Discussion

materials for children as well as the method of data collection in the schools. Most of the scales were found to be reliable and valid. A clear factor structure was found for the BBES victim subscale, and the CATCH. All of these scales also had a high Cronbach’s alpha.

The reliability scores and factor structure of two scales were not at an acceptable level. These were the SDQ conduct problems subscale and the BBES bully subscale. The SDQ conduct problems scale has been used frequently in previous research and has not always been found to have an acceptable Cronbach’s alpha (Muris, Meesters,

Eijkelenboom & Vincken, 2004; Muris, Meesters, van den Berg, 2003), however reviews conducted into the scale maintain that it is a reliable and valid scale (Bourdon, Goodman, Rae, Simpson & Koretz, 2005; Goodman, 2001). The BBES was developed recently and was tested on a relatively small sample (348 children aged between 8-10 years old) and so has not been used extensively in previous research (Fink et al., 2015). The unreliable nature of the scale may have been found in this research due to the recruitment of slightly older children (11-14 years old), however in order for the scale to be accessible to those with SEND, a scale with a low reading age, such as the BBES, was the most appropriate choice. The Cronbach’s alpha in the original development of the subscale was very good (.80) however this was not replicated in this research (.62). This large decrease in internal consistency may indicate that the bully subscale of the BBES has some issues when being used on an older sample and conclusions using this measure must be tentative. As this scale was relatively new and had not been widely tested, it was decided that a more robust, pre-established scale should be used in this instance. These issues indicate that further research needs to be carried out on this scale to investigate the sample it is best used with in order to achieve a good reliability score and a clear factor structure. As both of these scales had a Cronbach’s alpha below .7 in this study, however, they were not used for the main study. This decision was based on several reasons beyond the poor reliability; firstly, the questionnaire was lengthy and it was decided that it would be better for student

engagement as well as time commitment from the school that the questionnaire be shorter; secondly, other scales were used to measure bullying behaviour (the adapted self-report PRS) and it was decided that as the main focus of this thesis is peer victimisation, rather than bullying, the conduct problems scale was not a key predictor of this variable.

The BBES victim subscale had a very good reliability score which was similar to that found in the original development of the scale (Fink et al., 2015). Furthermore, the SDQ emotional symptoms subscale had an acceptable reliability score which matched that found by Goodman et al. (1998) in the development of the scale. Finally, the CATCH, in its shorted form, had a very good reliability score which was similar to that found by Rosenbaum et al. (1986) when the scale was developed. All of these scales were retained for the main study.

3.2.3.1. Changes to main study. Following the above investigations of the scales, several changes were made prior to the main study being carried out. These changes were based on the results of the analysis and also practical issues faced in the pilot work. These are summarised below.

In the pilot work, all children from years 7 (aged 11-12) and 9 (aged 13-14) from one school were asked to take part. As the main study aims to investigate school level factors, the focus will be on number of schools as well as students. In order to recruit an appropriate number of both schools and participants, it was decided that approximately 50 children would be recruited per year group from 10-15 schools. After discussions

regarding the sample size, it was agreed that 150 children per school was optimal due to the practicality/time limitation of a study of this size. In order to study the entirety of key

stage 3, year 8 pupils (aged 12-13 years) were included in the main study to gain further insights into the progression of bullying across the first three years of secondary school.

The PRS was altered because only 2/225 children reported themselves to be bullies. This indicates that using a questionnaire version of the shorted PRS was not very accurate and a more comprehensive scale was needed in order to accurately capture the number of bullies in a school. The scale was altered back to the original PRS of 45 items, however it was kept as a self-report measure. Across the 45 items, there were five subscales

measuring the different roles. The bully role had 10 items, the reinforcer role had seven items, the assistant role had four items, the defender role had 20 items and the outsider role had seven items. This meant that the roles would be measured more accurately using several different items, rather than relying on one.

Additionally, the friendship question was refined to ask children to name just three friends from within their own class, rather than as many as they like. This is because many children listed all of their friends from the entire year group, rather than specifically identifying the closest friends, and so it may not have been very accurate, as some followed the instructions whereas others did not, and so the nominations cannot be compared. Parker and Asher (1993), who developed this method of friendship analysis, asked children to identify their three best friends, and so this method was utilised in the main study. Finally, the bullying behaviour scale of the BBES was removed due to both the poor reliability score and the inclusion of new items in the PRS which also measure bullying, making a second bullying measure (the BBES) unnecessary.

In regards to the disability question, many children were unsure whether their diagnosis was considered a disability based on the number of questions the researchers had during data collection – many children needed advice as to whether they should include their diagnosis or not. For example, some children asked whether

cancer/epilepsy/diabetes/depression/hypermobility etc. were disabilities. Therefore, instead of asking children to write the name of their disability, the decision was made to give a list of 23 common disabilities along with an ‘other’ option. This list was developed using the disabilities that children identified in the pilot, adding common disabilities found in schools (DfE, 2014c) and reviewing the final list with a SENCo who amended the list to make the terms more child accessible (e.g. removing profound & multiple learning difficulties, as this was too technical for the students) and added some additional disabilities that they found to be common through working with children with SEND. Upon analysis in the main study (Chapter 4), some of the disabilities were removed and this is explained in section 4.2.2. The conduct problems scale of the SDQ was removed due to low reliability. Finally, the CATCH was refined following reliability analysis and factor analysis and 5 items were removed to make it more reliable and coherent.

Two newly developed questions were also added to the questionnaire based on the concept on inclusion used in this thesis in order to measure school climate, asking children about their pride in the school’s inclusion and their approach to promoting tolerance. This aimed to capture the children’s perception of the level of school inclusion. This was subsequently in conjunction with the school level data collected from a variety of

additional sources in order to create an overall score of school inclusion. The school level pilot work, along with an explanation of these sources, will be explained in the following sections (3.3 and 3.4).

In the pilot work, two questionnaires were used, one focused primarily on disability and one focused primarily on bullying. The first questionnaire session consisted of open questions about a child’s disability, the SDQ (conduct problems and emotional symptoms) and the CATCH with Handicaps scale. The second questionnaire session consisted of an

adapted self-report version of the Participant Role Scale, a friendship measure and the Bullying Behaviour and Experiences Scale.

For the main study, the questionnaire was combined into one session. This is because each session took very little time (between 5 and 10 minutes each) and it was deemed unnecessarily disruptive to the school to visit twice for such short sessions. Furthermore, children made the connection between the two sessions despite them being a week apart, as students asked questions about the questionnaire from the previous session, indicating they were thinking about both questionnaires despite having a gap between the two. This was probably due to information being given about the whole study and the same researcher returning to school.

Thus, the final questionnaire was as follows: definitions of disability and bullying were provided at the start and children then worked through the scales in the following order; PRS, friendships, BBES, disability questions, SDQ, and the CATCH. As both sessions were combined, it was imperative to ensure children did not feel targeted by the research, particularly children with SEND who were being victimised, and so the

introduction and debrief were carefully worded for the main study. In addition, an

educational activity that increases awareness of celebrities with disabilities was delivered after the debrief.

3.3. Development of Policy and Ofsted Analyses