The present investigation evaluated relations between bullying, victimisation, multiple dimenstio... more The present investigation evaluated relations between bullying, victimisation, multiple dimenstions of self-concept, sex and age over two occasions for a large sample of students (N =3445) from six high schools in Year 7 to 11. In Study 1, there was strong psychometric support (confirmatory factor analysis and reliability) for two new instruments; a new short version of the widely used Self Description Questionnaire II (SDQII-S) that measures 11 different components of self-concept and Adolescent Peer Relations Instrument that measures three Bully factors (Physical, Verbal, Relational) and the corresponding three Victim factors. In Study 2, males used all three types of bullying (Physical, Verbal, Relational) and experienced two types of victimisation (Physical and Verbal) significantly more than females. Whereas levels of victimisation and bullying both increased during early high school years, vitimisation tended to decrease during subsequent high school years whereas bullying did...
An increasing awareness of the detrimental effects of single-item scales to measure bullying has ... more An increasing awareness of the detrimental effects of single-item scales to measure bullying has recently become apparent. A new multiple-item multiplescale behavioural measure of bullying was developed for secondary schools by Parada (2000) and found to be a reliable and valid scale for adolescent students. However, it is not known whether a similar instrument would yield sound psychometric properties for younger students and therefore provide a salient measure for those students. The aim of the present investigation is to examine the multi-dimensional and hierarchical structure of the Adolescent Peer Relations Questionnaire (APRI)(Parada, 2000) for upper primary aged students. A total of 894 students from Years 5 and 6 from eight Western Sydney primary schools completed the questionnaire. The APRI contains 36 items, 6 scales, and measures 3 types of bullying (Physical, Verbal, Social) in 2 categories (bullying, being targeted). Each scale (e.g., Bullying Physical) is comprised of ...
Journal of Adventure Education and Outdoor Learning, 2019
The Duke of Edinburgh's International Award (as it is named in Australia) is an extremely widespr... more The Duke of Edinburgh's International Award (as it is named in Australia) is an extremely widespread and popular youth development program. Participants (14-25 year olds) navigate the Bronze, Silver and Gold Award levels by completing: (1) Service, (2) Skills, (3) Physical Recreation, and (4) Adventurous Journey (recognising that at Gold level there is also a Residential Project requirement). Despite the international nature of the Award, with more than 1 million participants, research into its effects has been limited. This paper describes for the first time the ways in which the attribution of learning effects works with respect to the DoEIA. Using a mixed-methods approach, the research team sought results to show how participants themselves attribute their learnings to the Award, and what this could mean for youth development.
Marsh, Parada, Craven and Finger (2004) were amongst the first to find empirical support for a re... more Marsh, Parada, Craven and Finger (2004) were amongst the first to find empirical support for a reciprocal effects model of bullying in which being a bully leads to being a victim, and being a victim subsequently leads to being a bully. As such, the bully and victim roles cannot be seen as separate entities but rather as mutually reinforcing roles that co-occur. This paper extends those findings by examining whether this is the case for all forms of bullying, in particular verbal, physical and social/relational forms of bullying through the use of longitudinal structural equation models. A total of 3500 students attending NSW high schools were surveyed with a multidimensional measure of bullying behaviours at three time points during a single school year to examine their participation in bullying and victimising behaviours. Results, including the psychometric properties of the instruments and longitudinal structural equation models examining the reciprocal relation between specific forms of bullying and victimisation are presented. Implications for developing anti-bullying interventions are discussed.
Current victimization studies and meta-analyses are based mainly on a unidimensional perspective ... more Current victimization studies and meta-analyses are based mainly on a unidimensional perspective in a few developed OECD countries. This provides a weak basis for generalizability over multiple victimization (relational, verbal, physical) components and different countries. We test the cross-national generalizability (594,196 fifteen-year-olds; 77 countries) of competing victimization models. In support of our three-component model, differentiating the multiple components of victimization facilitated understanding: gender differences (girls experience less physical and verbal victimization and stronger anti-bullying attitudes, but relational differences are small); paradoxical anti-bullying attitudes (physical victims have less –not more--anti-bullying attitudes); and well-being (policy/practice focuses primarily on physical victimization, but verbal and relational victimization effects are larger). These key findings provide theoretical advances with implications for policy, practi...
The temporal ordering of depression, aggression, and victimization has important implications for... more The temporal ordering of depression, aggression, and victimization has important implications for theory, policy, and practice. For a representative sample of high school students (Grades 7-10; N = 3,793) who completed the same psychometrically strong, multiitem scales 6 times over a 2-year period, there were reciprocal effects between relational-aggression and relational-victimization factors: aggression led to subsequent victimization and victimization led to subsequent aggression. After controlling for prior depression, aggression, and victimization, depression had a positive effect on subsequent victimization, but victimization had no effect on subsequent depression. Aggression neither affected nor was affected by depression. The results suggest that depression is a selection factor that leads to victimization, but that victimization has little or no effect on subsequent depression beyond what can be explained by the preexisting depression. In support of developmental equilibriu...
Four studies evaluate the new Self Description Questionnaire II short-form (SDQII-S) that measure... more Four studies evaluate the new Self Description Questionnaire II short-form (SDQII-S) that measures 11 dimensions of adolescent self-concept based on responses to 51 of the original 102 SDQII items and demonstrate new statistical strategies to operationalize guidelines for short-form evaluation proposed by G. T. Smith, D. M. McCarthy, and K. G. Anderson (2000). Multiple-group confirmatory factor analyses revealed that the factor structure based on responses to 51 items by a new cross-validation group (n=9,134) was invariant with the factor structures based on responses to the same 51 items and to all 102 items by the original normative archive group (n = 9,187). Reliabilities for the 11 SDQII-S factors were nearly the same and consistently high (.80 to .89) for both groups. Multitrait-multimethod analyses support the internal validity of responses over time. Gender and age effects on the 11 SDQII-S factors were invariant across the archive and cross-validation groups.
Australian Association For Research in Education 2005 Conference Papers, 2015
Abstract There is a growing recognition that bullying, violence, aggression, victimisation, and p... more Abstract There is a growing recognition that bullying, violence, aggression, victimisation, and peer-relation difficulties in schools are pervasive problems with long-term psychosocial consequences for bullies, victims, other classmates, and communities. Bullying is linked to ...
The author explains what bullying is, how a whole-school approach works and what educators need t... more The author explains what bullying is, how a whole-school approach works and what educators need to do if their whole-school program is to succeed. Talk with schools about interventions to reduce bullying and you will discover that the whole-school approach has become the default program. However, there are many misconceptions in relation to the effectiveness and implementation of such an approach. With this in mind, the author provides further insight into what bullying is; explains what is and how effective is a whole-school approach; and outlines the minimum requirements for whole-school programs to succeed. To provide teachers and principals with practical advice in terms of policies and practices the author draws on both the empirical evidence and experiences obtained through his research and practice. [Author abstract, ed]
The Aboriginal Girls' Circle (AGC) is an intervention targeted to increase social connection, par... more The Aboriginal Girls' Circle (AGC) is an intervention targeted to increase social connection, participation and selfconfidence amongst Aboriginal girls attending secondary schools. Researchers from the University of Western Sydney (UWS)'s School of Education sought to evaluate the AGC pilot undertaken at Dubbo College and to provide recommendations for the program's further development.
Australian Association For Research in Education 2005 Conference Papers, 2015
Abstract Effective strategies for addressing school bullying are underpinned by the findings of a... more Abstract Effective strategies for addressing school bullying are underpinned by the findings of anti-bullying research. However the latter is plagued with methodological flaws including the use of:(a) dichotomous variables with quantitative and continuous data,(b) uni-...
Relations between self-concept and mental health are best understood from a multidimensional pers... more Relations between self-concept and mental health are best understood from a multidimensional perspective. For responses by 903 adolescents (mean age = 12.6) to a new French translation of the Self Description Questionnaire II (SDQII), confirmatory factor analysis demonstrated a well-defined multidimensional factor structure of reliable, highly differentiated self-concept factors. Correlations between 11 SDQII factors and 7 mental health problems (Youth Self-Report; YSR) varied substantially (.11 to -.83; mean r = -.35). Single higher-order factors could not explain relations among SDQII factors, among YSR factors, or between the SDQII and YSR factors. This highly differentiated multivariate pattern of relations supports a multidimensional perspective of self-concept, not the unidimensional perspective still prevalent in mental health research and assessment.
Regional and Global Cooperation in Educational Research Proceedings of the 42nd Joint Australian Association For Research in Education and Asia Pacific Educational Research Association Conference 2 6 December 2012 University of Sydney N S W, 2015
This paper offers a brief review of research on the impact of bullying and racism on Aboriginal a... more This paper offers a brief review of research on the impact of bullying and racism on Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples within Australia. The overarching emphasis was on the variety of physical, social, mental, and educational outcomes for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children and youth, whilst also critiquing the prevailing literature with regard to its inclusion and sensitivity towards the importance of culture and connected values. Within the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander research setting, although a strong base of research on the impact of racism has emerged, research on the impact of bullying is more recent. In addition, while there may be considerable overlap as to the individual impact of bullying and racism, racism research has identified a wider cultural/identity-threat that bullying research (with a few exceptions) has largely ignored. As a result, there is a need to be sensitive to cultural differences with regard to both the types and effects of racism and bullying, and that efforts to understand and to lessen the prevalence of racism and bullying should be framed within the development of a culturally sensitive and secure framework (Coffin, 2008).
The Aboriginal Girls’ Circle (AGC) is an intervention targeted to increase social connection, par... more The Aboriginal Girls’ Circle (AGC) is an intervention targeted to increase social connection, participation and self-confidence amongst Aboriginal girls attending secondary schools. Researchers from the University of Western Sydney (UWS)’s School of Education sought to evaluate the AGC pilot undertaken at Dubbo College and to provide recommendations for the program’s further development. The following specific aims were outlined for this pilot research. 1. To determine the effects of the AGC for participants’ resilience, connectedness, self-concept and cultural identity, 2. To investigate and track the development of culturally appropriate tools and methods for measuring these constructs, and 3. To evaluate the relative effectiveness of various components of the program and implementation processes. Ethical protocols for working with Aboriginal communities were an important aspect of the research design, which was approved by the UWS Human Research Ethics Committee and by the by the...
The present investigation evaluated relations between bullying, victimisation, multiple dimenstio... more The present investigation evaluated relations between bullying, victimisation, multiple dimenstions of self-concept, sex and age over two occasions for a large sample of students (N =3445) from six high schools in Year 7 to 11. In Study 1, there was strong psychometric support (confirmatory factor analysis and reliability) for two new instruments; a new short version of the widely used Self Description Questionnaire II (SDQII-S) that measures 11 different components of self-concept and Adolescent Peer Relations Instrument that measures three Bully factors (Physical, Verbal, Relational) and the corresponding three Victim factors. In Study 2, males used all three types of bullying (Physical, Verbal, Relational) and experienced two types of victimisation (Physical and Verbal) significantly more than females. Whereas levels of victimisation and bullying both increased during early high school years, vitimisation tended to decrease during subsequent high school years whereas bullying did...
An increasing awareness of the detrimental effects of single-item scales to measure bullying has ... more An increasing awareness of the detrimental effects of single-item scales to measure bullying has recently become apparent. A new multiple-item multiplescale behavioural measure of bullying was developed for secondary schools by Parada (2000) and found to be a reliable and valid scale for adolescent students. However, it is not known whether a similar instrument would yield sound psychometric properties for younger students and therefore provide a salient measure for those students. The aim of the present investigation is to examine the multi-dimensional and hierarchical structure of the Adolescent Peer Relations Questionnaire (APRI)(Parada, 2000) for upper primary aged students. A total of 894 students from Years 5 and 6 from eight Western Sydney primary schools completed the questionnaire. The APRI contains 36 items, 6 scales, and measures 3 types of bullying (Physical, Verbal, Social) in 2 categories (bullying, being targeted). Each scale (e.g., Bullying Physical) is comprised of ...
Journal of Adventure Education and Outdoor Learning, 2019
The Duke of Edinburgh's International Award (as it is named in Australia) is an extremely widespr... more The Duke of Edinburgh's International Award (as it is named in Australia) is an extremely widespread and popular youth development program. Participants (14-25 year olds) navigate the Bronze, Silver and Gold Award levels by completing: (1) Service, (2) Skills, (3) Physical Recreation, and (4) Adventurous Journey (recognising that at Gold level there is also a Residential Project requirement). Despite the international nature of the Award, with more than 1 million participants, research into its effects has been limited. This paper describes for the first time the ways in which the attribution of learning effects works with respect to the DoEIA. Using a mixed-methods approach, the research team sought results to show how participants themselves attribute their learnings to the Award, and what this could mean for youth development.
Marsh, Parada, Craven and Finger (2004) were amongst the first to find empirical support for a re... more Marsh, Parada, Craven and Finger (2004) were amongst the first to find empirical support for a reciprocal effects model of bullying in which being a bully leads to being a victim, and being a victim subsequently leads to being a bully. As such, the bully and victim roles cannot be seen as separate entities but rather as mutually reinforcing roles that co-occur. This paper extends those findings by examining whether this is the case for all forms of bullying, in particular verbal, physical and social/relational forms of bullying through the use of longitudinal structural equation models. A total of 3500 students attending NSW high schools were surveyed with a multidimensional measure of bullying behaviours at three time points during a single school year to examine their participation in bullying and victimising behaviours. Results, including the psychometric properties of the instruments and longitudinal structural equation models examining the reciprocal relation between specific forms of bullying and victimisation are presented. Implications for developing anti-bullying interventions are discussed.
Current victimization studies and meta-analyses are based mainly on a unidimensional perspective ... more Current victimization studies and meta-analyses are based mainly on a unidimensional perspective in a few developed OECD countries. This provides a weak basis for generalizability over multiple victimization (relational, verbal, physical) components and different countries. We test the cross-national generalizability (594,196 fifteen-year-olds; 77 countries) of competing victimization models. In support of our three-component model, differentiating the multiple components of victimization facilitated understanding: gender differences (girls experience less physical and verbal victimization and stronger anti-bullying attitudes, but relational differences are small); paradoxical anti-bullying attitudes (physical victims have less –not more--anti-bullying attitudes); and well-being (policy/practice focuses primarily on physical victimization, but verbal and relational victimization effects are larger). These key findings provide theoretical advances with implications for policy, practi...
The temporal ordering of depression, aggression, and victimization has important implications for... more The temporal ordering of depression, aggression, and victimization has important implications for theory, policy, and practice. For a representative sample of high school students (Grades 7-10; N = 3,793) who completed the same psychometrically strong, multiitem scales 6 times over a 2-year period, there were reciprocal effects between relational-aggression and relational-victimization factors: aggression led to subsequent victimization and victimization led to subsequent aggression. After controlling for prior depression, aggression, and victimization, depression had a positive effect on subsequent victimization, but victimization had no effect on subsequent depression. Aggression neither affected nor was affected by depression. The results suggest that depression is a selection factor that leads to victimization, but that victimization has little or no effect on subsequent depression beyond what can be explained by the preexisting depression. In support of developmental equilibriu...
Four studies evaluate the new Self Description Questionnaire II short-form (SDQII-S) that measure... more Four studies evaluate the new Self Description Questionnaire II short-form (SDQII-S) that measures 11 dimensions of adolescent self-concept based on responses to 51 of the original 102 SDQII items and demonstrate new statistical strategies to operationalize guidelines for short-form evaluation proposed by G. T. Smith, D. M. McCarthy, and K. G. Anderson (2000). Multiple-group confirmatory factor analyses revealed that the factor structure based on responses to 51 items by a new cross-validation group (n=9,134) was invariant with the factor structures based on responses to the same 51 items and to all 102 items by the original normative archive group (n = 9,187). Reliabilities for the 11 SDQII-S factors were nearly the same and consistently high (.80 to .89) for both groups. Multitrait-multimethod analyses support the internal validity of responses over time. Gender and age effects on the 11 SDQII-S factors were invariant across the archive and cross-validation groups.
Australian Association For Research in Education 2005 Conference Papers, 2015
Abstract There is a growing recognition that bullying, violence, aggression, victimisation, and p... more Abstract There is a growing recognition that bullying, violence, aggression, victimisation, and peer-relation difficulties in schools are pervasive problems with long-term psychosocial consequences for bullies, victims, other classmates, and communities. Bullying is linked to ...
The author explains what bullying is, how a whole-school approach works and what educators need t... more The author explains what bullying is, how a whole-school approach works and what educators need to do if their whole-school program is to succeed. Talk with schools about interventions to reduce bullying and you will discover that the whole-school approach has become the default program. However, there are many misconceptions in relation to the effectiveness and implementation of such an approach. With this in mind, the author provides further insight into what bullying is; explains what is and how effective is a whole-school approach; and outlines the minimum requirements for whole-school programs to succeed. To provide teachers and principals with practical advice in terms of policies and practices the author draws on both the empirical evidence and experiences obtained through his research and practice. [Author abstract, ed]
The Aboriginal Girls' Circle (AGC) is an intervention targeted to increase social connection, par... more The Aboriginal Girls' Circle (AGC) is an intervention targeted to increase social connection, participation and selfconfidence amongst Aboriginal girls attending secondary schools. Researchers from the University of Western Sydney (UWS)'s School of Education sought to evaluate the AGC pilot undertaken at Dubbo College and to provide recommendations for the program's further development.
Australian Association For Research in Education 2005 Conference Papers, 2015
Abstract Effective strategies for addressing school bullying are underpinned by the findings of a... more Abstract Effective strategies for addressing school bullying are underpinned by the findings of anti-bullying research. However the latter is plagued with methodological flaws including the use of:(a) dichotomous variables with quantitative and continuous data,(b) uni-...
Relations between self-concept and mental health are best understood from a multidimensional pers... more Relations between self-concept and mental health are best understood from a multidimensional perspective. For responses by 903 adolescents (mean age = 12.6) to a new French translation of the Self Description Questionnaire II (SDQII), confirmatory factor analysis demonstrated a well-defined multidimensional factor structure of reliable, highly differentiated self-concept factors. Correlations between 11 SDQII factors and 7 mental health problems (Youth Self-Report; YSR) varied substantially (.11 to -.83; mean r = -.35). Single higher-order factors could not explain relations among SDQII factors, among YSR factors, or between the SDQII and YSR factors. This highly differentiated multivariate pattern of relations supports a multidimensional perspective of self-concept, not the unidimensional perspective still prevalent in mental health research and assessment.
Regional and Global Cooperation in Educational Research Proceedings of the 42nd Joint Australian Association For Research in Education and Asia Pacific Educational Research Association Conference 2 6 December 2012 University of Sydney N S W, 2015
This paper offers a brief review of research on the impact of bullying and racism on Aboriginal a... more This paper offers a brief review of research on the impact of bullying and racism on Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples within Australia. The overarching emphasis was on the variety of physical, social, mental, and educational outcomes for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children and youth, whilst also critiquing the prevailing literature with regard to its inclusion and sensitivity towards the importance of culture and connected values. Within the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander research setting, although a strong base of research on the impact of racism has emerged, research on the impact of bullying is more recent. In addition, while there may be considerable overlap as to the individual impact of bullying and racism, racism research has identified a wider cultural/identity-threat that bullying research (with a few exceptions) has largely ignored. As a result, there is a need to be sensitive to cultural differences with regard to both the types and effects of racism and bullying, and that efforts to understand and to lessen the prevalence of racism and bullying should be framed within the development of a culturally sensitive and secure framework (Coffin, 2008).
The Aboriginal Girls’ Circle (AGC) is an intervention targeted to increase social connection, par... more The Aboriginal Girls’ Circle (AGC) is an intervention targeted to increase social connection, participation and self-confidence amongst Aboriginal girls attending secondary schools. Researchers from the University of Western Sydney (UWS)’s School of Education sought to evaluate the AGC pilot undertaken at Dubbo College and to provide recommendations for the program’s further development. The following specific aims were outlined for this pilot research. 1. To determine the effects of the AGC for participants’ resilience, connectedness, self-concept and cultural identity, 2. To investigate and track the development of culturally appropriate tools and methods for measuring these constructs, and 3. To evaluate the relative effectiveness of various components of the program and implementation processes. Ethical protocols for working with Aboriginal communities were an important aspect of the research design, which was approved by the UWS Human Research Ethics Committee and by the by the...
Uploads
Papers by Roberto Parada