due to errors or omissions in their responses (28) were dismissed for analysis and 34 students did not obtain parental consent to participate in this investigation. The age range was between 13 and 18 years ( M = 15.22; SD = 1.27); the average age for the boys was 15.2 ( SD = 1.29) and for the girls was 15.18 ( SD = 1.26). The distribution in terms of course levels was as follows: 45.3% at ESO 2 nd level; 20.1% at ESO 3 rd level; 27.2% at ESO 4 th level; and 7.5% in the 1 st year of Baccalaureate. As PE is a compulsory subject for all students of the 1 st year of Baccalaureate, these students were also included in this research. There were no statistically significant differences in gender × age between the included participants ( p = 0.501) (see Table 1 ).

Table 1. Distribution of the sample (n) according to Gender × Age ( p = 0.501).

Instruments

To carry out this investigation, the next instruments have been used.

Teaching Competence

The Spanish version of the Competencies Evaluation Scale for Teachers in Physical Education (ETCS-PE) by Baena-Extremera et al. (2015) was used, adapted from the original Evaluation of Teaching Competencies Scale by Catano and Harvey (2011) . It consists of eight items that measure the students’ perception of teacher effectiveness. A seven-point Likert scale ranging from low (1, 2), medium (3, 4, 5), and high (6, 7) was used for the responses. The internal consistency indices were: Cronbach alpha (α) = 0.86; composite reliability = 0.86; Average Variance Extracted (AVE) = 0.59.

School Satisfaction

The Spanish version of the Intrinsic Satisfaction Classroom Questionnaire (ISC) by Castillo et al. (2001) was used, adapted from the original Intrinsic Satisfaction Classroom Scale by Nicholls et al. (1985) , Nicholls (1989) , and Duda and Nicholls (1992) . It consists of eight items that measure the degree of school satisfaction using two subscales that measure satisfaction/fun (five items) and boredom with school (three items). For the responses, a Likert scale ranging from 1 ( totally disagree ) and 5 ( totally agree ) was used. The internal consistency indices were: satisfaction/fun α = 0.76, composite reliability = 0.76, AVE = 0.54; boredom , α = 0.70; Composite reliability = 0.72; AVE = 0.52.

Disruptive Behaviors in Physical Education

The Disruptive Conduct in Physical Education Questionnaire (CCDEF) by Granero-Gallegos and Baena-Extremera (2016) was used, which is the Spanish version of the original Physical Education Classroom Instrument (PECI) by Krech et al. (2010) . This version consists of 17 items that measure disruptive behaviors in PE students in five subscales: (a) Aggressive (2 items), (b) Low engagement or irresponsibility (4 items), (c) Fails to follow directions (4 items), (d) Distracts or disturbs others (4 items), and (e) Poor self-management (3 items). A five-point Likert scale ranging from 1 ( never) to 5 ( always) was used for the responses. The internal consistency indices were: aggressive ,α = 0.58, composite reliability = 0.81, AVE = 0.54; low engagement or irresponsibility , α = 0.73, composite reliability = 0.84, AVE = 0.74; fails to follow directions , α = 0.77, composite reliability = 0.94, AVE = 0.65; distracts or disturbs others , α = 0.81, composite reliability = 0.92, AVE = 0.80; poor self-management , α = 0.84, composite reliability = 0.96, AVE = 0.92. Given the low index achieved by Cronbach’s alpha, and that the AGR subscale consists of only two items, this factor was ignored in the analyses performed.

Permission to carry out the work was obtained from the competent bodies, be they at the secondary schools or the university. Parents and adolescents were informed about the protocol and the study’s subject matter. Informed consent by both was an indispensable requirement to participate in the research. The tools measuring the different variables were administered in the classroom by the researchers themselves, without the teacher present. All participants were informed of the study objective, the voluntary and confidential nature of the responses and the data handling, as well as their rights as participants under the Helsinki Declaration (2008) . This research has been approved by the Ethics Committee of the University of Murcia (REF-45-20/01/2016).

The questionnaires where completed in the classroom in about 25–30 min with the same researcher always present who expressed the possibility of consulting him about any doubts during the process, respecting the Helsinki Declaration (2008) .

Data Analysis

The descriptive statistics of the items, the correlations and the internal consistency of each subscale were calculated, as well as the asymmetry and kurtosis with values close to 0 and <2.0. It is important to note that the data from this work were collected in schools so that the students could be nested based on the center, course and/or class, that is, violating the independence of observations principle. Therefore, the Mixed Linear Models analysis (MLM) were conducted, bearing in mind the individual characteristic variables of the participants and context variables. The dependent variables were the different ETCS-PE, ISC and CCDEF subscales, and the grouping or level of the school was considered a random effect, as were the student courses. The analyses were performed using the SPSS 23.0 MIXED procedure with the Restricted Maximum Likelihood Estimation Method. The Logarithm of Likelihood -2 (-2LL) ( Pardo et al., 2007 ) was used to estimate the effects of the school and course variable on each estimated model. Different models were tested according to the different combinations of school levels and course with each of the dependent variables, including a null model. The “school” variable proved statistically significant ( p < 0.05) in all cases, so it was estimated that the context variable “school” had an effect on each model. In addition, the intraclass correlation coefficient (ICC) was calculated for each of the compared variables. The results showed that the variance explained was greater than 6.14% in all cases, which allows us to say that a percentage of the differences between the dependent variables can be attributed to the school. The estimation method used was the restricted maximum likelihood estimation method. In light of the above, gender differences in relation to the various ETCS-PE, ISC and CCDEF subscales were calculated, in this case, the independent variable (mixed model factors) was the gender of the students. To calculate the differences according to teaching competence, the responses of this scale were categorized into three groups, low (responses 1 and 2 on the Likert scale), medium (responses 3, 4, and 5) and high (responses 6 and 7). The calculation of the differences between the three categorized groups of teaching competence in relation to satisfaction and boredom with school and disruptive behaviors was also conducted and, in this case, the independent variable (mixed model factors) was the teaching competence categorization.

Additionally, the factorial structure of each instrument was evaluated with confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) using the Maximum Likelihood method with the bootstrapping procedure, since the Mardia coefficient was high in each of the scales (16.71 in ETCS-PE; 12.51 in ISC and 292.55 in CCDEF). The different analyses were performed using the SPSS v.23 and AMOS v.22 statistical packages.

Psychometric Properties of the Instruments

Based on recommendations that discourage the use of a single overall model-fit measure ( Bentler, 2007 ), each model was assessed using a combination of absolute and relative fit indices. The chi-squared ratio (χ 2 ) and the degrees of freedom (df) (χ 2 /df), the comparative fit index (CFI), the Tucker-Lewis index (TLI) the incremental fit index (IFI), the root mean square error of approximation (RMSEA) with its confidence interval (CI 90%) and the Standardized Root Mean Square Residual (SRMR) were calculated. In the (χ 2 /df) ratio, values < 2.0 are considered very good model fit indicators ( Tabachnick and Fidell, 2007 ), although values < 5.0 are considered acceptable ( Hu and Bentler, 1999 ). According to Hu and Bentler (1999) , for the incremental indices (CFI, IFI, and TLI), values ≥ 0.95 are considered to indicate a good fit, although values of ≥ 0.90 are considered acceptable. These same authors consider that, for RMSEA, a value of ≤ 0.06 is considered to indicate a good fit, while for the RMSR values ≤ 0.08 are considered acceptable. As can be observed in Table 2 , the different values for the goodness-of-fit indices of each instrument (ETCS-PE, ISC, and CCDEF) are acceptable.

Table 2. The goodness of fit index of the models.

Descriptive and Correlation Analysis

Table 3 shows that teaching competence presented moderately high average values, that for the ISC, the average values were higher for bored than for satisfaction with school , and that for disruptive behaviors, the average values were moderately low, oscillating between low engagement or irresponsibility and poor self-management , which presented the lowest average.

Table 3. Descriptives and correlations of the ECTS-PE, ISC, and CCDEF subscales.

The correlations show that teaching competence only presented positive, moderate, and statistically significant values for satisfaction with school . Disruptive behaviors presented high, positive and statistically significant correlations between the same CCDEF subscales although positive correlations with more moderate values were also found between the different disruptive and boredom with school subscales (see Table 3 ).

Differences According to the Gender Variable

The differences were analyzed between the various subscales of teacher competence, school satisfaction and disruptive behaviors according to the gender variable. As shown in Table 4 , the analyses indicate that there are statistically significant differences in the boredom with school and the four CCDEF subscales, and that, in all of them, the average values are higher for boys.

Table 4. Gender differences based on the ETCS-PE, ISC, and CCDEF subscales according to the mixed regression model.

Differences According to Teaching Competence

In order to check the differences in the satisfaction with school and the disruptive behaviors subscales, according to the three teaching competence groups (low, medium, and high), the analysis performed indicates that the p -value associated with the comparative statistical tests of marginal averages has been calculated and corrected for multiple comparisons using SIDAK ( Table 5 ).

Table 5. Differences in teaching competence (ETCS-PE) based on the ISC and CCDEF subscales according to the mixed regression model.

Table 5 shows that there are statistically significant differences in all the subscales studied. In the case of satisfaction with school, the highest averages correspond to the high teaching competence group, whereas for boredom with school and the four CCDEF subscales, the highest average values are presented by the low teaching competence group.

Regarding satisfaction with school and boredom with school, comparison tests show statistically significant differences between low and high teaching competence and between those of medium and high teaching competence, corrected using SIDAK (see Table 5 ). In the cases of disruptive behaviors, for low engagement or irresponsibility and fails to follow directions, statistically significant differences are notable between medium and high teaching competence; in the case of the Distracts or disturbs others subscale, statistically significant differences were found between high teaching competence and the other two groups, while in poor self-management, they were only found between low and high teaching competence.

This study set out two objectives: to understand the differences that exist in school satisfaction, disruptive behaviors and teaching competencies according to the gender of the students; and to analyze school satisfaction and disruptive behaviors based on teaching competence.

The results of this work relate teaching competence, satisfaction with school and inappropriate behaviors in the classroom. As in other studies (e.g., Kulinna et al., 2006 ; Cothran and Kulinna, 2007 ), the children presented higher levels of disruptive behavior. These results might be due to the boredom experienced by adolescents coming from a lack of attachment to social institutions and from disruptive behaviors at school ( Feinberg et al., 2013 ; Granero-Gallegos et al., 2020 ). It is essential that students do not experience boredom in school, given that it is related to school violence, and this in turn can contribute to reduced academic performance, mental health and general well-being of the students ( Huebner et al., 2014 ; Olweus and Breivik, 2014 ). In addition, boredom has been associated with high-risk behaviors such as drinking, drug use, joyriding and criminal activity ( Yang and Yoh, 2005 ; Wegner and Flisher, 2009 ). Therefore, it is important that teachers work on their social skills with students and acquire sufficient competency as educators so that, amongst other things, both feel satisfied in classes ( Allen et al., 2015 ; Trigueros and Navarro, 2019 ). Accordingly, this confirms Hypothesis 1.

If one looks at the mixed regression model, no significant differences were found in the teacher competence and school satisfaction variables based on gender. However, significant differences were found in the boredom with school, low engagement or irresponsibility, fails to follow directions, distracts or disturbs others and poor self-management variables, with boys presenting higher values than girls. These results are similar to those obtained in previous studies (e.g., Beaman et al., 2006 ; Kulinna et al., 2006 ; Cothran and Kulinna, 2007 ; Driessen, 2011 ), in which higher levels of disruptive behavior were also found in boys. They may be due to boys being more defiant with the teacher and more competitive with their peers, seeking to get the attention of the girls. In addition, it has been observed that males tend to engage in louder and more intentional behaviors to distract their peers in class ( Glock and Kleen, 2017 ). Also, a possible cause for the increased level of negative behaviors has been linked to low emotional support from the teacher ( Shin and Ryan, 2017 ). All this can be the basis for proposing more comprehensive teacher training, not only at the technical level, but also in the management of emotions, both in the initial training and in the continuous workplace training. In contrast, the girls presented more positive and less problematic behaviors, as was the case in other studies (e.g., Driessen, 2011 ). This may be because girls tend to demonstrate more introverted behavior, being uninvolved, shy and avoiding working as a group to give their opinion on a topic ( Glock and Kleen, 2017 ). Therefore, this does not confirm Hypothesis 2 in its entirety.

The model analyzed based on teacher competencies found that when students perceived PE teachers as being competent, they felt more satisfied with the school, less bored and that their disruptive behavior level fell. Conversely, when students perceived their teachers as being incompetent, they became more bored and inappropriate behaviors increased. Similar results were found in the study by Baños et al. (2019) , which was conducted in the same country as our work. These results suggest that the way teachers interact with their students affects classroom behavior ( Ryan et al., 2015 ). This highlights the importance of PE teachers acquiring a great deal of skills to control and manage the sessions, creating a proactive environment among students, thus decreasing the likelihood of bad behaviors ( Shin and Ryan, 2014 ; Fortuin et al., 2015 ). However, teachers reporting high levels of concern regarding how to effectively manage discipline issues in the classroom are common ( Evertson and Weinstein, 2006 ; Tsouloupas et al., 2010 ) as they feel incompetent in the face of certain situations and this can be related to academic failure ( Jurado-de-los-Santos and Tejada-Fernández, 2019 ). The inability to prevent and control student misbehavior is one of the main generators of teacher stress and anxiety, resulting in teachers burning out and increasing the likelihood of student truancy – with all the expenses that this involves for the educational system in terms of having to find substitute teachers ( Tsouloupas et al., 2010 ; Ervasti et al., 2011 ). Therefore, this confirms Hypothesis 3.

PE teachers affirm that they find it more difficult to manage the boys’ behavior ( Jackson and Smith, 2000 ). These higher management issues may be due to the fact that teachers assess the temperament and educational competence of boys more negatively than those of girls ( Mullola et al., 2012 ) and that boys more frequently show emotional opposition behaviors than girls do ( McClowry et al., 2013 ). These differential behaviors in students and the teachers’ perceptions are reflected in less intimate and more conflictive relationships between teachers and boys ( Spilt et al., 2012 ). As a result, male students receive more reprimands ( Beaman et al., 2006 ) than female students, making it harder to manage the boys’ behavior ( McClowry et al., 2013 ). This implies less effective classroom management with respect to males, as research has emphasized the importance of positive relationships between the teachers and the students to promote good classroom management ( Marzano and Marzano, 2003 ). Therefore, teacher training is needed to better support trust and good management in the classroom.

The results obtained from this study identify males as having higher levels of inappropriate behaviors and the importance of students perceiving their teachers as being competent, that teachers have a command of the pedagogical content ( Voss et al., 2011 ) and knowledge of classroom management techniques ( Emmer and Stough, 2001 ) so that they can help reduce misbehavior in PE. Therefore, it is essential that adolescents perceive the PE teacher as competent, providing emotional support to his/her students, and that he/she continues to train in areas such as conflict resolution in the classroom, didactics and teacher pedagogy.

From this study, some recommendations can be made to bring, both to the classroom and to school. In general, the creation or strengthening of classrooms for school coexistence that improves the reflection, help, and accompaniment by other selected students can be recommended; it would be a program based on responsibility and without punishments or sanctions, and contribute to the resolution of conflicts in a positive way. By law, all educational centers must have a School Coexistence Plan, which must be implemented. More particularly, it is possible to focus on approaches that imply an enhancement of the motivation among students, especially in boys. Also, the enhancement of teaching competence in several topics (e.g., communication, work awareness, individual consideration of the student, problem-solving, social awareness, etc.), although the educational administration should supply teachers continuous training to improve social skills and capacity to solve conflicts among students.

Limitations and Strengths

The notable strengths of this work are the sample size and the theme, which can contribute to remedying one of the main problems found on a day-by-day basis in secondary schools. However, despite the novelty and interest of the topic and the results provided in this study such as the relationship between teaching competence and disruptive behaviors, as well as the implications this might have at the pedagogical and teacher-training level, certain limitations should be taken into account. The sample is composed of secondary school students from a single autonomous region and, in addition, no probabilistic sample design was carried out, so the results cannot be generalized and the method used does not allow to deeper into the disruptive causes in the classroom. Further studies should be performed in which other research designs are proposed, such as experimental studies with intervention programs to reduce disruptive behaviors in the classroom, and which consider other variables related to teacher, or mixed quantitative and qualitative research designs could be proposed, focusing on all subjects, not just PE. Some of these studies could also include private schools and public schools located in different socioeconomic level areas. On the other hand, it would also be convenient to perform longitudinal researches, with various data collections, in which the effectiveness of coexistence programs is valued.

Data Availability Statement

The datasets generated for this study are available on request to the corresponding author.

Ethics Statement

The studies involving human participants were reviewed and approved by REF-45-20/01/2016. Written informed consent to participate in this study was provided by the participants’ legal guardian/next of kin.

Author Contributions

AG-G, RB, and AB-E conceived the hypothesis of this study. RB, AB-E, and MM-M participated in data collection. RB and AG-G analyzed the data. AG-G, AB-E, and MM-M wrote the manuscript with the most significant input from AB-E. All authors contributed to data interpretation of statistical analysis and read and approved the final manuscript.

Conflict of Interest

The authors declare that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest.

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Keywords : physical education, disruptive behavior, indiscipline, high school, satisfaction

Citation: Granero-Gallegos A, Baños R, Baena-Extremera A and Martínez-Molina M (2020) Analysis of Misbehaviors and Satisfaction With School in Secondary Education According to Student Gender and Teaching Competence. Front. Psychol. 11:63. doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2020.00063

Received: 12 November 2019; Accepted: 10 January 2020; Published: 28 January 2020.

Reviewed by:

Copyright © 2020 Granero-Gallegos, Baños, Baena-Extremera and Martínez-Molina. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY) . The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) and the copyright owner(s) are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

*Correspondence: Raúl Baños, [email protected]

Disclaimer: All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article or claim that may be made by its manufacturer is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.

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A Meta-Analysis: Student Misbehaviors That Affect Classroom Management

Research on student misbehaviors in classroom have focused on the identification of most frequent misbehaviors and individual practices used by the teachers. However there is still a significant gap about the demographic and other factors that affect teachers’ perceptions of misbehaviors in classrooms. This meta-analysis reviewed the literature in Turkey on student misbehaviors from the views of teachers and demographic factors in theses and published articles between 2000-2012. The sample included 3648 teachers gathered from 16 studies. The results highlight that task avoidance, constant talking with classmates, verbal hostility towards peers and teacher, indifference to study subject during classes, damaging school stuff, and coming late are the most frequent student misbehavior types reported by teachers. Results showed a small relation between perceived student misbehavior and teachers’ teaching field, teacher seniority, educational background of teachers, and number of students in classroom. Gender was not determined as a statistically significant variable in determining teachers’ perceptions of student misbehavior. Practical implications for future research and practices are discussed.

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• Published: 28 September 2023

Handling students’ misbehaviors in crowded classrooms: the nursing faculty members’ experiences

• Shahin Salarvand   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0002-3326-1624 1 ,
• Reyhaneh Niknejad   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0002-9610-3295 2 &
• Razak M. Gyasi 3 , 4  

BMC Medical Education volume  23 , Article number:  709 ( 2023 ) Cite this article

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Introduction

The ability of teachers to organize classes and manage the behavior of their students is critical in achieving positive educational outcomes. The aim of this study was to explain the experiences of nursing faculty members in managing disruptive behaviors in the classroom.

The study adopted descriptive explanatory qualitative study design and provided an avenue to explain the experiences of nursing faculty members in managing disruptive behavior in the classroom Participants were included via the purposive sampling. In-depth and semi-structured interviews were used to collect data. The content analysis presented by Graneheim and Lundman was used to analyze the data. The present study utilized four strength criteria, including credibility, confirmability, transferability, and dependability.

The finding were presented using five themes that emerged from 350 open codes, including managing disruptive behavior in the classroom, guiding the disruptive student, trying to increase learning, and making the class more interesting, setting the rules and regulations of the class with sub-categories.

Conclusions

Participants cited strategies that they enabled to understand the cause of misbehavior and implement strategies to modify students’ misbehaviors by creating a safe and healthy climate to nurture effective learning by students.

Peer Review reports

The main goal of education is to train students to be good citizens, transform the society in which they live, and contribute to building a cleaner, more sustainable community [ 1 ]. A desirable academic environment should provide learning as a core subject and empower students to discover the appropriate value system that can guide them in self-awareness and developing a sense of national and global consciousness [ 2 ]. The classroom is a social organization for education, and the presence of order is very instructive to enhancing the effectiveness and efficiency of the teacher’s teaching. A teacher who can effectively manage the classroom creates a suitable learning environment for students [ 3 ]. To achieve teaching and learning goals, classroom management becomes essential [ 4 ]. If a teacher cannot manage his/her classroom using multiple appropriate techniques, his/her teaching process may not be effective [ 3 ].

Given that behavior is one of the social aspects of the classroom environment of significant importance [ 5 ], the frequency and prevalence of educational misbehavior is a major problem in university classrooms, and its magnitude has increased dramatically over the past two decades [ 6 ]. Due to the high prevalence of educational misbehavior among students in crowded classrooms, identifying the types and the prevalence of educational misbehavior should be considered by educational authorities and faculty members in the universities [ 6 ]. In this study, disruptive classroom behavior means indiscipline, misbehavior, and lack of attention that can disrupt the learning process. These student’s misbehaviors can have far-reaching detrimental effects on the experience and emotional state of teachers and students, hinder the achievement of teaching goals, and reduce the overall effectiveness of learning for all of class [ 7 , 8 ]. Classroom management is a term that scholars use to describe how to ensure that the teaching process in the classroom runs smoothly, even when students behave in a disruptive manner. This term refers to preventing disruptive behaviors, which is likely one of the most challenging aspects of teaching for many teachers [ 3 ]. For some teachers, it is problematic and intolerable to maintain an orderly and productive learning environment in the classroom [ 4 ]. These challenges may cause teachers to leave the profession [ 9 ]. The costs of disruptive classroom behaviors can be accounted for in terms of negative impacts on student learning, school climate, and teacher well-being [ 10 , 11 ]. As such, preventing, controlling, and reducing disruptive behaviors are critical skills for anyone hoping to teach effectively in face-to-face and one-to-many teaching situations. Competence in establishing and maintaining order, involving students, and gaining their trust, respect, and cooperation are essential aspects of classroom management [ 7 ]. This, in turn, is a necessary topic in educational research [ 12 ].

Classroom management can be defined as a set of techniques and activities for creating and maintaining an effective learning environment that provides a quality training climate, improves class working conditions, and eliminates any distractions that may arise [ 13 ]. Teachers who engage in effective classroom management practices utilize a range of strategies to increase appropriate behavior and decrease inappropriate behavior which varies based on the complexity and severity of the behavior [ 14 , 15 ]. These strategies include maximizing structure, setting and reinforcing expectations, involving students, and recognizing appropriate and responding to inappropriate behavior [ 16 ]. Lacking these skills, teachers often struggle to maintain order and spend more time managing misbehavior than teaching [ 17 ]. Therefore, the development of classroom management skills is becoming increasingly critical [ 18 ].

Unfortunately, although positive classroom management skills are necessary to maximize students’ academic and social achievement, many teachers have indicated that behavior management is a skill they are least prepared for doing it [ 19 , 20 ]. A review of the literature shows that having skills in classroom management is a concern for teachers that should be considered [ 21 , 22 , 23 , 24 ]. As mentioned above, worse still, when teachers are not well-prepared to manage a classroom, they are likely to be dissatisfied with their job and leave the profession [ 25 ]. Of course, teachers usually have their own classroom management strategies for dealing with student misbehavior [ 26 ]. Furthermore, classroom management approaches may be contextual or culturally different, but these approaches are more likely to be dependent on local circumstances than on cultures [ 27 ]. In order to reduce this misbehavior, suitable disciplinary preventive measures based on culture and important measures for teaching and controlling the students’ behavior in the classroom are necessary [ 6 ]. In this study, the management of disruptive behavior has been studied in a face-to-face/in-person classroom and, a crowded class means a class with 30 to 50 students [ 26 ]. We conducted this study in nursing faculties. Due to the nursing shortage and the high recruitment demand in the nursing profession in Iran, the classes in nursing schools are among the most crowded classrooms. In addition, the first and second authors are nursing educators. They are interested in and familiar with the study context. Several reviews and research studies have focused on classroom management in Iran [ 3 , 28 , 29 , 30 , 31 , 32 ] However, these studies have not used qualitative approaches to provide rich insights on a specific subject. To our knowledge, this is the first original study in this field to unearth the experiences of faculty members in managing disruptive behavior in the classroom. This study employed a qualitative approach and content analysis to understand the experiences of teachers. One of the consequences of qualitative research is the gathering of information in areas where knowledge and/or a deep understanding of people’s experiences are insufficient [ 33 ]. Therefore, our study adopted a naturalistic paradigm. Furthermore, the identification of these behaviors significantly influences the learning-teaching process and provides an important picture of the way in which such behaviors are dealt with and reflected upon by the teachers [ 6 ]. The content analysis will show how researchers conceptualized the possible responses of teachers, which can play an important role in classroom management and student discipline. This study aimed to explain the experiences of nursing faculty members in managing disruptive behaviors in the classroom.

Study design and sampling techniques

This is explanatory qualitative research using a content analysis approach for data analysis. This study was conducted at the Lorestan University of Medical Sciences as a western province of Iran, which includes four nursing faculties in four different cities. The main faculty is placed in Khorramabad. In sum, these nursing faculties have 46 nursing faculty members. Participants were recruited by purposive sampling according eligibility criteria. The participants were nursing faculty members/teachers and had work experience of at least five years. The sampling was ended after achieving data saturation.

Data collection

Data were collected from 1 July to 31 October 2022 using face-to-face semi-structured in-depth interviews. Data saturation was achieved by 11 participants with 15 interviews. The interviewer(SS) established a relationship prior to study commencement. She is working in the same nursing faculty. She explained her personal goals and reasons for doing the research to the participants. The interviews were conducted in a calm and quiet environment such as an office room/workspace/free space of the faculty that were convenient to the participants. The informed consent form was completed by all participants before the interviews. Interviews averagely lasted 30 to 90 min. Upon the agreement of the interviewees, the interviews were audio-recorded. The extraction of primary codes and interviews were conducted simultaneously. Thus, the next interview was conducted after analyzing the previous interviews and extracting the primary codes. During the interview, several open questions in the collection of information were applied. The main question was “What are your experiences in counter with the students’ misbehaviors in your classroom management? How do you manage students’ misbehaviors/disruption in your classroom?”. Respondents were questioned for further details, questions were asked to obtain rich and in-depth information (Table  1 ).

Face-to-face interviews with participants were conducted by the first author. It is worth noting that interviews were conducted in Persian/Farsi language given that the study was carried out in the Iranian context. The transcripts were later translated to English. The second author (RN) had an interest in the research subject and transcribed the interviews verbatim. Transcription was performed alongside data collection. That is, the participant’s recorded statements were played repeatedly and transcribed verbatim after each interview. The analysis process was conducted by The first author (S.S.).

The first author(SS) is an experienced researcher and a nursing faculty member and she worked on several qualitative content analysis as the main author and has a Ph.D. degree in nursing education. The second author(RN) is an administrator in the community health nursing research center and holds an MSc degree in operating room Nursing. The third author (RMG) is a Medical Gerontologist and senior scientist whose research focuses sub-Saharan Africa and other low- and middle-income countries.

Data strength

The four criteria proposed by Lincoln and Guba [ 33 ], including dependability, transferability, confirmability, and credibility, were applied to ensure the rigor of the study. To obtain credibility; the extracted codes were sent to the study participants. Their confirmation indicated the validity of the codes and ensured that the data analyst understood the participants’ experiences correctly (member check). In addition, peer check was applied, where the results and extracted codes were shared with other qualitative research experts for extensive review and validation (MS.M) (peer check) and the findings were revised based on the expert review and the comments provided. The interviews and primary data analysis duration were prolonged for five months. This prolonged engagement was crucial to allow the researchers to be immersed deeply in the site/study context in order to build trust with the participants and gain a deep understanding of the culture [ 34 ]. In addition, the researcher(SS), who conducted interviews and primary data analysis, put aside her preconceived notions, experiences, and thoughts about the subject (bracketing) and avoided reviewing the literature before collecting data to avoid researcher’s bias during the interviews and data analysis. In the present study, crucially, triangulation occurred at the level of the researcher and, Investigator triangulation, so that each team member presented different comments and we achieved an integrated perspective. To ensure confirmability, researchers applied bracketing and documented the stages of the study in detail to enable an audit trail. To ensure dependability, two researchers were involved in the data analysis process (SS and RMG). In addition, the coding process was revised by the second author (RN). We asked the two external experienced qualitative research experts to revise and categorize the coding (MS.M and NB). Given this study was conducted in a certain discipline and geographic area with a specific culture. Since in qualitative studies, there is no definite “truth”. In general, we were keenly interested an in-depth understanding of a specific issue and in showing different perspectives rather than a singular truth and generalization [ 35 ]. Although we tried to increase the generalizability of the findings by implementing rigor components, in qualitative research, we depend on the context and that we sought context-based results. Therefore, transferability was made possible by selecting participants with different demographic characteristics. Moreover, we provided a thick description to describe not only the behavior and experiences but also their context so that the behavior and experiences are meaningful to the reader. In other words, we helped other researchers in different locations achieve similar/same results by addressing rigor, such as audit trails and other items. We applied multiple coders to interpret data. The external reviewer, and conducted peer and member checking, in order to prevent bias in this qualitative inquiry.

We addressed reflexivity as a multidimensional and ongoing practice throughout our research process. Reflexivity can be defined as a set of collaborative, multifaceted, and continuous practices through which qualitative researchers self-consciously appraise, evaluate, and critique how their subjectivity and context impact the research processes [ 36 ]. We also emphasized the multifaceted nature of reflexivity; it contains critical addressing of personal, interpersonal, methodological, and contextual agents that impact the study being done and we explained them as follows; In personal reflexivity, the researchers were conscious of their values, life experiences, and beliefs to identify their influence on how they collected and interpreted their research data. In other words, a reflexive process is a suitable tool that can help researchers validate qualitative inquiry findings e.g., As mentioned above, the authors have been teaching in the classroom for many years and have experienced the concern of classroom management and guiding the classroom toward educational aims. Therefore, the first author, who conducted the interviews, put aside his preconceptions to understand the participants’ experience(bracketing), She avoided asking questions that only led respondents in one particular direction, and the research team considered rigor items over the data analysis process.

Interpersonal reflexivity refers to how the participants interpret interview questions, how the participants’ unique perspectives, and how the relationships among the researchers impact the research process [ 36 ]. In the present study, there was a transactional relationship between the research team and participants that resulted in 15 interviews with 11 participants to clarify and understand participants’ perspectives. We achieved the participants’ confirmation about extracted data by member checking. In addition, in the present study, the first author as the interviewer is working in the main faculty. She does not have any organizational relationships with other faculties. There was a collaborative interrelation between the research team and we took the assistance of external researchers to revise our work.

Methodological reflexivity refers to the researchers asking themselves how to make methodological decisions and their implications [ 36 ]. We focused on the meaning of these decisions and ensuring that they were ethical, accurate, and aligned.

Contextual reflexivity refers to the researchers asking themselves how the aspects of context influence the research and involved people [ 36 ]. We described the research context and participants’ characteristics which may have influenced on the study findings.

Data analysis

The content analysis approach designed by Graneheim and Lundman was used [ 37 ]. At the end of each interview, the recorded voice was transcribed verbatim, then each transcript was studied several times to understand the participants’ experiences and impressions to identify meaningful units. All-important and relevant phrases or information were underlined to highlight the statements of interest. For instance, a participant said: “A student exhibited an anti-social behavior by stepping on his classmate’s chair and then pushed it forward…I looked at him silently but he realized that his behavior was awkward …”. The significant unit that was underlined part is the most important phrase extracted from the respondent’s statement. Then the meaningful units were summarized and condensed, and the initial codes emerged. In this instance, warning to the student with non-verbal gestures is an initial code. This initial code with other similar codes were categorized and formed a subcategory of “Purposeful non-verbal gestures in shutting down the disruptive behavior”. S.S. carefully considered the original codes and categorized them into subcategories according to their similarities in concepts. Using this inductive process, similar sub-categories were assigned to the categories. For instance, due to similarity in concept, three subcategories such as; “Purposeful non-verbal gestures in shutting down the disruptive behavior”, “Avoiding making quick judgments” and “Experiencing the effectiveness of advice with humor” were categorized under a higher level of abstraction entitled: “The reaction to the disruptive behavior”. Then this category with similar categories formed a higher level of abstraction category named theme entitled “Managing disruptive behaviors/misbehaviors in the classroom”. This coding process and the emergence of the themes were reviewed and discussed by the second author (RN) and by an experienced researcher(MS.M) with SS. Finally, categories were determined as the expression of the implicit content of the transcripts. In the present study, purposive sampling was applied to include the participants of the target population. It is worth noting that we used Persian/Farsi language in the interviews because this study was conducted in the Iranian context. As in similar studies, after ending the research, the first author wrote the manuscript in English.

Ethical consideration

The study protocol was reviewed and approval by the Research Ethics Committee of the Lorestan University of Medical Sciences, (Approval Code No. IR.LUMS.REC.1394.2137). Following this, the consent of the persons in charge of the hospitals concerned and the informed written consent of the participants was obtained. In addition, participants were informed of the study objectives and methodologies of the study, including the need to record interviews, and their rights, including confidentiality, anonymity, the assignation of a private code to each participant, and the unfettered right to opt out of the study.

This study explored the experiences of nursing faculty members in managing disruptive behaviors/misbehaviors in the classroom. The participants comprised of six females and five males with mean age is 42.5 years old. The results of the present study included four themes emerged from 350 codes. These include managing disruptive behaviors/misbehaviors in the classroom, trying to guide the disruptive student, trying to increase learning, and make the class more interesting, and setting the rules and regulations of the class with sub-categories (Table  2 ; Fig.  1 ).

Coding tree of the study

Managing disruptive behaviors/misbehaviors in the classroom

Faculty members tried to control and manage disruptive behavior in the classroom with several approaches. One of these approaches was the reaction to the disruptive behavior, where most of the participants referred to targeted non-verbal gestures in shutting down the disruptive behavior.

“… if a student comes late, it’s not like I don’t let him come… the moment a student comes late, I try to be silent so that the student can sit down… and this causes the others to warn him that, … sit down quickly!!… But it is not usual to tell the student to go back ” P.10.

Non-verbal feedback such as silence for student delay and temporary interruption of teaching:

“… By being silent and interrupting teaching, I understand the person and the class that being late is not a good manner… ” P.1.

Participants mentioned interrupting teaching and sitting down to control the class as an effective strategy.

“…instead of directly dealing with the disruptive behavior in the class, I stopped teaching for two minutes and sat down, and this method has worked so far… and the disruptive behavior has not been stopped or repeated” P.4.

Avoiding making quick judgments.

“…I try not to judge too soon about the students’ disruptive behavior or their delay….and at first, I avoid direct warning to the student in the class and give a general warning until I have to check the cause.“. P. 9 .

“If the re-establishing disruptive behavior being occurred, I will give a direct warning to the student”. P. 2 .

Experiencing the effectiveness of advice with humor.

“Coercive confrontations usually do not work if the student’s personality is crushed in front of the crowd in the classroom… I talk to them with humor and advice”. P. 1 .

Investigation of the cause of disruptive behavior.

Faculty members stated that they considered it necessary to investigate the cause of disruptive behavior. Holding a private meeting with a disruptive student and investigating the cause of the student’s tardiness, lack of motivation, fatigue, and problems in the student’s life were some issues they mentioned.

“We see the well-groomed appearance of the student and are unaware of the problems in her/his life … I set up a private meeting with the disruptive student and would like to hear what she/he has to say before taking any action.” P. 9 .

Preventing of disruptive behavior: Some participants stated teacher role modeling and close and informal communication are the silent languages to warn the disruptive student.

“I am willing to communicate a simple and informal relationship with the student, and most importantly, the student should learn from my behavior and gesture. For example, if I am late, I can no longer remind the student to follow the discipline” P.11 .

Trying to guide the disruptive student

Subcategory of Knowing and Understanding the conditions of the students, protection and safety, notice and warning, and encouragement and motivation. Faculty members stated that in order to manage disruptive behavior, they tried to communicate with the approaches of addressing generational differences, ignoring minor disruptive behaviors, and communicating with the disruptive student.

Ignoring low-level/minor misbehaviors due to the belief that it is impossible for students couldn’t talk in the classroom, and ignoring these disruptive behaviors, were expressed by the professors. “A student cannot be silent for the whole class” P.1 .

Participants stated that communicating with the disruptive student and addressing generational differences.

“…I pay attention to generational differences, this new generation has different demands and expectations …” P.10.

Participants said to try to hold Protected and a safe class atmosphere, including Culturally responsive teaching, creating a safe and healthy atmosphere, Notice and warning, encouragement, and motivation. Moreover, they emphasized a fair and equal look at every student.

“…I try to have a fair and equal look at every student…” P.11 .

“…I pay attention to ethnic and cultural sensitivities in classroom management” P.7 .

“My effort is to provide a safe and healthy atmosphere for better learning” P. 3 .

“ I give feedback to the disruptive student on time/timely and make him aware that I am paying attention” P.5 .

This subcategory consisted of encouragement and motivation, which included encouraging students in front of the crowd and encouraging and praising active students.

“… I encourage the student in front of the crowd in the classroom … and I say that she will get a positive … and I record it in my sheet …”. P.1.

Trying to increase learning, and make the classroom more interesting

This theme included the subcategories of the academic richness of the teacher, and choosing the appropriate teaching method.

“I ask the disruptive student about the material presented in the class … in this way, she/he gets some attention ”. P.8.

Most participants said the teacher’s scientific richness and ability to respond to students’ scientific questions are essential to successful classroom management.

“… I like my students consider me an up-to-date teacher who can be accountable so that my class sessions become attractive …” P. 6.

Participants stated choosing an appropriate and effective teaching method based on knowledge of students, class atmosphere, and the type of content in choosing a teaching method. They said these items make the classroom attractive.

“…According to the students’ preferences and the class atmosphere, the type of content, and the level of the students, I choose the appropriate teaching method to keep the students interested and increase their learning ” P. 8.

Setting the rules and regulations of the class

Participants cited keeping respect for the class and students. For example, participant number 8 provided a critical perspective about respect for the student and her mutual respect:

“If you treat them with respect, they will certainly treat you with respect. I have never seen them cause any disruption in the class.” P. 8.

Participant number 5 shared an experience about respectfully waking up the student:

“The student was sleeping in the classroom while teaching and learning was in session, I tried to tell her to go and wash her hands and face”. P. 5.

Creating a disciplinary framework is another approach which participants applied to classroom management.

“…From the first day of the class, I announce the rules and regulations as a disciplinary framework in the class and even use the students’ participation in developing this framework.” P.9 .

Participants stated the implementation of some disciplinary action for classroom management. Participant number 2 said that having a private meeting with a disruptive student and applying disciplinary action:

“I believe that this student has not yet learned education and needs more training, and if the inappropriate behavior of the student disrupts the class, I will require the student to leave the class, or after the class, I will call the student and tell him about his behavior”. P.2 .

Classroom management is a critical aspect of teaching that can greatly impact the success of students. This study elaborates on the experiences of faculty members in managing disruptive behavior in the classroom. One of the extracted themes is managing disruptive behaviors/misbehaviors in the classroom had three sub-categories; The participants showed the reaction to the disruptive behavior as purposeful non-verbal gestures in shutting down the disruptive behavior. Other studies confirmed non-verbal communication is a way to manage students’ misbehavior or give effective feedback [ 26 , 38 ]. One of the tools that may seem ordinary, but can be very important for teaching and class management is non-verbal communication [ 39 ].

The findings suggest that avoiding making quick judgments and experiencing the effectiveness of advice with humor were effective approaches to prevent of misbehaviors in the classroom. They used humor to pass indirect commands to stop students’ misbehaviors. Jeder’s study confirms that using humor in classroom management has some benefits such as creating a positive atmosphere for learning and fun, supporting student engagement with course materials, and making students happier [ 35 ].

The participants indicated investigating the cause of disruptive behavior and that they held a private meeting with a disruptive student. Sun’s study reported the teachers cited that talking to students after the class sessions was an excellent opportunity to inculcate suitable values, to assist students in making changes and growing up [ 26 ]. Talking with students after class and relationship building were student-centered and helped forge good teacher-student relationships conducive to cultivating student trust and positive behavioral changes [ 26 ].

The participants also acted as role models and had close and informal communication in prevention of disruptive behavior. So They were careful about their behaviors to be able to act as a successful role model. They had experienced these two components causing to decrease in disruptive behaviors. Other studies confirmed teachers should strive to be positive role models for their students, treating all students equally and avoiding actions that may lead to negative reactions [ 40 ].

One of the teachers’ approaches to respond to student misbehavior is trying to guide the disruptive student including; knowing and understanding the conditions of the students, addressing generational differences, having a fair and equal look at every student, ignoring low-level/minor misbehaviors, and communicating with the disruptive student. In every society, counseling and guidance services are essential components in the management of discipline [ 41 ]. It is common in schools to refer disruptive students to specially trained staff (e.g., counselors, social workers, and psychologists) for counseling, and this backup system is specifically designed to support teachers and students [ 26 ]. Guidance and counseling are services provided to help students optimally develop their potential [ 42 ]. These services require the work of competent and professional consultants to ensure that the services provided achieve the goal of meeting the needs of students in a variety of fields, both personal and social, educational and vocational [ 43 ].

Participants experienced the prevention of disruptive behavior comprised of the teacher’s role model, close and informal communication, and avoidance of punishment. Other studies reported that teachers served as role models to guide students emulate societal appraised values and behaviors [ 26 , 44 ]. Chitiyo and May’s study confirmed that the use of punitive strategies such as suspension and detention has been shown to be ineffective in reducing misbehavior [ 45 ].

In the present study, the teachers believed they should avoid punishment interventions and they liked to communicate with students closely and informally to lead students’ behaviors unlike Sun’s study, which was conducted with secondary school teachers in Chinese contexts and reported that teachers believed a blend of positive and punitive strategies was needed for reining or changing students’ misbehavior [ 26 ]. Plausibly, the social maturity age category of university students might be the reason for teachers to largely avoid meting obvious punitive strategies in the university context unlike the second cycle institutions. In other words, punishments should be primarily future-oriented and used as tools to promote compliance with social norms and reduce norm violations [ 46 ]. This means that face-to-face conversations can increase students’ awareness of their behavior and their autonomy in choosing how to act under the guidance of the teacher.

The majority of the participants emphasized the teachers’ role in trying to guide the disruptive students. They cited the knowing and Understanding of the conditions of the students comprising “addressing generational differences”, “ignoring low-level/minor misbehaviors”, and “communicating with the disruptive student”. Teachers must consider the impact of generational differences, between the teachers and students, on the learning environment and classroom management [ 47 ]. The generation gap, as another aspect of the learning environment, is a potential cause of increased stress and other experiences of disrespect in nursing education [ 44 ].

As mentioned above, the participants tried to guide the disruptive student through a student-centered strategy such as holding a private session with the disruptive student to assess and understand the underlying reasons for manifested misbehavior. Therefore, teachers managed student behavior by building up fair communication. Sun’s study revealed the interviewed teachers confirmed the key to managing misbehavior is good communication with their students [ 26 ].

In the present study, the participants provided a protected and safe atmosphere in a classroom environment in which students feel free of any disparities and unhealthy. They paid attention to a fair and equal look at every student, culturally responsive class management, and created a safe and healthy atmosphere. Fallon, et al. reported that teachers’ classes, with higher socio-cultural responsiveness, were with low occurrences of students’ misbehaviors [ 48 ]. Darawshe’s study confirmed that every student should be treated as a person, not a jar that needs to be filled with knowledge. Another point of importance was to avoid “student-centered humor” and " discriminatory treatment based on unfair prejudice” [ 49 ]. Astor, et al. reported the lack of supportive norms, relationships, and structures in schools/classrooms, makes students more likely to experience violence, peer bullying, and punitive discipline, often accompanied by high levels of absenteeism and poor academic performance [ 50 ]. Therefore, creating a safe atmosphere in the classroom environment could be an effective approach to prevent students’ misbehavior.

The participants cited notices and warning compromised of timely feedback/directed commands to manage students’ behavior. Sun’s study reported that teachers usually make specific, directive statements to stop students’ misbehaviors and maintain classroom learning [ 26 ]. Directive orders are warnings or threats to force students to follow the teacher’s expectations or rules.

The participants cited encouragement and motivation as another effective strategy to manage students’ misbehavior. They mentioned encouraging students in front of the crowd and praising active students as a key. Allday’s study confirmed a strategy to notice positive behavior in others, teachers need to find good Students who deserve encouragement, are close to misbehaving students, and teachers praise and give benefit to them [ 38 ].

The participants cited trying to increase learning and making the class more interesting/attractive. They tried it by the scientific richness of the teacher and choosing the proper teaching method. So that they should have the ability to respond to students’ scientific questions and choose the proper teaching method based on the knowledge of students, class atmosphere, and type of content in choosing a teaching method. Gordon’s study reported that teachers who truly know the content of their lessons and are effective managers of instructional material can then focus on motivational strategies, student assessment, and reflection on teaching and learning [ 51 ]. Therefore, novice teachers and experienced teachers if needed, should be trained to manage the classroom and apply all ethical conducts of their profession. They should be prepared and equipped to manage the classroom according to the changes of the present age.

In addition, the participants of the present study set the rules and regulations of the class through keeping respect for the class and students, creating a disciplinary framework/disciplinary action. Sun’s study confirmed that most teachers reported that they first set rules in the classroom, informing students about expected behavior and providing guidelines to follow [ 26 ]. Thilagaratnam and Yamat’s study confirmed that teachers agreed on a set of rules that would positively influence students’ behavior, establishing them as the basis for discipline in language classrooms [ 52 ].

The main limitation of this study was the possible localization of the findings given that the entire research was conducted within the remit of a specific discipline and geographic area with a clearly defined culture. This may have implications for the generalizability of the findings. In addition, interviews were conducted in an environment outside of the classroom atmosphere, We, therefore, could not critically observe and appreciate participants’ behavior in natural circumstances Finally, the data for the current study were exclusively based on the participants’ experiences which could be infused with social desirability bias.

From the teachers’ point of view, it was not only important to effectively manage disruptive behavior, but also prevent disruptive behavior in the classroom. Participants cited strategies that may facilitate their understanding of the causes of misbehavior and implement strategies to tackle students’ misbehaviors by creating a safe and healthy climate to nurture effective learning by students.

Policymakers should provide teachers with quality classroom management resources by creating suitable infrastructure. Given the increasing changes in teaching and learning styles, the lack of access to extensive resources and training modules for teachers may lead to poor knowledge and skills development needed to managing students’ misbehaviors. Therefore, they force to use unsuitable/punitive responses to classroom disruptions which may have unappropriated outcomes.

Managers should prioritize to the empowerment of teachers, and the teachers themselves should try to improve their classroom management skills. Definitely, the teachers’ training and practice can improve their abilities in classroom management.

Data availability

The datasets used and/or analyzed during this study are available from the corresponding author.

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Acknowledgements

We are grateful to the nursing teachers of Lorestan University of Medical Sciences for participating in this study.

This study was conducted with the support of Lorestan University of Medical Sciences.

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All authors were involved in the conceptualization and design of the study. Data collection and analysis were performed as outlined in the methods section of the paper. SS and RN drafted the initial manuscript. All authors read and approved the final manuscript.

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Salarvand, S., Niknejad, R. & Gyasi, R.M. Handling students’ misbehaviors in crowded classrooms: the nursing faculty members’ experiences. BMC Med Educ 23 , 709 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1186/s12909-023-04692-5

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Student Classroom Misbehavior: An Exploratory Study Based on Teachers' Perceptions

• Rachel C. F. Sun , D. Shek
• Published in TheScientificWorldJournal 1 August 2012
• Education, Psychology
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Student classroom misbehavior: an exploratory study based on teachers' perceptions

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• 1 University of Hong Kong, Faculty of Education, Hong Kong, China. [email protected]
• PMID: 22919297
• PMCID: PMC3415159
• DOI: 10.1100/2012/208907

This study aimed to examine the conceptions of junior secondary school student misbehaviors in classroom, and to identify the most common, disruptive, and unacceptable student problem behaviors from teachers' perspective. Twelve individual interviews with teachers were conducted. A list of 17 student problem behaviors was generated. Results showed that the most common and disruptive problem behavior was talking out of turn, followed by nonattentiveness, daydreaming, and idleness. The most unacceptable problem behavior was disrespecting teachers in terms of disobedience and rudeness, followed by talking out of turn and verbal aggression. The findings revealed that teachers perceived student problem behaviors as those behaviors involving rule-breaking, violating the implicit norms or expectations, being inappropriate in the classroom settings and upsetting teaching and learning, which mainly required intervention from teachers.

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Classroom Misbehavior in the Eyes of Students: A Qualitative Study

Rachel c. f. sun.

1 Faculty of Education, The University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong

Daniel T. L. Shek

2 Department of Applied Social Sciences, The Hong Kong Polytechnic University, Hong Kong

3 Public Policy Research Institute, The Hong Kong Polytechnic University, Hong Kong

4 Kiang Wu Nursing College of Macau, Macau

5 Division of Adolescent Medicine, Department of Pediatrics, University of Kentucky College of Medicine, Lexington, KY 40506, USA

6 Department of Social Work, East China Normal University, Shanghai 200062, China

Using individual interviews, this study investigated perceptions of classroom misbehaviors among secondary school students in Hong Kong ( N = 18). Nineteen categories of classroom misbehaviors were identified, with talking out of turn, disrespecting teacher, and doing something in private being most frequently mentioned. Findings revealed that students tended to perceive misbehaviors as those actions inappropriate in the classroom settings and even disrupting teachers' teaching and other students' learning. Among various misbehaviors, talking out of turn and disrespecting teacher were seen as the most disruptive and unacceptable. These misbehaviors were unacceptable because they disturbed teaching and learning, and violated the values of respect, conformity, and obedience in the teacher-student relationship within the classroom. The frequency and intensity of misbehaviors would escalate if students found it fun, no punishment for such misbehaviors, or teachers were not authoritative enough in controlling the situations. Implications for further research and classroom management are discussed.

1. Introduction

There are numerous studies examining the definitions and range of student misbehaviors. For example, in the United Kingdom and Australia, researchers defined classroom misbehaviors as behaviors which are disruptive to classroom order and cause trouble to teachers, such as making nonverbal noise, disobedience, talking out of turn, idleness/slowness, nonpunctuality, hindering others, physical aggression, untidiness, out of seat, and verbal abuse [ 1 – 3 ]. In the United States, James [ 4 ] conceived students misbehaved when they “either did what they were not supposed to do or did not do what they were supposed to do” (page 9), ranging from fooling around as mild misbehavior to fighting as severe misbehavior. In the Caribbean contexts, student misbehaviors in classroom included those disruptive behavior which hampered teaching, and learning, such as classroom disconformity, verbal and physical hostility, defiance of authority, task avoidance, inappropriate use of school property, inconsiderate interpersonal relationships, over-reactions to normal situations, and technological related factors [ 5 ].

While classroom misbehavior is generally interpreted as disruptive and improper behavior that adversely affects the order, teaching, and learning in classroom, it is noteworthy that the range of student misbehavior varies across cultures [ 6 , 7 ]. Particularly, as respect for authority, conformity, and obedience are highly valued in the Chinese school context [ 8 ], some student behaviors would be considered as problematic or unacceptable in Chinese classroom but not elsewhere. For example, in the traditional Chinese culture, students who kept on asking questions would be regarded as “troublesome” students whereas students strictly followed teachers' orders were regarded as excellent students. However, in contrast to the studies conducted in the Western cultural contexts, there have been very limited research findings on student misbehavior in the Chinese cultural contexts [ 9 , 10 ], particularly in Hong Kong [ 11 , 12 ]. Therefore, it is necessary to understand more about the definition and conception of student misbehavior in Hong Kong. This need is particularly acute when we realize that adolescent behavior has changed tremendously with the advance in technology. Through the Internet, it does not take long to popularize certain misbehavior in young people.

Against the above background, a recent study was conducted in Hong Kong Chinese schools by Sun and Shek [ 13 ], which showed that most of the classroom misbehaviors reported by the teachers included doing something in private, talking out of turn, verbal aggression, disrespecting teachers, nonattentiveness/daydreaming/idleness, sleeping, habitual failure in submitting assignments, and out of seat. These findings suggest that classroom misbehaviors can be defined as those behaviors that involve rule breaking, violating the implicit norms or expectations, being inappropriate in the classroom settings and upsetting teaching and learning. The findings also matched with the categorization of misbehavior as off-task, disruptive, and unruly behaviors [ 14 ]. Off-task behaviors like doing things irrelevant to the class learning, or daydreaming and sleeping, are regarded as classroom misbehaviors. These misbehaviors would become disruptive if their frequency and intensity escalated. Similar to those obvious disruptive behaviors such as talking out of turn and out of seat, they impede teachers' teaching and students' learning. Failing one's responsibility in handing homework on time and lacking respect to classmates and teachers by showing verbal and physical aggressiveness are definitely breaking the conventional rules and values in Chinese classroom. Among the various forms of misbehaviors, “talking out of turn” was constantly rated by teachers as the most frequent and troublesome misbehavior across contexts [ 15 ]. However, it is doubtful whether behaviors considered as problematic, inappropriate, disturbing, or unruly in the eyes of teachers are necessarily shared by the students.

One serious limitation of the research on student misbehavior is that most of the existing studies on school misbehavior were primarily based on teachers' perceptions and ratings, (for example, [ 1 , 9 , 11 , 12 ]). However, it can be criticized that teachers usually have a dissimilar conception of school misbehavior with their students due to differences in social roles and values [ 16 ]. Moreover, teachers and students might have different degree of tolerance in judging whether a particular action is a misbehavior or not, or in rating the intensity of disruptiveness on the same misbehavior [ 17 ]. Hence, it is argued that findings simply based on teachers' responses might be partial or biased, and the perceptions of students should also be included. Nevertheless, there is scant research studies investigating students' perceptions of classroom misbehavior [ 4 , 18 ]. Although a study was conducted in Hong Kong to examine misbehavior from the students' perspective [ 19 ], it focused on students' explanations of their school misbehavior and effective means to deal with student misbehavior. However, it can be argued that any meaningful intervention would not be possible if students' conceptions and definitions of classroom misbehavior are not thoroughly examined before the intervention. Thus, the present study attempted to examine classroom misbehavior from the students' point of views, and to understand what are the most common, disruptive, and unacceptable misbehaviors in the eyes of students.

The overarching goal of this study was to examine classroom misbehavior from the perspective of students in junior secondary school settings in Hong Kong. In this study, classroom misbehavior was regarded as a kind of problem behavior [ 20 – 22 ]. It is a descriptive and exploratory qualitative research study which attempted to identify and categorize classroom misbehaviors reported by a group of Grade 7 to 9 students. By understanding the issue from the students' perspective, the present findings would contribute to the existing literature and shed light on teaching, discipline, or guidance work in the school context.

A qualitative research method was adopted in this study. This method can enrich our understanding of the problem area because most of the studies in this area are quantitative in nature. By listening to the voices of the students, it is expected that the findings can help generate findings that cannot be adequately captured by those based on the teachers. A general qualitative study orientation (i.e., no particular qualitative research strand was adhered to) was adopted, with the following elements intrinsic to the study. First, voices of the students instead of the “experts” or “adults” were heard. Second, narratives of the students were focused upon. Third, individual interviews were conducted in nonartificial setting. As it is an exploratory study, a general qualitative orientation close to a postpositivistic tradition (qualitative data collection with coding and thematic analyses) was sufficient for this purpose.

2.1. Participants

The informants were 18 junior secondary school students from three schools, with each school admitting students having low, medium, or high academic competencies. In each school, six students (one boy and one girl in Grade 7, Grade 8, and Grade 9) were randomly selected by their teachers and they were invited to join an individual interview on a voluntary basis. The informants comprised nine boys and nine girls, with a mean age of 13.9 years old (range = 12–17 years old). Although there is no “sacred number” in qualitative research, an engagement of 18 participants could be regarded as on the high side. Also, recruitment of students from schools with different academic abilities and gender could ensure that a wide range of experiences would be examined. Written consent from the school principals and the informants, as well as passive parental consent from the student informants, were obtained prior to data collection. At the beginning of each interview, anonymity and confidentiality of the study were clearly explained to the informants. Before conducting this research, ethical approval was obtained from the Human Research Ethics Committee, The University of Hong Kong.

2.2. Instruments

A self-constructed semi-structured interview guide was used for each individual interview. In the interview guide, questions and prompts were used to explore the informants' perceptions of students' problem behaviors and teachers' management strategies in the classroom and school contexts. The informants were asked to define “problem behaviors” based on their own understanding and interpretation. They were invited to use real-life examples to further illustrate their views. The average time for an interview was 48 minutes (range = 33–71 minutes). Each interview was conducted by two trained interviewers in Cantonese (the mother tongue of both the interviewers and interviewees). The interviews were audio-taped with informants' prior consent and transcribed in verbatim after the interviews.

As many open-ended questions were covered in the interview guide, only data related to the following questions were analyzed in this paper. Interested readers can write to the first author to obtain the full list of interview questions.

• In the classroom, what student problem behaviors are there? Please list out as many as possible and describe them.
• Among these problem behaviors, which one(s) is/are the most common?
• Among these problem behaviors, which one(s) is/are the most disruptive to teaching and learning?
• Among these problem behaviors, which one(s) is/are the most unacceptable? Please illustrate.

2.3. Data Analysis

The data were analyzed by general qualitative analyses techniques [ 23 ], in which codes and categories of misbehavior were inductively derived from the data. A colleague who has a Bachelor degree in psychology and teaching experiences conducted the first-level coding to cluster semantically similar words, phrases, and/or sentences that formed meaningful units in each conclusion at the raw response level. The first author further checked and carried out second-level coding and categorization, in which similar codes were grouped to reflect higher-order categories of themes. The coding and categorization were finalized with consensus among the coders, and agreed by another colleague with a Bachelor degree in psychology and professional counseling training.

The researchers were aware of their possible biases in their conceptions of student misbehavior because they had worked in the education field for some time. Therefore, checking procedures were carried out to look at the consistency in the coding process without the involvement of the authors. Both intra- and interrater reliability on the coding were calculated to ensure the credibility of the findings. Intrarater reliability tests were conducted by the two coders independently, whereas interrater reliability tests were conducted by two colleagues (one has a Master degree and several years of teaching experience and one has a Bachelor degree) independently. In each reliability test, 20 raw responses were randomly selected for each rater to code without referring to the original codes. Results of the reliability analyses were on the high side: intrarater agreement percentages were both 100% for both coders; interrater agreement percentages were 80% and 90% for each coder when they coded the analyses of the counterpart. To enhance the quality of the research, audit trails were developed and data analyses processes were systematically documented.

Table 1 summarizes the categorization of responses based on students' perceptions of problem behaviors inside classroom reported by 18 student informants. The 107 responses could be classified into 19 main categories and six of them could further be divided into subcategories. The frequently reported classroom misbehaviors were “talking out of turn”, “disrespecting teachers”, “doing something in private”, “verbal aggression”, “out of seat”, “sleeping”, “playing”, “clowning/making fun”, “(habitual) failure in submitting assignments”, “non-attentiveness/looking out of window”, and “non-verbal communication”. Among them, “talking out of turn” and “out of seat” were viewed as the most common misbehavior in the classroom. “Talking out of turn” and “disrespecting teachers” were rated as the most disruptive and unacceptable problem behaviors.

A Summary of students' perceptions of student problem behaviors inside classroom ( N = 18).

3.1. Talking Out of Turn

The informants perceived that students usually talked out of turn, such as “do not put up their hands before answering questions” and “shout the answer out” (Student A05). This kind of calling out, as well as asking nonsense questions without teacher permission, were regarded as disturbing. As mentioned by Student B08:

“No one likes to hear people speaking too loudly. It will affect the learning environment. The class is often distracted by this kind of noise. Also the noise will largely affect each student psychologically. I mean student may be annoyed by the noise. They will become more agitated, easy to lose their temper and becomes inattentive in class. It is fine if you make noise but you should not disturb others” .

They also revealed that “conversation among students” was the most common and annoying. Student B10 described:

“When the teacher is teaching, students at the back talk to each other… Sometimes they are not too excessive, but sometimes they speak too loudly that we can hardly hear what the teacher is saying… There are not just two (students) but sometimes a cluster… just like to kick up a fuss, because sometimes you won't sit next to your friend. Your friend may sit far away from you at the diagonal corner. You have to speak out loudly in order to let your friend hear you. Then, other students will hear you and all of them will laugh together. This is like ripple effect” .

“Talking out of turn”, especially chatting among students, was perceived as most disruptive to teachers' teaching and students' learning. Student C10 explained:

“Chatting will disturb teaching. If they chat very loudly or do not listen to the teacher, they and other students will miss some new knowledge. Also the teacher may think that you do not have motivation to learn which may make him/her unhappy” .

It was perceived as unacceptable when the misbehavior becomes so noisy and uncontrollable that it adversely affects other students' learning. Student A10 revealed :

“It is acceptable if you chat in a low voice. But the point is you chat louder and louder despite being asked to stop. This is the most distracting behavior which makes others unable to concentrate in class” .

3.2. Disrespecting Teacher

Behaviors that were disrespectful to teachers, such as disobedience, refusing to follow instructions, rudeness, talking back, arguing with teacher, offending, or attacking teachers, were reported as an obvious problem behavior in the classroom. Student B08 described how students used some subtle ways to offend their teachers:

“The students do not respect their teacher. Sometimes they do not treat their teacher as a person. Generally speaking, they do not care about him/her. They may pretend to be good, but in fact, they behave differently at the back of their teacher” .

On the other hand, some students would attack teachers directly. Student A06 recalled:

“Such as our class teacher, when teaching, some boys offended him/her for no reason. It is because the teacher does not know how to scold the students. That's why those boys like to assault him/her” .

Arguing with teachers could disrupt teaching and learning because it was time consuming. Student C07 commented that “if the teacher scolds us, we will argue back, and then the teacher will scold us even much more. It uses up all the time” . Student B08 also considered it as an unacceptable behavior: “ I think politeness of a student is very important. Sometimes if the teacher asks you to do something, you need to show your politeness in addition to respect… A person's virtue is more important than his/her knowledge” .

3.3. Doing Something in Private

Students liked to do something unrelated to classroom learning, such as doing homework of other subjects, dealing with personal stuff, having irrelevant drawing, or using mobile phone. However, not all informants would regard “doing something in private” as a kind of problem behavior. For example, Student C09 explained: “some students use mobile phone to text when the teacher is not looking at them… Actually, I think using mobile phone or pushing classmates are not problematic. It will not affect the learning atmosphere… playing mobile phone only affects the individual…a person's learning attitude… and usually the teacher do not see them so that it affects nothing” .

3.4. Out of Seat and Sleeping

The informants also pointed out that “out of seat” (including changing seats and wandering around the classroom) and “sleeping” were other problem behaviors in the classroom. Moreover, these problem behaviors would become more serious and spread over if without proper teacher control. Some students also considered that both of these behaviors would affect classroom teaching and learning. As two students described:

“The teacher sometimes is not aware of students who are out of seat, and also he/she may be dealing with the students who are making noise…so he/she is not able to handle those who leave their seats” .  (Student A06)

“When the students, who are very tired but try to endure the sleepiness, find their classmate is sleeping, they will begin to lay on the table, sleep or do other things because they realize that the sleeping student will not be punished, that means they are allowed to do so” .    (Student A09)

3.5. Verbal Aggression and Physical Aggression

“Verbal aggression” (including attacking classmates, quarrelling with classmates, speaking foul language, teasing classmates, and gossiping) and “physical aggression” (including striking, attacking and pushing classmates, and destroying things) were reported as problem behaviors. Student might feel bad and even threatening when there was hostility. As Student C09 expressed, “I feel hurt when I saw my classmate was struck by others… We are classmates, we are friends… I don't dare to stop them because I'm afraid that they will strike me too” .

3.6. Other Forms of Misbehaviors

As shown in Table 1 , there were other problem behaviors reported by the informants. They were “playing”, “clowning/making fun”, “failure in submitting assignments” (and in a habitual manner), “nonattentiveness” (also including looking out of window), “nonverbal communication” (via body language or passing papers), “making noise” (like rocking chair and singing), “isolating classmates”, “copying homework”, “forget to bring textbook and other learning materials to class”, and “disturbing other classmates” (e.g., pulling classmate's braid, tickling others, messing up other's things). Individual informants also reported that “invasion of privacy” (tried to sneak a quick look of other personal stuffs) and “intimate physical contact” (likes touching and hugging during class) were problem behaviors in the classroom.

4. Discussion

The present study attempted to examine classroom misbehaviors perceived by junior secondary school students in Hong Kong. A total of 19 problem behaviors were mentioned by the students, including talking out of turn, disrespecting teachers, doing something in private, verbal aggression, out of seat, sleeping, playing, clowning/making fun, (habitual) failure in submitting assignments, nonattentiveness/looking out of window, nonverbal communication, physical aggression, isolating classmates, making noise, copying homework, forget to bring textbook and other learning materials to class, disturbing other classmates, invasion of privacy, and intimate physical contact (see Table 1 ). The present findings showed that many of the misbehavior categories are similar to those reported in the studies conducted in the Western and Chinese cultural contexts [ 1 , 9 , 11 ], and they are consistent with those reported by teachers and students as well [ 4 , 13 ]. The findings generated from the Chinese students' perspective lent support to the previous research findings that “talking out of turn” is the most common and disruptive misbehavior inside the classroom [ 15 ].

In conjunction with the previous study conducted by the authors [ 13 ], the present study showed that the views of both the teachers and students were complementary in understanding the definition and types of student misbehaviors inside classroom. In terms of the categorization of the classroom misbehavior, there was a consensus in some of the misbehavior, though some differences were also identified. While teachers perceived lateness to class, eating/drinking and passive engagement in class were problem behaviors, students did not regard these to be misbehaviors. On the other hand, while students reported that disturbing classmates, intimate physical contact, invasion of privacy, isolating classmates, and making noise were problem behaviors, their teachers did not mention these behaviors in their narratives.

There are two explanations for the discrepancies in the conceptions of misbehavior between teachers and students. First, some misbehaviors may be more easily identified among students than by teachers such as those misbehaviors performed at the back of the teacher inside the classroom. It was mentioned by the students that teachers were not aware of some misbehaviors when they were concentrated in teaching or dealing with other problem behaviors in the classroom. Second, the discrepancies might be due to different levels of tolerance between the students and teachers. For example, some students did not perceive some off-task behaviors as problematic as they considered that these behaviors would not cause disturbances to others. Moreover, students and teachers might view the same thing through different lens. For example, students who had not brought textbook to class were perceived as “forgetfulness” in the eyes of the students but perceived as “unprepared for learning” by the teachers. Both “forgetfulness” and “unpreparedness” refer to a lack of responsibility in the expected role of students, but the level of accusation for “unprepared for learning” seemed to be more serious than that for “forgetfulness”. Obviously, the present study shows that collecting students' views can help provide a more comprehensive picture in describing various types of student misbehaviors.

In the present findings, all the reported misbehaviors were actually off-task and inappropriate behaviors inside classrooms. This observation is in line with the assertion that misbehavior is behavior “students either did what they were not supposed to do or did not do what they were supposed to do” [ 4 , page 9]. It is noteworthy that some of these misbehaviors are disruptive to teaching and learning as well. For instance, asking nonsense questions and fighting with teachers are wasting the time which is timetabled for valuable learning. Students who are running out of seat and playing would disturb others. Students would learn nothing if they fell asleep in class, and the worse was more students would slumber as a result of imitation. Interestingly, some misbehaviors, such as chatting in a low voice and doing irrelevant things in private, were perceived as nonproblematic as they simply affected one's own learning and did not disturbing other students', or when these behaviors were not detected by the teachers and thus did not disturb teachers' teaching. This observation may be due to the fact that contemporary young people have become more egocentric (i.e., not really caring about others' feelings) and pragmatic (i.e., less emphasis on moral principles).

Among various misbehaviors reported in this study, both talking out of turn and disrespecting teachers were rated as the most unacceptable problem behaviors. Obviously, these behaviors, particularly if uncontrollable, are disruptive to classroom learning and thus unacceptable. Moreover, it is interesting to note that some students found these misbehaviors as intolerable, when they upheld the personal virtues of politeness and respect, and the Chinese values of conformity and obedience, in the teacher-student relationship within the school context [ 8 ]. Therefore, they regarded misbehaviors as those behaviors that were impolite, challenging, noncompliant, and rebellious behaviors because they violated the hierarchical teacher-student relationship as well as the order and organization of the classroom [ 24 ]. Also, attacking and striking classmates, though rarely happened, were unacceptable because they upset the harmonious peer relationship and classroom atmosphere. All these misbehaviors would elicit negative emotions, such as annoying, hurtful, and even threatening, that in turn affected learning adversely.

Some students also mentioned that the frequency and intensity of misbehaviors, such as chatting, sleeping, and out of seat, would escalate if they found it fun, or no punishment for such misbehaviors, or teachers were not authoritarian enough in controlling the situations. Dreikurs [ 25 ] stated that student misbehavior is a purposeful endeavor to gain social recognition, while Glasser [ 26 ] stated that student misbehavior is a response to the classroom context or instruction that cannot satisfy their basic needs of love, belongingness, self-worth, freedom, fun, and survival. Thus, misbehavior usually occurs when there is a mismatch between the school and student needs [ 27 ]. It was suggested that having caring teachers who are willing to cater for students needs might be one of the helpful means to deal with student misbehavior [ 19 ]. Research findings also showed that a combination of care and behavioral control [ 28 ], schoolwide/whole-school positive behavior support [ 29 , 30 ], character education [ 31 ], social skills training [ 32 ], and positive youth development programs [ 33 – 35 ] was effective in mitigating students' problem behavior. In particular, positive youth development programs such as the Project P.A.T.H.S. would help to reduce misbehavior in class. The existing evaluation findings showed that this program was able to promote psychosocial competencies (which may eventually lower classroom misbehavior) and reduce adolescent delinquency [ 36 – 39 ].

The present findings underscore the importance to view student misbehavior through the lens of students. Practically, they shed lights on managing student behavior and enhancing student learning and development via identifying students' needs and matching up with the classroom context. It is equally important for future research to further explore the reasons behind student misbehaviors and the effective means of managing student behaviors from both students' and teachers' perspectives. As mentioned above, there are few studies looking at both the perspectives of the teachers and students. Theoretically, it is important to look at the discrepancies between teachers and students on student misbehavior and understand how such differences may affect school policies on school discipline and counseling. For researchers adopting an interpretive perspective, the social reality is fluid in nature. Hence, it is important to look at things from different angles and hear voices of different parties. For critical theories, it is even more important to understand the views of different stakeholders so that we can empower them.

There are several limitations in this study. First, it was a small-scale exploratory study with 18 students from three secondary schools recruited via convenience sampling. Hence, representativeness of the findings should be viewed with caution. However, it is noteworthy that the informants were randomly selected from the students. Second, as the informants were junior secondary school students, generalization of the findings to other age groups, like upper secondary or elementary school students, needs further validation. Third, only a one-shot interview was conducted for each informant. It would be ideal if more interviews over a longer period of time can be conducted. Finally, it may be criticized that the students may share the ideologies of the teachers. However, as the students were randomly selected, this possibility is not too high. Regardless of these limitations, this study is a good endeavor to understand the issue of classroom misbehavior from the perspectives of students, which helps to give a fuller picture of the phenomenon of classroom misbehavior, particularly in Hong Kong Chinese school context.

To what extent the present study is an acceptable qualitative study? Based on the criteria proposed by Shek et al. [ 40 ] to evaluate the quality of qualitative research, the present study can be regarded as having good quality. First, there was an explicit statement of the philosophical base of the study (Criteria 1). Second, the number and nature of the participants of the study were justified (Criteria 2). Third, the data collection procedures were given in details (Criteria 3). Fourth, biases and preoccupations of the researchers were discussed (Criteria 4) and how such biases were handled (Criteria 5) are described. Sixth, interrater reliability and intrarater reliability procedures were used (Criteria 6) and the present findings were triangulated with those collected from the teachers (Criteria 7). Seventh, the researchers were consciousness of the importance and development of audit trails (Criteria 9). Eighth, alternative explanations for the observed findings were discussed (Criteria 10). Ninth, negative evidence were accounted for (Criteria 11). Finally, limitations of the study were examined (Criteria 12). Because of time and manpower constraints, the researchers were not able to include peer checking and member checking procedures (Criteria 8), which should be carried out in future studies.

Acknowledgments

The authorship of this paper is equally shared by both authors. The research and preparation for this paper was financially supported by the Faculty Research Fund, Faculty of Education, The University of Hong Kong. Special thanks to Ms. Katrina Cheung and Ms. Evana Lam for their assistance in data collection and analysis.

Why do students misbehave?

Key takeaways.

• Decoding Behavior: Unravel the complex threads of children's actions to understand the underlying reasons and shift toward an empathetic, emotional intelligence approach in addressing misbehavior.
• Needs in Focus: Explore the interplay of instinctual needs, emotional regulation, and social skills, recognizing that misbehavior is often a call for attention, connection, or coping mechanisms.
• Beyond Labels: Challenge the perception of misbehavior, viewing it as an opportunity for growth rather than a deficiency, and empower yourself as an educator to create supportive environments for every child's uniqueness.

Why is it crucial to delve beyond the surface of children's behavior and cultivate an understanding of its underlying causes? When considering an adult who has experienced abuse and exhibits harsh behavior , society often acknowledges the impact of their past trauma on their actions. However, a contrasting pattern emerges when addressing children's misbehavior, particularly in school. Are we prone to fixating on the observable behavior rather than investigating the root cause, and if so, why does this tendency persist? Could it reflect historical, educational practices emphasizing control and authority over understanding and support?

When children misbehave, it's essential to recognize that their actions are often messages communicating unmet needs. Understanding misbehavior as a form of expression can prompt a shift towards an emotional intelligence approach in addressing these issues. Instead of solely focusing on the behavior itself, decoding these messages can lead to a more empathetic response. 

Here, we will reflect on how a shift in our approach, guided by emotional intelligence , can significantly change how we address and support children facing challenges. By recognizing and responding to their unmet needs, we create an environment that fosters growth, emotional well-being , and positive behavioral development.

Unraveling the Mystery of Misbehavior: A Call to Understand and Act

Educators, parents, and caregivers often grapple with the question: Why do children misbehave? This seemingly simple question unravels a complex web of factors influencing a child’s behavior. From personal issues and peer pressure to lack of engagement and family dynamics, the reasons behind misbehavior are as diverse as the children themselves.

Historically, educational practices have emphasized control and authority, leading us to fixate on observable behavior rather than understanding the root cause. However, this approach could steer our attention away from the underlying issues and contribute to a power dynamic between adults and children that may not be beneficial.

In our quest to manage classroom conduct effectively, it becomes crucial to question ourselves beyond observable behavior and investigate the root causes. Like an iceberg, the visible misbehavior is often just the tip, with a vast expanse of underlying issues hidden beneath the surface. When we shift our perspective and view misbehavior not as defiance but as a form of communication, we open the door to empathy, curiosity, and a commitment to addressing the underlying reasons.

Addressing student behavior is not merely about maintaining discipline or ensuring a quiet classroom . It’s about fostering a conducive learning environment where students can learn and grow happily. If not addressed appropriately, misbehavior can lead to unmet learning targets, disrupting the educational journey of the students involved and their peers. Moreover, persistent misbehavior can exert immense stress on educators, often leading to teacher burnout.

However, every instance of misbehavior can be a potential learning opportunity. It’s a call for us to understand the underlying issues that lead to such behavior. Is it a reflection of unmet needs, a cry for attention, or a response to an unfavorable environment? Recognizing and responding to children’s unmet needs can create an environment that fosters growth, emotional well-being, and positive behavioral development. Let’s remember the aim is not to eliminate misbehavior but to understand it, minimize its disruptive impact, and channel it into constructive learning experiences. Because when we change our perspective, we change their world.

Emotional intelligence: The key to academic success and well-being for teachers and students

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Needs Into the Language of Student Behavior

Human behavior, including the expression of needs, is a complex tapestry woven from various threads such as biology, environment, and individual experiences. To understand how needs translate into behavior, we must examine the intricate interplay between these factors. This becomes particularly crucial when addressing misbehavior in children, as their brains undergo dynamic processes that significantly contribute to their actions.

At a fundamental level, we, as humans, share instinctual needs for survival, safety, nourishment, and social connection. These needs, deeply embedded in our DNA, drive behaviors such as seeking food, forming bonds, and avoiding danger. These are not mere actions but evolutionary responses refined over millennia to ensure our survival. But how do these primal needs translate into the context of a classroom?

As we grow and develop cognitively, our ability to assess these needs and make decisions evolves. Rational thinking, problem-solving, and goal -setting become integral tools in our arsenal, translating our primal needs into purposeful behavior. It’s akin to a sculptor chiseling a block of marble, gradually revealing the form within. But what happens when this cognitive development intersects with the structured environment of a classroom?

Emotions play a significant role. Joy, anger, and sadness are responses to internal or external stimuli, colors on the palette of our emotional landscape. Over time, we learn to regulate these emotions, influencing how our needs are communicated through our behavior. It’s a delicate balancing act, much like a tightrope walker maintaining their equilibrium. So, how do these emotional responses influence student behavior?

Language and social skills then become our crucial tools for expressing these needs. Verbal and nonverbal communication, from spoken words to gestures and facial expressions, enable us to convey our desires and seek assistance from others. Our past experiences and learned behaviors shape how these needs are expressed. Just as a river is shaped by the landscape it flows through, our responses to certain situations are molded by positive and negative reinforcements. This learning and conditioning process contributes to the development of habits, creating the unique tapestry of our behavior. 

Don’t Take it Personal! 

As educators , it’s crucial to remember not to take students’ misbehavior personally. It’s natural to feel upset or frustrated when faced with disruptive behavior, but it’s important to remember that these actions do not reflect us as educators. Instead, they’re often a manifestation of the student’s struggles, whether they’re academic, social, or emotional.

Taking it personally can cloud our judgment and inhibit our ability to find effective solutions. Making this shift requires practice and patience. It involves developing a mindset of empathy and understanding, much like Atticus Finch in “To Kill a Mockingbird” who said, “ You never really understand a person until you consider things from his point of view… Until you climb inside of his skin and walk around in it .”

The Messages Behind Actions 

Behavior is a dynamic and multifaceted form of communication, especially in the case of children. When children misbehave, it's important to recognize that their actions are not random or arbitrary; rather, they serve as a powerful means of conveying messages about their internal states, needs, and experiences. Decoding these messages requires a thoughtful and empathetic approach, considering various factors that may be influencing the child's behavior. Here, we try to list some possible causes. 

Unmet Needs:

Children, particularly those still developing language skills, may struggle to express their needs verbally. Misbehavior can be a way for them to communicate unmet needs or desires. It might signify hunger, fatigue, discomfort, or a need for attention and affection. Observing the context and identifying potential triggers can offer insights into the underlying needs prompting the behavior.

Emotional Expression:

Children often lack the vocabulary to articulate complex emotions. Misbehavior can be an outlet for frustration, sadness, or confusion. Understanding the emotional undercurrents behind their actions allows caregivers and educators to address the root cause rather than merely responding to the outward behavior. Teaching children emotional literacy empowers them to express their feelings more appropriately.

Seeking Attention or Connection:

Misbehavior can serve as a plea for attention or connection, especially in environments where positive attention is scarce. Children may act out to elicit a response from adults or peers, indicating a desire for engagement or validation. Creating opportunities for positive interactions and fostering a supportive environment can diminish the need for attention-seeking misbehavior.

Testing Boundaries:

Children naturally explore boundaries to understand societal norms and expectations as part of their development. Misbehavior can be a way of testing limits and asserting autonomy. Instead of reacting with strict discipline, offering clear and consistent boundaries helps children feel secure while learning acceptable behavior.

Coping Mechanism:

Misbehavior can also be a coping mechanism for stress, change, or overwhelming emotions. Children may lack effective strategies for handling challenging situations, leading to disruptive behavior. Teaching and modeling coping skills can empower them to navigate difficulties more adaptively.

Communication of Discomfort:

Physical or sensory discomfort can manifest as misbehavior. A child may be signaling discomfort through their actions, whether with a learning task, sensory sensitivities, or a physical ailment. Identifying and addressing these discomforts contributes to a more supportive and accommodating environment.

The Puzzle of Misbehavior: Understanding the Whys Behind Children's Actions

As students progress through different stages of cognitive development, their understanding of social norms, consequences, and moral reasoning evolves. This evolution can manifest in various ways - younger students may exhibit impulsive behavior, while older students might engage in more complex, intentional misconduct. How can we, as educators, adapt our teaching strategies to cater to these developmental changes?

Peer influence becomes more significant as students age. Adolescents, in particular, may be more susceptible to peer pressure, which can contribute to certain types of misbehavior. How can we effectively equip our students with the skills to navigate these social dynamics?

Emotional regulation, a skill that improves with age, plays a crucial role in behavior. Younger students may struggle to express and manage their emotions appropriately, leading to disruptive behavior. Adolescents facing heightened emotions may grapple with identity issues and stress, influencing their behavior. 

With age, students seek greater autonomy and independence. This quest for independence may manifest as defiance or rebellious behavior, especially during adolescence. 

Family dynamics and environmental factors, such as transitioning from primary to secondary school, can also significantly impact behavior. Students may struggle adapting to new social structures, expectations, and academic challenges. 

Cultural norms and societal expectations shape behavior. Students from different cultural backgrounds may exhibit varying attitudes toward authority and rules. 

Academic struggles , such as difficulties with reading or math, can also lead to student misbehavior in the classroom. Frustration and feelings of inadequacy can cause students to lash out or act disruptively to cope with their struggles. 

Every child is a one-of-a-kind individual, and individual differences in temperament, personality, and learning styles can contribute to misbehavior. It’s essential to recognize that misbehavior is multifaceted, and interventions should be tailored to individual needs. A holistic approach that considers age, cognitive and emotional development, family dynamics, and cultural context is more likely to effectively address and prevent student misbehavior. Regular communication between educators, parents, and students can foster a supportive environment for understanding and managing behavioral challenges.

Decoding Behavior: Translating Surface Actions into Emotions and Needs in Children

Children’s emotions and behaviors are often interconnected, serving as windows into their needs and feelings. Recognizing these connections can provide valuable insights that enable us to support our students better. Here are some examples and questions we can try to answer in scouting for the best applicable solutions. 

• Anger : Could this be a manifestation of frustration, fear, or feeling misunderstood? How can we address these underlying issues in our classrooms? 
• Fear : Might this indicate a sense of insecurity or a need for safety? How can we create a secure learning environment for all students?
• Sadness : Could this suggest a need for comfort, love, or reassurance? How can we provide emotional support within the school setting?
• Excitement : Could this reflect a need for stimulation or a desire to share joy? How can we channel this energy into productive learning activities?
• Withdrawal : Might this indicate a need for space or time to process feelings? How can we respect this need while ensuring the student feels supported?

Each child is a unique blend and may express their needs and emotions differently. Observing, listening, and responding to each child’s needs is important.  These translations are general guidelines. A nuanced understanding of the child’s temperament, developmental stage, and specific context is crucial for accurate interpretation and effective response, reason why we are asking ourselves open questions as we believe each child and each educator together can scout their unique way to deal with the situation. 

Interpreting children’s behavior in terms of needs and emotions involves understanding that behavior is a form of communication. Here’s an evidence-based guide to interpreting some common children’s behaviors in terms of underlying needs or emotions:

• Tantrums or Aggression : Could this indicate frustration, feeling overwhelmed, or lack of control? How can we help the child communicate their needs more effectively?
• Withdrawal or Isolation : Might this suggest fear, anxiety, or overstimulation? How can we provide a quiet, safe space for the child to process their emotions?
• Resistance or Defiance : Could this reflect a desire for autonomy, independence, or frustration? How can we provide choices within acceptable limits?
• Clinginess or Regression : Might this indicate insecurity or a need for reassurance? How can we offer comfort and support to help the child feel more secure?
• Crying or Whining : Could this suggest discomfort, frustration, or fatigue? How can we address these issues in a compassionate and understanding manner?

As educators, we must always remember that we are not alone; collaborating with colleagues, reaching out to parents, and seeking advice from child development specialists can provide additional support and insights. 

Parent engagement: A key to addressing challenging behavior

Avoiding Labels, Maximizing Growth

In the dynamic environment of a school, behavioral issues are not outliers but rather an integral part of children’s growth and learning journey. As children traverse their developmental stages, they experiment, push boundaries, and learn from their experiences. This process, intertwined with the evolving structure of their maturing minds, often results in behaviors that may be perceived as challenging.

However, it’s essential to remember Goethe’s insightful words: “The way you see people is the way you treat them, and the way you treat them is what they become .” Labeling these behaviors as ‘misbehavior’ can unintentionally lead to feelings of shame, potentially impeding the child’s growth. Instead, perceiving these behaviors as opportunities for learning and growth can cultivate a more positive and supportive environment.

Labels can create a profound ripple effect, particularly in an educational context. When we label a child’s behavior, it not only influences how we perceive and interact with them but also how they perceive themselves and their abilities. This can impact their self-esteem, motivation, and overall learning experience.

For instance, labeling a child as ‘misbehaving’ might result in punitive measures at home that don’t address the root cause of the behavior. The child might internalize this label, leading to feelings of shame or inadequacy. Conversely, understanding the behavior as a form of communication or a reflection of unmet needs can lead to more empathetic and effective responses.

The goal is not to create a utopian classroom devoid of behavioral issues but rather to minimize their frequency and intensity over time. By understanding, guiding, and responding to these behaviors effectively, we can assist children in learning to navigate their emotions and actions better. 

As educators, our role extends beyond teaching academic content. We are also architects of the learning environment, shaping it to enable every child to succeed. As J. Stuart Ablon insightfully states in his TED, “ Rethinking Challenging Kids-Where There’s a Skill There’s a Way ”, we need to shift our perspective from “ Kids do well if they want ” to “ Kids do well if they can ”.

This profound statement underscores the importance of discerning the primary sources of misbehavior. Children’s misbehavior often manifests their unmet needs or unexpressed emotions. By channeling these emotions and addressing the underlying needs, we can transform the landscape of misbehavior. It’s not about suppressing or punishing the behavior but rather about understanding it, empathizing with it, and guiding the child toward more constructive expressions.

Creating a supportive learning environment is key in this process. An environment that teaches academic skills, emotional intelligence, and coping mechanisms. An environment that sees misbehavior not as defiance but as a call for help, a signal that the child is struggling with a skill they haven’t mastered yet.

So, here is a call to action for all educators: Let’s create an environment where every child feels welcomed. When we see a child misbehaving, let’s not ask, “Why won’t they behave?” Instead, ask, “What can we do to help them learn the skills they need to behave?” Because, indeed, kids do well if they can. Let’s aim to minimize the frequency and intensity of behavioral issues over time, not by suppressing them but by understanding and addressing them. Let’s turn today’s behavioral issue into tomorrow’s learning opportunity because every child deserves the chance to succeed. And we can make that happen.

References:

J. Stuart Ablon , Rethinking Challenging Kids-Where There's a Skill There's a Way ,  TEDxBeaconStreet

Westrupp, E. M., Macdonald, J. A., Bennett, C., Havighurst, S., Kehoe, C. E., Foley, D., Berkowitz, T. S., King, G. L., & Youssef, G. J. (Year). The Child and Parent Emotion Study: Protocol for a Longitudinal Study of Parent Emotion Socialisation and Child Socioemotional Development. 

Author: Paola Mileo

Posted: 18 Jan 2024

Estimated time to read: 13 mins

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How You Can Handle the Most Common Misbehaviors in the Classroom

We all have to deal with bad behavior in our classroom but what are the best strategies to use? The 7 best behavior management strategies are:

• Teacher Style
• Use Positive Language
• The Black Dot and the White Square
• Choice in Direction
• Partial Agreement
• Controlled Severity

You know that whilst most kids are great, you WILL get misbehavior, some easy to deal with and some that will drive you to the edge of insanity.

I know I will!

Want to know the best behavior management strategies?

Don’t worry, in this article, we will take a look at the most common misbehaviors in the classroom and how to handle misbehaving students.

Handling misbehavior in the classroom doesn’t have to be difficult. The key is to make minor adjustments to how you address misbehavior in your classroom. These 7 strategies will help massively.

Read on to find out more about them.

What is Misbehavior?

Misbehavior is improper, inappropriate or bad behavior.

As educators, it is more important not to focus on what the misbehavior is but how to address it while maintaining the continued learning for the whole class.

There is ALWAYS a reason WHY misbehavior occurs in a class but in the heat of the moment, it is our job to minimize the impact on the class as a whole.

To start with let’s look at what the most common misbehaviors are in the classroom, both for elementary/primary schools and high/secondary schools.

I’m not going to talk about bullying or fighting as these require a whole post to themselves which I will write at a later date.

Common Behavior Problems of Elementary School Students

• Talking when they shouldn’t.
• Temper tantrums.
• Arguing/Backchat.
• Lack of work.
• Taking things without permission.
• Calling out answers.

Common Behavior Problems of High School Students

As I was researching the common misbehaviors of high school students I realized that most of the above Elementary School misbehaviors were also relevant to high school students.

The misbehaviors listed below are more prevalent in high schools but may be evident in elementary schools to a lesser extent.

• Lateness to class.
• Cell/Mobile phone use.
• Lack of Classwork.
• Lack of Homework.
• Social Chatter.

How to Handle Misbehaving Students

When I started writing this article I envisaged addressing each one of these misbehaviors but as I was thinking about how I handle misbehaving students.

As I was researching how other teachers address individuals, I quickly realized that it’s not the individuals that we need to focus on, (we don’t teach one to one) we need to focus on ourselves and our management of the whole class at the same time as the student or students causing the problem.

I went back over the copious notes I made when training and remembered an inspirational man from whom I watched lectures or videos.

It became apparent that I should use his teachings to explain the methods I use on a daily basis.

Dr Bill Rogers; Behavior Guru

The behavior guru Dr Bill Rogers explains things in the clearest way I have ever found.

Everything from my classroom persona to my behavior management I owe to his video series.

I am going to describe his most effective methods here and include some videos throughout this post.

Here’s a little taste of what he is all about:

The titles of the series give an overview of his approach to managing behavior in the classroom setting.

• Positive Correction: This part is based on the idea that good behavior is based on building positive relationships between teachers and students . This is something I rely on heavily in my classroom. It is the understanding that shouting and screaming at a student only fosters a behavior pattern where the student shouts and screams back (monkey see, monkey do). Whereas displaying a respectful, encouraging behavior will foster a similar response from the students.
• Prevention: This section relies on setting up the expected behavior in the class. If students know what is expected of them in your class from the get-go, you can refer back to it throughout the year. I get them all to write my simple 4 rules in the back of their book at the beginning of the year and if needed get them to refer back to it during a confrontation.
• Consequences: This builds on the previous idea; the students already know what is expected of them and what the consequences are if they are not followed. This clear structure allows students to make positive choices in their behavior.
• Repair and Rebuild: Things will go wrong, there will be behavior that falls outside the structure you have set; if you think there won’t be, you’re kidding yourself! What we do and how we approach the aftermath is the most important part in my opinion. This should be done with the premise that we want to continue to build a relationship with that student. We want them to feel like we are still on their side, even after a breakdown in behavior.

My Top 7 Bill Rogers Principles

Your zenith as a teacher should be working to become an assertive teacher.

Assertive teachers expect good behavior but don’t rely on dominance to achieve it.

They rely on respect and clear boundaries.

1. Teacher Style

The idea here is to grow into an assertive teacher .

It is the fine balance between being an Indecisive teacher and an autocratic teacher.

I can list many teachers that fall into both of the latter categories, I bet you can too.

When I first started teaching I followed bad advice and styled myself on the autocrat; this didn’t work and ultimately I had to change schools as it had ruined my relationships with students and staff.

• An indecisive teacher is one that through their own behavior allows the class to overrule them, they set no boundaries through fear of either not being liked or “losing” the class. In short, they hope the class behaves.
• An autocratic teacher rules with an iron fist. They demand respect without earning it. There is no wiggle room in their rules. They generally shout without control and can be perceived as a bully.
• An assertive teacher is your zenith, you have to train yourself to get there but it really is the only way to teach effectively. If I’m being honest, I’d say I’m 90% there, I work at it daily, the better I get, the better my classes run. An assertive teacher expects good behavior but not by using dominance or hope. They plan for good behavior, they set clear boundaries and adapt to every situation that presents itself.

2. Positive Language

This is a simple, easy and elegant behavior to start using but it works from the start.

We were all told to use please and thank you and to speak nicely to people by our parents, now we are adults we definitely shouldn’t stop!

Instead of telling a student to stop doing something, tell them what they should start doing and always with a thank you.

For example, if I have two students who are chatting and off-topic instead of saying “Will you two stop talking to each other” I may say “I’d like everyone to be listening please, that includes you, Paul and Daisy…Thank you” and move on.

Saying thank you implies that the students have already complied leading to them actually complying.

3. Black Dot, White Square

This idea focuses on keeping things in perspective.

It is very easy to focus on the misbehavior in the classroom and ignore all the good stuff.

In the black dot, white square idea the black dot represents the misbehavior and the white square represents good behavior.

If we focus on the white square we can easily avoid thoughts like:

This class are always bad (are they really?).

No one ever does the homework (really, no one?).

That student is always calling out (I don’t think they do, do they?).

As I started to use his method I found I was choosing my battles more wisely.

I stopped pausing my class (and disrupting the flow of the learning) when a student arrived late, I now acknowledge they have arrived and kept the lesson moving.

If it is persistent lateness I will address it either later in the class or at the end of the lesson/day.

Here’s the thing:

This has the added benefit of the late student will feel more comfortable to slip into the lesson and start learning, after all, I have no idea why they are late, only assumptions.

They could have been ill, lost something or been to the school office to collect their lunch.

Bringing this up in front of the class will damage my relationship with the student AND the class.

I have spent way too much energy chasing homework in my life (yes, I know you have too!).

I have found that if spend the time I previously used to chase homework to celebrate and reward the homework I did get in, over time I got more homework in.

The students saw the positive effects of doing the work and wanted a piece of that pie.

Again, persistent offenders are spoken to privately rather than in front of the class.

4. Choice in Direction

This is a tactic I have only been using for a couple of years but wish I had been using from the beginning.

Again it is a simple minor adjustment to how I address a situation, not something to instil in my students.

Rather than just giving them a demand, I calmly give them a choice.

One option is what I want them to do and the other is the consequence.

9 times out of 10 they will choose your preferred option.

For instance; “Paul, you can either complete the work you are supposed to be doing OR you can come back at lunchtime to do it” or “Daisy, you can either stop chatting to your friends OR you will go to the heads office”.

The rest of the class (the white square) will also benefit from a calmer approach.

The student/s in question will choose the correct option and the lesson moves on with minimal interruption.

Remember to thank them when they have made the correct choice.

In the very small minority of cases, the student will choose the consequence.

It is very important for the success of this tactic that you follow through with the consequence quickly and immediately or this tactic will never work again with that class.

Make sure you consider this when giving the choice, never promise what you can’t deliver!

Again, another very simple method of mastering your classroom presence.

Like us, students will have lots going on in their heads and also like us, they need some processing time.

It is very unlikely that they will comprehend what you are saying the moment you start talking.

The way this work is:

• Gain eye contact: Paul…pause…
• Give instruction: Please face me and listen….thanks.

This is one of Bill’s Books, I’ve used it myself, it’s very good!

6. Partial Agreement

This builds on the ethos of modelling the behavior you want to see.

I’ve also heard this method being referred to as “being the adult”.

This is something that some teachers seem unable to do sadly.

They simply think they can’t be seen to give an inch and will argue to the death to get the last word.

This strategy diffuses conflict in an instant because it allows some give.

It also helps builds respect in the class.

The “white square” see you compromising for the greater good of the class and the “black dot” witnesses you actually listening to them. For Example:

• Teacher: “Paul, stop chatting and get on with your work.
• Paul: “I wasn’t talking, I was doing my work”.
• Teacher: “Ok, maybe you were but now let’s finish the task”.

In this case, you’d been watching Paul get more and more off task for the last 5 minutes, he definitely was talking.

However, what matters more?

Is it more important for Paul to admit he was wrong or to get on with the work?

If you find yourself wanting to “not let them get away with it” try just letting it go, trust me, it’s better for your stress levels and better for the class and the student.

7. Controlled Severity

Unfortunately, there will be times where you have to raise your voice but how we approach this can also be adjusted.

In the heat of the moment, it is easy to let the anger get control of you and let your raised voice be fueled from that anger, at this point you are not in control of the class even if you think you are!

Excellent teachers will have set very clear boundaries and will only use an “act” of controlled severity fuel the raised voice.

A short, sharp, louder tone to remind them that their actions are not within the expected behavior is all that is needed.

Your voice should immediately return to your normal calm voice.

It is a voice that tells them they have crossed the line but you still care about them, their actions are not acceptable but you still want them to be the best they can.

Again, controlled severity is and ACT, it is not actual anger, it is a tool to say very simply….you crossed the line, you are now aware you have crossed the line and we are now back to normal.

This method should not be used too much or it will desensitize the class to it.

The class should know it is there but not want to go there.

I once heard it referred to as an electric fence. You know it will sting so you don’t touch it!

But What About When They Just Say No

You Should Now Be Able to Handle Common Misbehaviors in the Classroom

I have found that employing Bill Rogers tactics in class dramatically improves the progress of all students, it reduces my stress levels and it makes my class a much happier place to be for everyone.

Some take time to master but they ALL work.

Go for it, give it a go!

Similar Posts:

• 35 of the BEST Educational Apps for Teachers (Updated 2024)
• The Flipped Classroom: The Definitive Guide
• 20 Huge Benefits of Using Technology in the Classroom

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June 25, 2024

This article has been reviewed according to Science X's editorial process and policies . Editors have highlighted the following attributes while ensuring the content's credibility:

fact-checked

Study: Teacher perceptions of chronically absent young students may add to the challenges of missing school

by American Educational Research Association

A new study finds that early elementary school teachers report feeling less close to chronically absent students and view them less positively, even when those students do not cause trouble in the classroom. This "cooling down" in the relationship between teachers and their chronically absent students may exacerbate the academic challenges these children face.

The study, by Michael A. Gottfried and Phil H. Kim at the University of Pennsylvania, and Tina Fletcher at the Walton Family Foundation, is published in AERA Open , a journal of the American Educational Research Association.

Chronic absenteeism has skyrocketed since the pandemic, with 30% of U.S. students chronically absent in the 2021–22 school year , nearly double the rate in 2018–19, according to the Annie E. Casey Foundation.

In addition to feeling less close to chronically absent students, teachers in kindergarten, first grade, and second grade reported viewing them as more withdrawn and as having worse interpersonal skills. When it came to academics, teachers perceived chronically absent students as having fewer positive learning behaviors as well as being worse at literacy and math, even if this was not true.

The study found that while teachers reported feeling less close to these students, they did not feel as if they had more conflict with these students. Rather, teachers viewed chronically absent students as displaying more internalizing behaviors, such as being withdrawn, but not externalizing behaviors, such as acting out.

"One stereotype about absent students is that they are 'troublemakers' when they are back in the classroom, but we don't find that to be the case at all," said Gottfried, a professor at the University of Pennsylvania Graduate School of Education.

Prior research has shown that negative teacher perceptions of students can harm children's growth and development in school.

"Our findings suggest that absenteeism puts students at a double disadvantage," Gottfried said. "First, they miss out on essential learning opportunities by not being in school. And then it erodes their teachers' relationships with them, which can further harm their academic growth."

Gottfried noted that schools can help by providing teachers with professional development to mitigate potential bias against students who miss a lot of school. This is especially important given that there are demographic disparities in who is absent, such as by race and ethnicity. Teachers might be adjusting perceptions in a systematic way by race and ethnicity as it is tied in with absenteeism.

While previous studies have examined the impact of student absenteeism, this is one of the only studies to consider how student absenteeism might influence teachers. The study used nationally representative data from the National Center for Education Statistics on 14,370 students in kindergarten, first grade, and second grade. The data were drawn from direct assessments of children, parent interviews, and education and administrator questionnaires. Chronically absent students were defined as missing at least 11 days of school during the academic year.

Gottfried stressed that this study highlights that absenteeism is both an individual and classroom issue.

"We need to pay attention to both if we are aiming to solve the absenteeism crisis," Gottfried said.

Provided by American Educational Research Association

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Teacher’s Classroom Management Behavior and Students’ Classroom Misbehavior: A Study with 5th through 9th-Grade Students

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Teachers feel more negatively toward children who are chronically absent, study finds.

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Teachers feel less close to children who miss a lot of school, according to a new study (Pic: Getty ... [+] Creative)

Teachers feel more negatively toward children who are chronically absent than towards those who are rarely off school, according to a University of Pennsylvania-led study .

Children who miss a lot of school are seen as more withdrawn and having worse interpersonal skills, as well as being worse at literacy and math than their classmates, even when that is not true.

And researchers fear that these negative perceptions may exacerbate the challenges that children face when they are off school for extended periods.

The number of children who are chronically absent from school in the U.S. — missing 10% of school days or more — has rocketed since the pandemic, from around 16% in 2018/19 to 30% in 2021/22.

Although latest figures show a fall in persistent absence in the U.K., it is still almost double the pre-pandemic rate, with illness a major component, according to the Department for Education.

Now a research has found that when chronically absent children are in the classroom, their teachers feel less positively towards them.

“Our findings suggest that absenteeism puts students at a double disadvantage,” said Professor Michael Gottfried of the University of Pennsylvania Graduate School of Education and lead author of the study.

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“First, they miss out on essential learning opportunities by not being in school. And then it erodes their teachers’ relationships with them, which can further harm their academic growth.”

Researchers collected data on 14,370 early elementary children — in kindergarten and first and second grade — for the study, published in AERA Open , the journal of the American Educational Research Association.

The data included assessments of children, parent interviews and questionnaires completed by teachers and administrators.

Analysis found that teachers said they felt less close to chronically absent children and viewed them less positively than classmates who had a good attendance record.

They did not feel as though they had more conflict with these children, suggesting chronically absent children were not seen as causing more trouble in the classroom.

Instead, they were viewed as having more internalized behaviors, such as being withdrawn, according to Gottfried, who carried out the study with researchers at the Walton Family Foundation.

“One stereotype about absent students is that they are ‘troublemakers’ when they are back in the classroom, but we don’t find that to be the case at all,” Gottfried said.

This negative attitude towards chronically absent children extended into academic ability. Teachers saw chronically absent children as having fewer positive learning behavior and as being less proficient in literacy and math, even when that was not true.

Schools could provide teachers with professional development to help change their view of chronically absent children, particularly as perceptions of persistent absentees could also be bound up with perceptions of race and ethnicity, Gottfried said.

American Indian, Pacific Islander, Black and Hispanic students all have higher rates of chronic absenteeism than white and Asian students, while non-English learners are more likely to be persistent absentees than English learners.

And the study highlights how persistent absenteeism is not just an issue for the individual, but for the classroom as well, Gottfried added.

“We need to pay attention to both if we are aiming to solve the absenteeism crisis,” he said.

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Judges Block Parts of Biden’s Student Loan Repayment Plan

A part of the SAVE plan that would have cut monthly bills for millions of borrowers starting on July 1 was put on hold.

By Tara Siegel Bernard and Zach Montague

Two federal judges in Kansas and Missouri temporarily blocked pieces of the Biden administration’s new student loan repayment plan on Monday in rulings that will have implications for millions of federal borrowers.

Borrowers enrolled in the income-driven repayment plan, known as SAVE, are expected to continue to make payments. But those with undergraduate debt will no longer see their payments cut in half starting on July 1 , a huge disappointment for borrowers who may have been counting on that relief.

The separate preliminary injunctions on Monday are tied to lawsuits filed this year by two groups of Republican-led states seeking to upend the SAVE program, a centerpiece of President Biden’s agenda to provide relief to student borrowers. Many of the program’s challengers are the same ones that filed suit against Mr. Biden’s $400 billion debt-cancellation plan, which the Supreme Court struck down last June.

“All of this is an absolute mess for borrowers, and it’s pretty shocking that state public officials asked the courts to prevent the Biden administration from offering more affordable loan payments to their residents at time when so many Americans are struggling with high prices,” said Abby Shafroth, co-director of advocacy at the National Consumer Law Center. “It’s a pretty cynical ploy in an election year to stop the current president from being able to lower prices for working- and middle-class Americans.”

The preliminary injunctions freeze parts of the SAVE plan until the cases are decided.

In a statement, the White House press secretary, Karine Jean-Pierre, said the Biden administration strongly disagreed with the court decisions. “Today’s rulings won’t stop our administration from using every tool available to give students and borrowers the relief they need,” she said.

Eleven states led by Kansas filed a lawsuit challenging the SAVE program in late March in U.S. District Court for the District of Kansas. The next month, Missouri and six other states sued in U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Missouri. Both suits argued that the administration had again exceeded its authority, and that the repayment plan was a backhanded attempt to wipe debts clean.

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