Intervention of anti-violence in school: implementation and results

Abstract

Introduction: Health Education in schools has had an important role in raising awareness of issues that go beyond the curriculum. School violence is a phenomenon with potentially dramatic consequences, especially in the victim, bully, family and the whole school community. In this sense, we developed a project in a Vertical Group of Schools of Portugal (VGSP) that energized the school about the bullying prevention. Objectives: To characterize bullying in a group of students attending the VGSP and evaluate a program of prevention / intervention, involving the whole school community. Methodology: We performed a diagnostic evaluation (1st time: n = 313) in a random, stratified sample of students through questionnaire “Diagnosis of Bullying at School” of the Directorate-General of Health. Subsequently, an intervention program called “We and the Others”. In the end, further evaluation was conducted (2nd time: n= 298). Results: The extent of bullying found is consistent with the results of the literature decreasing from 14.6% to 10.7% of students who reported having been victims in the past two months. With regard to bully provokers, the results showed differences in the intensity of the phenomenon, revealing a decrease of verbal aggressiveness behaviors between the two points in time (t(280) = 2.40, p = 0.017). Conclusions: It is important that this topic be part of the educational program of the AVENP. Bullying has changing characteristics and the School has the role of monitoring this phenomenon in a longitudinal logic to modify behaviors. This program has implications for pedagogical practices that promote the mental health of students.