Practice Goals/Target Population
Research has shown that youth violence and related aggressive behaviors, such as bullying or antisocial behavior, can be risk factors for later adult violence (Mytton et al. 2006). According to the 2017 Youth Risk Behavior Survey, nearly a quarter of U.S. high school students reported getting into a physical fight in the previous year (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 2020). Selective school-based violence prevention programs (also known as secondary violence prevention programs) target specific students in grades K–12, compared with universal violence prevention programs, which are implemented with all students in a school or classroom. The overall goal of these programs is to prevent or reduce violence and aggression schoolchildren.
Services Provided
Selective school-based violence prevention programs vary in their components, approaches, and scope. Specific components may include anger control training, anger management, stress inoculation, individual counseling, mentoring, parent training, life skills, peer-group conflict management, coping skills training, cognitive skills training, empathy training, problem-solving skills training, and conflict management training (Mytton et al. 2002).
Programs can be implemented based on theoretical approaches, rooted in established psychological theories of behavior (Park-Higgerson et al. 2008). For example, some programs are based on attribution theory, which proposes that aggressive and hostile behavior stems from outward motivators (e.g., negative actions of others that are perceived as intentional). These programs seek to reduce aggressive behavior by teaching youth how to control and manage anger when these motivators occur (Herrmann and McWhirter 2003). Other programs are built on social cognitive theory, which suggests that learning occurs through a social context by observing outside interactions and experience. Following on to this theory, these programs often involve elements of role play and modeling (Park-Higgerson et al. 2008).
The scope of the intervention may also vary from program to program. For instance, single-approach programs focus solely on implementing a curriculum in the classroom, whereas multiple-approach programs involve other aspects of the students’ lives and can include parents, peers, and members of the community in violence prevention efforts.
School-based interventions are often led by the child’s classroom teacher, but specialists can also come into the classroom to lead the program while the teacher assists.
