Children’s Evaluation of Bystander Behavior in Intergroup Situations: The Role of Peer Group Dynamics and First Insights From a School-Based Intervention Program

• In Event: Facilitating Positive Intergroup Relations: Research on Children’s and Adolescents’ Out-Group Prosociality

Abstract

Bystander reactions in negative peer interactions have become a recent focus of research on improving intergroup relations (Rutland et al., 2022). Bystanders express behaviors that support or defend victims and represent powerful sources in bullying interventions (Salmivalli, 2010). In intergroup situations, children from marginalized groups are often targets of exclusion; thus, previous research focused on the question how children balance considerations for group identity and peer group norms with concerns of fairness (Gönültaş & Mulvey, 2020) and how children perceive their efficacy for intervening (Abbott et al., 2020).
Extending this work, we examined children’s evaluations of bystander behavior with regards to social exclusion of peers with special educational needs (SEN, see Figure 1). We aimed to gain more insights on how children balance considerations of fairness (e.g., concerns regarding the excluded peer) with considerations of existing peer dynamics in their classroom (e.g., consequences for one’s own status), given their peer status within their classroom. Moreover, we investigated whether children’s evaluations and bystander efficacy changed over time when participating in the Friendship Project, a comprehensive intervention targeting teachers’ knowledge about social classroom dynamics as well as children’s understanding of group norms and moral considerations. The intervention includes a specifically designed child book in which emerging cross-group friendships are modelled (Turner & Cameron, 2016). This book was read to students over a period of 6 weeks, followed by classroom discussions that aimed to promote children’s understanding of group dynamics, and group exercises or role-play, with the two last weeks focusing on bystander behavior.
The intervention was examined in a randomized control trial including 67 school classes (N = 1019, grades 3-6, Mage = 11.15, 22% non-Swiss, 29% who needed assistance of a special needs teacher) of which 34 classes were part of the intervention group. The student questionnaires included various aspects (preregistered hypotheses), whereby the current analyses focus on students’ efficacy for bystander interventions. Moreover, a follow-up study with 10 additional intervention classrooms (N = 153) examined changes in students’ bystander efficacy and evaluations related to bystander behavior in a vignette, where a peer with learning difficulty was excluded, followed by a resource allocation task (allocating 6 pieces of chocolates between the child, the excluder, and the victim). Children’s reasoning about their allocation strategies was coded based on the social domain model (Killen & Rutland, 2011).
Preliminary results from multilevel analyses showed that, in intervention as compared to control classrooms, students with SEN became more likely to perceive efficacy to support a peer with SEN (see Figure 2). The results from the follow-up study replicated this result and highlight that all students became more likely over time to perceive the behavior of bystanders as wrong (t(146) = 2.68**, d = 0.22). Moreover, 83% of children allocated resources equally between the three parties, while 13% allocated more to the SEN character. Reasonings predominantly focused on equal treatment, while children were also concerned with potential consequences for their own status. Follow-up analyses will investigate more complex associations between children’s peer status within their classroom.

Authors

• Jeanine Grütter, University of Konstanz
  Presenting Author

• Carmen Barth, University of Konstanz