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School climate and students’ disruptive behavior: Perceptions of school professionals

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Abstract

School climate (SC) reflects the culture and norms of the school community, being a potential factor linked to students’ disruptive behavior (DB). This study intended to characterize the Portuguese school professionals’ perception on SC, analyzing the connections to the students’ DB. Another objective was to explore the differences on SC based on the functions of school professionals and school geographic location. An exploratory study with 333 school professionals was carried out. Concerning SC, the participants were asked about environmental-structural and relationships, while absenteeism, behavior problems, and incivilities were included in the students’ DB. Overall, the participants generally reported positive perceptions about SC. Differences were observed on DB, based on SC ratings. The participants rating poorer environmental-structural and relationships tended to report more DB. SC differed according to the school geographic location and to functions of school professionals. Additional research about the implications of SC on students’ DB is needed to develop preventive strategies.

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Available upon request to the authors.

Notes

  1. “LookCrim - Looking at crime: Communities and Physical Spaces” Projetc, which is financed by National Funds through FCT – Fundação para a Ciência e Tecnologia under the project PTDC / DIR-DCP / 28,120/2017.

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Code Availability

SPSS syntax is available upon request to the authors.

Funding

This work was supported by the National Funds through FCT (Foundation for Science and Technology) under the project “LOOKCRIM: Looking at communities and physical spaces” (PTDC/DIR-DCP/28120/2017). FCT did not interfere in the study design, in the collection, analysis and interpretation of data; in the writing of the report; and in the decision to submit the article for publication.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Permanent Observatory Violence and Crime (OPVC) at UFP, University Fernando Pessoa (UFP), Porto, Portugal

    Vanessa Azevedo, Sónia Caridade, Maria Alzira Pimenta Dinis, Laura M. Nunes & Ana Sani

  2. Faculdade de Ciências Humanas e Sociais, University Fernando Pessoa (UFP), Praça 9 de Abril, 349, 4249-004, Porto, Portugal

    Vanessa Azevedo

  3. UFP Energy, Environment and Health Research Unit (FP-ENAS), University Fernando Pessoa (UFP), Praça 9 de Abril, 349, 4249-004, Porto, Portugal

    Maria Alzira Pimenta Dinis

  4. Centro de Investigação em Justiça e Governação (JusGov), University of Minho (UM), Braga, Portugal

    Laura M. Nunes

  5. Research Center on Child Studies (CIEC), University of Minho (UM), Braga, Portugal

    Ana Sani

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  1. Vanessa Azevedo
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  2. Sónia Caridade
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  3. Maria Alzira Pimenta Dinis
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  4. Laura M. Nunes
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  5. Ana Sani
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Contributions

Conceptualization: Vanessa Azevedo, Sónia Caridade; Methodology: Vanessa Azevedo, Sónia Caridade; Formal analysis and investigation: Vanessa Azevedo, Sónia Caridade; Writing - original draft preparation: Vanessa Azevedo, Sónia Caridade; Writing - review and editing: Maria Alzira Pimenta Dinis, Laura M. Nunes, Ana Sani; Funding acquisition: Laura M. Nunes, Ana Sani, Sónia Caridade, Maria Alzira Pimenta Dinis.

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Vanessa Azevedo.

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Ethics Approval

The study was conducted in accordance with the Declaration of Helsinki, and the protocol was approved by the Ethics Committee of University Fernando Pessoa (UFP) Porto, Portugal, Project “Diagnosis of the school climate”, 20 April 2017, no specific reference assigned, date acting as reference ID. The research project was also submitted and approved by the Portuguese Ministry of Education (Ref. No. 0498800002).

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Azevedo, V., Caridade, S., Dinis, M.A.P. et al. School climate and students’ disruptive behavior: Perceptions of school professionals. Curr Psychol 42, 10012–10024 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12144-021-02181-w

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