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Teaching and Teacher Education 26 (2010) 957e964

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Teaching and Teacher Education

journal homepage: www.elsevier .com/locate/ tate

Why did you do that? Teachers explain the use of legalaggression in the classroom

Philip Riley a,*, Ramon (Rom) Lewis b, Christine Brewb

aMonash University, Building 6, Wellington Road, Clayton, Victoria 3800, Australiab La Trobe University, Plenty Road, Bundoora 3086, Australia

a r t i c l e i n f o

Article history:Received 20 May 2008Received in revised form23 July 2009Accepted 28 October 2009

Keywords:Classroom disciplineAttribution theoryEfficacy theoryAttachment theory

* Corresponding author. Tel.: þ61 3 9905 2546; faxE-mail addresses: Philip.riley@education.monash

latrobe.edu.au (R. (Rom) Lewis), c.brew@latrobe.edu.a

0742-051X/$ e see front matter � 2009 Elsevier Ltd.doi:10.1016/j.tate.2009.10.037

a b s t r a c t

Teachers (n ¼ 233) who employ aggressive classroom management strategies were asked to theoriseabout their use. Levels of support for three theoretical explanations for aggressive behaviour wereassessed via a 26 item scale. The items loaded to three factors: Attribution Theory; Efficacy Theory andAttachment Theory. Results indicated most teachers, 42%, supported Attribution, 34% supported Efficacy,and 33% supported Attachment as an explanation for aggressive behaviour. Moreover, 14% of teacherssupport all theories simultaneously, whilst 27% of teachers rejected all theories. The implications of thesefindings are that many teachers may be theoretically blind when it comes to classroom management:hence re- rather than pro-active. The importance of this finding for professional development providersand future qualitative research design is discussed.

� 2009 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction

Aggression shown by teachers toward their students isa common occurrence (Lewis, Romi, Katz, & Qui, 2008; Lewis, Romi,Qui & Katz, 2005; Cukier, 1990; Poenaru & Sava, 1998; Sava, 2002).The evidence is clear that teacher aggression distracts students fromtheir schoolwork (Lewis et al., 2008) diminishes rather thanenhances student learning (Aysan, Baban, Savage, & Van De Vijver,2001; Kearney, Plax, Hayes, & Ivey, 1991; Sava, 2002) and does notfoster a sense of responsibility in students (Romi, et al., 2009). Manyteachers are faced with serious provocations from their studentsthat need effective and timely responses. The efficacy of teachers'classroom discipline techniques have been researched for over 50years, with increasing awareness of the detrimental effects ofteacher misbehaviour for students (Lewis, 2006; Lewis & Riley,2009; Lewis et al., 2008; Poenaru & Sava, 1998; Sava, 2002; Treloar,2007). This article is concerned with one of the subtypes of teachermisbehaviour, legal acts of aggression defined as either yelling inanger, humiliation or sarcasm displayed toward students byteachers. For the remainder of this article these behaviours will bedefined as teacher aggression. While aggressive behaviour in othersettings has been widely researched (see, Barling, Dupre, & Kello-way, 2009; De Dreu & Gelfand, 2008; Hershcovis et al. 2007; Inness,

: þ61 3 9905 2779..edu.au (P. Riley), r.lewis@u (C. Brew).

All rights reserved.

LeBlanc, & Barling, 2008; Winstanley & Whittington, 2002) to datethis has not been addressed in schools. Indeed Sava (2002) sug-gested that it appears to have been a taboo area for Westernresearchers, at least in English. However, the extent and impact ofteacher aggression on students has been documented (Hyman &Snook, 1999; Sava, 2002) which behoves us to try to understandwhy it occurs. Understanding the phenomena of teacher aggressionis the first step toward reducing, mitigating or preventing itsoccurrence through changes to initial training and professionaldevelopment for teachers.

A search of the literature provided three theories which appearcapable of explaining why teachers use aggressive techniqueswhen managing challenging children: Attribution theory, Attach-ment Theory and Efficacy Theory. Although the elements of eachtheory are discrete there are points of overlap. The following briefdescription of each attempts to emphasise the unique elements ofeach highlighting why it might explain teachers' use of aggressivetactics for maintaining classroom discipline. The order reflects theirtake-up by teachers.

1.1. Efficacy theory

Efficacy theory is the most widely researched theory inpsychology. Since its inception it has dominated thinking ineducation. A teacher who adopts the theory is focussed on identi-fying techniques that will keep students on task, and allow lessonsto continue. At times their concern will be what is best for themisbehaving student, at others they will be focussed on the class as

P. Riley et al. / Teaching and Teacher Education 26 (2010) 957e964958

a whole, which may be at odds with the needs of an individualstudent. At other times a teacher's need to feel in control of theclass will override the needs of students or even the class.

According to the theory, in terms of teacher aggression, whenteachers feel the classroom situation is very stressful they are thenmore likely to act aggressively with students because they regard itas an efficient way of dealing with challenging students. They willalso have assessed other techniques to be less effective. Theybehave this way because it works for them in controlling thestudent (For a more detailed description of efficacy theory as itrelates to classroom experiences see: Anderson, Hattie, & Hamilton,2005; Chan, 2003; Denzine, Cooney, & McKenzie, 2005; Fabio,Giorgi, Majer, & Palazzeschi, 2005; Hoy & Woolfolk, 1993; Kar-ademas & Kalantzi-Azizi, 2004; Knoblauch & Woolfolk Hoy,2008Shaughnessy, 2004; Skaalvik & Skaalivik, 2007; Tschannen-Moran, Woolfolk Hoy, & Hoy, 1998; Woolfolk & Hoy, 1990). Most ofthe professional development offered to teachers in the area ofclassroom management reflects the wide acceptance of the theoryin education: it offers skill training and coaching to improveteachers' classroom management behaviour.

1.2. Attribution theory

Teachers may cite students' challenging natures, theirupbringing or level of intelligence and socialisation as causal factorsfor both positive and negative classroom behaviours and outcomes.When teachers attribute the reason for their aggressive responsesto the characteristics of the students themselves, they feel justifiedin behaving aggressively. In effect, this places the responsibility forthe teachers' aggressive behaviour onto the students. They feelcompelled to respond this way because it will be “the only thing thestudent understands”. Once again, the justification may be in termsof what behaviour is seen as best for the student and/or teacher.(For a more detailed review of attribution theory in the classroomsee: Author, Lewis & Riley, 2009; Bibou-Nakou, Stogiannidou, &Kiosseoglou, 1999; Caprara, Pastorelli, & Weiner, 1997; Rudolph,Roesch, Greitemeyer, & Weiner, 2004; Sczesny, Spreemann, &Stahlberg, 2006; Weiner, 2000). Although cited in studies ofteachers as explaining classroom management behaviour there islittle professional development aimed at challenging teachers'causal attributions for student behaviour.

1.3. Attachment theory

Attachment theory was the most complex of the theoriesoffered to teachers in this study. It represents aggression as indi-cator of difficulties in the relationship between the teacher andstudents. Attachment theory describes the internal, need ofteachers to become connected, or attached, to their students andhow student behaviour affects the teacher's emotions and thereforehis or her responses to them, particularly “difficult to manage”ones. The theory suggests that teachers tend to form relationshipswith students that mirror relationships they had with their owncaregivers, including teachers, as they grew up. The theory alsopredicts that these formative experiences of relationshipsmay havecontributed to their career choice, as they seek some combinationof respect, adulation or even love, through reparative or restorativerelationships with students (Wright & Sherman, 1963), and thatthis becomes essential in the construction of a professional identity(Riley, 2009).

The insecurely attached teacher (Ainsworth, Blehar, Waters, &Wall, 1978) will be more likely to behave aggressively towardstudents because of the nature of the relationships (attachments)they form with them. An example of this is a teacher who uncon-sciously needs students to become dependent on him or her as

a way of remaining close to these students. Signs of student inde-pendence and/or a direct challenge from a student may beconstrued by the teacher as an emotional abandoning (Bowlby,1988). This perception in turn excites the attachment behaviouralsystem and instigates separation protest behaviours (almost alwaysaggressive to some degree) which the teacher learned in childhoodand remain largely outside of conscious awareness. (The majorworks that outline attachment theory are: Bowlby, 1975, 1980,1982,1988; For a more detailed description of attachment theory asit applies in the classroom see: Riley, 2009).

1.4. Research questions

The data reported in this article was drawn from a larger studydesigned to address support measures for teachers in dealing withdifficult students. The following research questions were used toguide the current investigation:

1. Towhat degree do teachers identify the theories as explanatoryfor their aggression

2. Do they identify more than one?3. Can each be measured reliably?4. Can each be separated psychometrically?5. To what degree do the theories overlap?6. To what degree does each describe the nature of teacher

aggression?

2. Teachers' use of theories supporting aggressive responding

Initially, as will be explained below, teachers were offered briefstatements characteristic of the three theories of behaviour out-lined above, that a review of the literature suggested may playa part in teachers aggressive responding. They were then asked toindicate the extent to which they agreed that each of the state-ments provided a reason for the use of aggression by teachers inresponse to misbehaviour (for example, “You can't get through tosome difficult kids”; “It makes the student do what I want”; “It'sa good way to show some students that I care”).

For answers, wewent to the teachers themselves, mindful of thefact that we sought explanations for the behaviour rather thanapportioning blame.Weundertook to survey teachers anonymouslyin the hope of gaining more candid and informative feedback.

3. Method

3.1. Participants

The participants were selected from teachers working ata number of schools at which one of the authors had been invited toprovide professional development on classroom management. Theanalysis proceeded with the surveys returned by 244 teachers.Since the investigation aimed to document the reasons given byteachers to explain their use of aggressive classroom disciplinarypractices, any teacher who reported never using such techniqueswas excluded. The extent of the problem of aggressive respondingin Victorian schools was confirmed in that only 11 teachers had tobe excluded from the sample on this basis. Consequently, the datapresented were provided by 233 teachers from 5 elementary and 5secondary state schools in the western region of Victoria. Table 1reports the distribution of male and female teachers in theseelementary and secondary schools.

The participants were largely secondary school teachers andwomen. Eighteen percent of the sampled teachers worked inelementary schools, of those, 83% were women. Among the 192secondary teachers sampled, 67% were women.

Table 1Sample demographics.

Type of School Male Female Total

Elementary 7 34 41Secondary 64 128 192

Total 71 162 233

P. Riley et al. / Teaching and Teacher Education 26 (2010) 957e964 959

It is possible that there is systematic bias in the sampling. First,the question needs to be asked, what stimulates school staff torequest professional development in the area of classroommanagement. The schools involved may represent those whereconsiderable aggression was apparent. If it is because they arefacing greater challenges from their students than they are used to,then one may assume that staff at such schools are more likely thanthe norm to engage in aggression. However, teachers who werestressed enough to act aggressively toward students may not wishto declare it.

Alternatively, it is possible that teachers who were concernedwith classroom management are those who are most concernedwith the welfare of children and therefore are less likely than thenorm to be acting aggressively. Thus, it is not possible to determineif teachers who are having trouble with classroommanagement areover or under-represented in the sample.

Nevertheless, as explained earlier, the survey sought primarilyto provide measures of types of justifications accepted to explaintheir usage of aggressive disciplinary techniques, and these maynot be influenced by teachers' levels of aggression. Therefore, thestudy design was deemed satisfactory.

3.2. Instrument

Participants filled in a modified version of the Teacher Ques-tionnaire (Lewis et al., 2005). The items included demographicinformation, three likert scale questions on type of aggressivebehaviour employed, and an open-ended question where partici-pants explained why they employed (or did not employ) thetechniques. The next section invited participants to indicate theextent to which they agreed with 26 five-point likert scale itemsand three open-ended questions that explained the use of aggres-sion. Finally, participants responded to 18 likert scale items thatsought to determine effective support measures that could be usedto reduce aggressive responding.

3.3. Validity analysis

To assess the extent to which teachers used aggressive disci-plinary techniques four items were incorporated into the survey tomeasure the extent to which the teachers manifested yelling inanger, sarcasm and group punishment, identified elsewhere asaggressive disciplinary techniques (Lewis et al., 2008).

To explore the validity of the three theoretical explanations forteacher aggression two processes were adopted. Initially a facevalidity study was conducted with 35 experienced teachers (notdrawn from the sample) who were provided definitions of each ofthe three explanatory theories; Attribution, Attachment and Effi-cacy theory and then asked to indicate which items froma substantive list related uniquely to each. Using a criteria of 80%agreement that the item related only to one specific theory resultedin 26 items for this component of the survey. These items wererandomised and assigned a 5 point scale of level of agreement(strongly agree, agree, not sure, disagree and strongly disagreewere coded 5 to 1 respectively). Teachers were asked to respond tothese items in the following way: If you have ever used techniques

such as yelling in anger, intentional embarrassment of students etc,please indicate the extent to which the following reasons accu-rately describe why.

Prior to attempting to establish scales comprising subsets of the26 items, missing data analysis revealed missing values for all itemsranging from 2.9 to 7.8%. Tomaintain a sample size greater than 200(n ¼ 234), missing data were replaced by the group mean for eachitem after establishing that the pattern of missing data was notsignificantly different from random.

To commence the development of scales, the 26 items weresubjected to an Exploratory Factor Analysis (EFA) (MaximumLikelihood) using SPSS. The adequacy of the data for factor analysiswas assessed by the Kaiser-Meyer-Olkin (KMO) test and Bartlett'stest of sphericity. The data were then subject to Direct Obliminrotation to explore whether the items clustered to form threefactors as proposed. A Direct Oblimin rotation assumes therewill besome relationship between the factors (Gorsuch, 1983), common ineducational, psychological and social research. Alternative rota-tions such as varimax assume no relationships between factors.Oblimin was used on the assumption that the three theoreticaljustifications for teacher aggression were related. To determine thenumber of real factors the scree plot was examined and a parallelanalysis (Watkins, 2000) was conducted.

Congeneric models of the resulting factors were tested in AMOS7 (Arbuckle, 2005) prior to testing the factorial validity of thehypothesised model derived from the EFA. The variances of thelatent variables were set to unity in order to identify the models.Multiple criteria were used to assess the goodness of fit followingKline (1998) and others (Arbuckle & Wothke, 1999; Conroy, Motl, &Hall, 2000; Kowalski & Crocker, 2001Pedhazur & Schmelkin, 1991;Vandiver & Worrell, 2002). Descriptive fit was assessed by the ratioof c2 to its degree of freedom (df), root mean square error ofapproximation (RMSEA), RMR (root mean square residual), TuckerLewis Index (TLI), the Comparative Fit Index (CFI), the Goodness ofFit Index (GFI), and the Adjusted Goodness of Fit Index (AGFI). Thecriteria used to indicate adequate fit of the models were: a c2/dfbetween 1 and 3; RMSEA and RMR range .05e.08; and GFI, AGFI, TLIand CFI > .90. Cronbach Alpha scores are also reported. Itemdeletion was assisted by examining the Standardized SquaredResiduals for pairs of items with values > 2.58 (Byrnes, 2001). Thefour items designed to measure the extent of aggressive disci-plinary techniques were also subject to a comparable validityanalysis using AMOS 7.0.

3.4. Analysis for group differences

To determine if gender, level of schooling (elementary versussecondary), or teachers' level of experience, influenced either theiruse of aggressive disciplinary techniques or their understanding ofwhy they occur, two Analyses of Variance (ANOVA) were per-formed. Both analyses used years of experience (up to 4, 5e12,13e22, more than 22), gender and schooling level (Elementary/Secondary) as independent variables. The first ANOVA examinedthe relationships between these variables and reported level ofaggression. The second was a Multivariate ANOVA in which thethree explanations for aggression scales served as dependentvariables. In addition to experience, gender and schooling level theamount of self-reported aggression (in halves) served as a fourthindependent variable. Although we acknowledge that dichoto-mising levels of aggression results in a conservative testing of itsimpact, there were too few elementary teachers displaying suffi-ciently high levels of aggression to permit the use of quartiles oreven thirds. Teachers were categorised as those who, on average,employed aggressive techniques hardly ever or less frequently andthose who manifested such behaviour more than hardly ever.

Table 2Goodness of fit indices for the scales.

Congeneric model No. items c2/df RMSEA RMR TLI CFI GFI AGFI

Attribution 5 2.341 .08 .04 .95 .97 .98 .94Attachment 4 1.81 .06 .03 .96 .99 .99 .96Efficacy 8 1.33 .04 .03 .99 .99 .97 .95Aggression 3 1.807 .06 .06 .94 .96 .94 .91

Table 4Descriptive statistics of the scales.

Scale Averageitem mean

Std.deviation

Alphacoefficient

Attribution (B9,6,14,25,1) 3.11 .82 .74Attachment (B25,5,26) 3.24 .81 .66Efficacy (B12,7,8,13,4,15,10,23) 3.25 .74 .86Aggression (A2,3,4) 4.79 .62 .53

P. Riley et al. / Teaching and Teacher Education 26 (2010) 957e964960

4. Results

4.1. Psychometric analyses

From the EFA the KMO was .88 and the Barlett's test wassignificant (c2 ¼ 2205.7, p < .001) indicative of a factor structureworthy of investigation. A reading of the scree plot indicated a threefactor solution explaining 45.6% of the variance. The parallel anal-ysis provided consistent findings. The third observed eigenvaluewas 1.80, above the expected 1.45 for a random data set, whereasthe fourth observed eigenvalue (1.37) was the same as the fourtheigenvalue for the random data set, indicative of only being ‘noise’.Having established the potential for a three-factor structure, one-factor congeneric models were tested for each of these three scalesand for the four teacher aggression items using AMOS 7. Itemdeletion occurred for all four congeneric models in order to obtaingood fit measures (Table 2). The factor loadings for the itemsassociatedwith the three explanatory constructs ranged from .47 to.88 indicative of all items contributing substantially to the varianceof the respective latent factor (Table 3). All items with the exceptionof item B21 (Some students are not prepared to behave reasonably),were associated with the factor to which it was assigned by the 35experienced teachers. Item B21 was rated as addressing Attributiontheory but psychometrically associated with the Attachmenttheory items. This indicated that of the three theoreticalapproaches attachment theory may be the most difficult to eval-uate empirically in this type of study. Nonetheless, on conceptualgrounds, Item B21 was omitted from further consideration.

Table 3Internal consistency measures and factor loadings for the scales.

Scale Factorloading

AttributionB9: I don't have much choice. Students who aren't disciplined

at home don't respond to reasonable discipline at school.88

B6: It makes me feel better .76B14: If parents taught their kids properly it wouldn't be necessary .74B25: You can't get through to some difficult kids .61B1: The student deserves it for behaving so badly .47

EfficacyB12: If I don't, the student won't learn to behave appropriately .79B7: It's the only thing some difficult students understand .75B8: It allows the lesson to continue .74B13: It makes the student do what I want .74B4: It makes sure the student gets back on task .68B15:It allows other students to learn better .63B10: It puts me back in control .47B23: It's an effective “shock tactic” technique (consider deleting as

missing data not random).50

AttachmentB24: It shows the students how shocking their behaviour really is .71B5: When you care for students their misbehaviour hurts you and

they need to know that.63

B26: It's a good way to show some students that I care .54B21: Some students are not prepared to behave reasonably .47

AggressionA2: Deliberately embarrassing students who misbehave .70A3: Yelling angrily at students who misbehave .32A4: Making sarcastic comments to misbehaving students .62

To test that the three reasons for misbehaviour scales forma three-factor structure with associated inter-correlations betweenlatent variables, a Confirmatory Factor Analysis (CFA) was con-ducted in AMOS. Adequate fit indices for the CFAwere obtained: c2/df¼ 2.182, (RMSEA) ¼ .07, RMR ¼ .08; TLI¼ .88, CFI ¼ .90, GFI¼ .88and AGFI ¼ .85. Table 4 records the average item mean, standarddeviation and the coefficient of internal consistency for each scale.

Inspection of the Cronbach's Alpha coefficients indicate goodmeasures were obtained for the Attribution and Efficacy scales. Forthe aggression and attachment scales the Alpha scores were lowindicating that there is a problem with internal consistency ofresponses. With regard to the aggression scale, low internalconsistency is understandable, as the use of sarcasm need notpredict the use of yelling in anger, or punishing a whole class for anindividual misdemeanour. Nevertheless, all three approaches areconsidered to reflect varying levels of aggressive behaviour andthereby contribute to measuring the aggression of the teacher. Theshortness of the scales also explains the low Cronbach Alpha valuesas the number of items in a scale influence the magnitude of thescore. As the study was exploratory, the measures were consideredsatisfactory.

4.2. Descriptive statistical analyses

The frequency distributions for each of the four aggressivediscipline techniques indicate that only a minority of teachersfrequently act aggressively toward misbehaving students (Table 5).Nevertheless, 53% of teachers reported yelling in anger at leastsometimes, 36% use sarcasm to the same extent, 27% use grouppunishment and 23% at least sometimes reported deliberatelyembarrassing students. These data are very similar to reportsprovided by other samples (Lewis, Romi, Katz, & Qui, 2008) andindicates that there is probably little sampling bias.

Inspection of the means for the three explanatory theoriesindicates that on average the teachers provided moderate supportfor each of the theories that address why teachers may actaggressively toward misbehaving students (Table 4). The responsedistributions for the three scales show that the percentage ofrespondents indicating support for the scales assessing Attribution,Attachment and Efficacy was 42%, 33%, and 34%, respectively. Ingeneral, teachers who are supportive of one theory are alsosupportive of the others to a degree. The correlation between each

Table 5Frequency of usage of aggressive disciplinary techniques.

Never Hardlyever

Some-times

Often Veryoften

Nearlyalways

Punishing the class asa whole because somestudents misbehave

31 43 19 6 1 1

Deliberately embarrassingstudents who misbehave

38 39 21 2 0 0

Yelling angrily at studentswho misbehave

10 37 43 7 3 0

Making sarcastic commentsto misbehaving students

27 30 27 8 1 0

P. Riley et al. / Teaching and Teacher Education 26 (2010) 957e964 961

pair of scales is between .48 and .50 with almost 18% of the sampleproviding support for all three explanations.

When individual items within scales were examined, theacceptance of each proposition by teachers varied. For the items inthe Attribution and Efficacy scales, respondents are supportivewithonly 21% of teachers failing to provide support for any of the rele-vant items in the respective scales. In total, 40% of respondentsrejected all three Attachment items as providing a potentialexplanation for their use of aggressive disciplinary techniques. Yetinspection of the open-ended responses on these questionnairesrevealed that these teachers often reported responses for theiraggressive behaviour that were aligned with Attachment theory.This finding highlights the difficulties associated with usingattachment self-report scales in these circumstances, particularlywhen only a few indicators of the theory were offered to theteachers judging the differences between the three theories. Forexample, in the open data section of the survey one participantrejected all three explanations for using aggressive behaviour withstudents but nevertheless wrote

I use them when I am stressed and tired (and as such more easilyfrustrated) and I don't mean to e they just happen. I'd say this iswhy others might do these things as well

There are two possible explanations for this response. The firstrelates to both efficacy and attachment theory (“I use them when Iam stressed and tired”). Efficacy theory accounts for this explana-tion by the frustrated teacher needing to find a technique whichefficiently ensures his or her need for order in the classroom is met,regardless of its fairness. Attachment theory accounts for this in analtogether different way. The need to be close to significant others isincreased in times of stress. The description of more easily frus-trated may be a rationalisation for a feeling of separation anxietyfrom the student in question. “I don't mean to e they just happen”would seem to be a confirmatory statement for this explanation asit implies a lack of control of the behaviour by the teacher. In thiscase the explanation may not be that of a teacher who is deliber-ately using a technique “because it works when I'm tired orstressed”. Attachment behaviours are generally unconsciouslydriven and the person displaying them is often unable to controlthem during times of stress or fatigue when their emotionalresources are at a low point (Bowlby, 1975). Attachment behaviourassociated with aggressive responding, such as separation protest, ismost obvious when a person is “frightened, sick, or simplyfatigued” (Holmes,1993, p. 63). Yet the participant did notmake theconnectionwith the theory as presented in the items. Therefore therejection of the theory by respondents who cited stress and fatigue,such as the one above, may indicate that the items we chose do notclearly capture the relevant Attachment concepts. (Brennan, Clark,& Shaver, 1998 discuss the difficulties of self-reported measures ofattachment in more detail).

4.3. Analysis for group differences

From the ANOVA, level of schooling is the only significant(p < .05) predictor of self-reported use of aggressive disciplinarytechniques. Secondary teachers (Mean ¼ 2.26, SE ¼ .05) reportmore use of aggression than teachers in elementary schools(Mean ¼ 1.88, SE ¼ .14). No gender differences were obtained.

The MANOVA attempted to identify predictors of teachers'support for Attribution, Attachment, and/or Efficacy theory, asexplanations for teacher aggression and produced two significanteffects (Pillai's Trace). These were for levels of aggression, F(3,151) ¼ 2.87, p ¼ .038, and Schooling level F (3, 151) ¼ 3.04,p ¼ .031. First, more aggressive teachers (M ¼ 3.06, SE ¼ .12) aregenerally more likely than less aggressive teachers (M ¼ 2.53,

SE ¼ .11) to report Efficacy theory (F ¼ 8.34, p ¼ .004) as anexplanation for their aggressive behaviour toward students.Second, elementary teachers (M þ 2.90, SE ¼ .08) are less likelythan secondary teacher (M ¼ 2.48, SE ¼ .19) to provide support forAttribution theory as an explanation for Teacher aggression towardstudents. No differences were apparent with respect to theAttachment theory explanation.

5. Discussion

The main findings from this study are that firstly many teachersseem to be attracted to theoretical explanations for their aggressivebehaviour. However, there is a lack of clear support for any one ofthe three theories over the others. The second finding is thatsecondary teachers are more likely to use Attribution theory thanelementary teachers. Thirdly, more aggressive teachers give moresupport to Efficacy theory than their less aggressive colleaguesindependent of level of schooling. Each of these findings will bedealt with below.

5.1. Finding 1: all theories are supported by some teachersand some teachers support none

The finding that no single theory seems to dominate as anexplanation for aggressive behaviour toward students suggests thatthe motivations and behaviours of teachers in such complex areasas classroom discipline are multi-faceted. Therefore, professionaldevelopment planners and deliverers need to take this into accountand provide multiple ways of addressing the issue of teacheraggression. This implies that there is little chance of “tailoring”professional development to restricted needs of teachers. A betterapproach would seem to be a ‘shotgun’ approach that provides

1. Skill training, if efficacy is the issue. There are many wellresearched techniques for classroom discipline that are effi-cient without damaging the studenteteacher relationship asaggression does.

2. Insight into the hurt/disadvantage carried by many challengingchildren, in case attribution is the issue. For example, “chal-lenging children” for teachers are often kinaesthetic, visuallearners who have great difficulty and considerable frustrationwith passive, linguistic, logical learning tasks. Providingteachers with this kind of information may lead to internalconfrontation of teachers' stereotypes of such children andundermine the negative aspects of Attribution theory. Further,there seems to be a need to address teachers' self-attributions,such as self-blame.

3. Focussed and guided introspection around teachers' family oforigin and attachment styles to help teachers understand theirown needs in terms of the teacherestudent relationship.

Some aggressive teachers may employ an eclectic approach tostudent discipline. It may well be that teachers use consistentapproaches with students but vary the type of applicationdepending on each type of ‘difficult’ student that they are dealingwith. They may be calling on a range of aggressive strategies withinany particular class, but consistently applying those strategies tothe same individual students. This may account for the 12% ofteachers who support all theories, and to a certain extent may alsoaccount for the teachers who reject all three theories, perhapsbelieving neither adequately describes the type of eclecticapproach they have adopted. Thus targeting aggressive responsesto individual students may be conceived by these teachers in thesame way as individualised learning plans are employed by manyteachers for students with particular learning needs. Further

P. Riley et al. / Teaching and Teacher Education 26 (2010) 957e964962

research designed to interrogate this issue would be a usefuladdition to the current study.

5.2. Finding 2: secondary teachers are more likely than elementaryteachers to choose attribution theory

Aggressive secondary teachers are more likely to use Attributionand/or Attachment theory to explain their use of aggression thando their elementary school colleagues. Attribution theory explainswhy an aggressive teacher apportions the “blame” for their actionsto external sources, rather than look at the interpersonal relation-ship as a whole. The reason why this is a less attractive option forelementary teachers may be related to their relatively greateropportunity to get to know their students. In general, they are withthe same group of students all day and observe them responding toa number of different learning situations and events. For some ofthese situations, students may be disruptive, yet in others moreattentive. Secondary teachers in contrast, see many more studentsfor shorter periods of time in a more restricted range of learningsituations. It may therefore be more likely that the misbehaviour ofstudents is seen a function of the child rather than the child incontext.

5.3. Finding 3: more aggressive teachers are more likelyto support efficacy theory

Themore aggressive teachers, independent of level of schooling,are more likely to accept Efficacy theory as an explanation thaneither Attribution or Attachment. A potential explanation for this isthat they agree that aggression is used because such behaviour“works” in controlling students.

The methodology employed for this study did not seek todetermine whether this type of responding was a calculatedstrategyemployed by teacherswith regard to their teachingpracticeor a discoverymade following anunintended aggressive response toa student or studentswhich proved effective in controlling students.If the former were the case then an acceptance of efficacy theory byteachers is a qualitatively different response to teachers whodiscovered the theory by chance following an aggressive interactionwith their students and then agreed to its efficacy. However wenote that most professional development for teachers is basedon the assumption that efficacy theory is what teachers use andtherefore need. For this sample at least this may be an unwise set ofassumptions to use to structure professional development.

Recently two large meta-analyses have provided useful infor-mation on teachers' approach orientations to students (Cornelius-White, 2007) and generalisations about the efficacy of various typesof professional development interventions for increases in studentoutcome data (Ingvarson, Meiers, & Beavis, 2005). In the first ofthese analyses, Cornelius-White (2007) reviewed over 1000 articleswhich reported on 119 studies, conducted between 1948 and 2004.Each study used a person-centred approach to teaching andlearning, with a combined population of 355,325 students. Hisfindings confirmed what many teachers know from experience andcommon sense: that the teacherestudent relationship is a criticalfactor in student outcomes. The second meta analyses, conductedby Ingvarson et al. (2005) examined “the structural and processfeatures of professional development programs on teachers'knowledge, practice and efficacy” (Ingvarson et al., 2005, p. 1) byanalysing data gathered from 3250 teachers at least three monthspost participation in 80 different professional development activi-ties. The authors found that for professional development to havean impact on teachers' classroom practice it needed to include“active learning and reflection on practice.. The extent to whicha professional development program influences knowledge and

practice. is enhanced by the extent to which that program alsostrengthens the level of professional community” (Ingvarson et al.,2005, p. 14). This last finding is an interesting one as the bulk ofprofessional development has been largely content or practicebased (Loughran, 2006). There is now cause to consider content incontext. When the combined findings of these two studies aretaken into account what becomes clear is that there is a need toinclude reflection and preflection (Sch€on, 1995) on stu-denteteacher relationships and teachereteacher relationships intothe planning of professional development interventions forsuccessful delivery to teachers.

Given the change in expectations of teachers' work roles toinclude more responsibility for student welfare and well-being,there is a need to consider the role of professional developmentcarefully in terms of teacher efficacy. Therefore, when it comes todesigning professional development aimed at improved classroomdiscipline techniques, reflection on behaviour by both teachers andstudents would seem to be a crucial element. To facilitate reflectionon what can be an emotionally charged topic, teachers need tounderstand and practice using reflective tools to assist them as partof professional development in this area. Therefore, we look to theprovision of practical outcomes by applying the axiom, “there isnothing so practical as a good theory” (Lewin, 1951, p. 169) whileremaining aware “that faulty theorising occurs when awareness ofour disciplinary myths is not present in conceptualising praxis.”(Bishop & Browne, 2006, p. 68).

6. Limitations of the study

One of the difficulties in this project has been that the concept ofAttachment theory is well known in relation to childeadult rela-tionships as a one-way construct. However, we propose that theteacherestudent relationship is an attachment dyad more closelyresembling the adult romantic attachments proposed firstly byHazan and Shaver (1990) and extended by a number of otherresearchers (Bartholomew & Shaver, 1998; Brennan et al., 1998;Brown & Wright, 2001; Hazan & Shaver, 1990; Riley, 2006, 2008;Stein et al., 2002). Further complexity is added when it is under-stood that this proposition rests largely on the concept of “innerworking models” (Bowlby, 1975, 1980, 1982, 1988). The innerworking models of both the teachers and the students are for allintents and purposes operating unconsciously. When we askteachers who are reporting relationship stress within their class-rooms to accurately classify their actions with regard to aggressiveresponding toward students, this may be a task that is too difficultfor some teachers to accomplish. This is not because they do notwish to but rather that their psychological defence mechanismsoperate to keep them unaware of the possibility of internal causesof their aggressive responding. To do so would create emotionaldissonance, so it remains outside of conscious awareness throughperceptual defence. There is a significant body of literature on thesubject of perceptual defence which is consistent with this postu-late (Baldwin, 1995, 2007; Bargh, Chen, & Burrows, 1996; Blair, Ma,& Lenton, 2001; Bowlby, 1987; Carnelley & Rowe, 2007; Dixon &Henley, 1991).

7. Conclusion

Two points are clearer at the end of this research project than atthe beginning. The first is that aggressive responding to student(s)'misbehaviour is common among many teachers; and, secondly thebehavioural interplay between teachers and students is toocomplex to be accounted for by simple explanations. Both of thesefindings add to the understanding of how professional develop-ment for these teachers might be adjusted toward self-reflective

P. Riley et al. / Teaching and Teacher Education 26 (2010) 957e964 963

practices to enhance teachers' understanding of the complexities ofclassroom interactions.

An interesting and potentially disturbing finding from thisresearch is the emerging realisation that many teachers may beworking blind: that is without a coherent theory of classroommanagement in general and aggressive responding in particular.These teachers have little sense or understanding of a clear theo-retical framework to guide their classroom management decisionsfrom moment to moment. Nearly one fifth of the teachers sampledrejected all theories offered to them as explanations for their ownaggressive responding. While we can be fairly sure that theirrejections of efficacy and attribution theories are based on anunderstanding of the theories the same may not be the case forattachment. This may have been because teachers are not conver-sant enough with the principles of attachment theory due to thecomplexity of the theory and our less than perfect explanation of itto them by way of item choices. Therefore further researchdesigned to uncover the hidden processes of attachment in theclassroom and making them clearer to teachers is called for. It maywell be that attachment theory accounts for a much larger level ofvariance in aggression toward students by teachers than in por-trayed in this study.

In general, as noted above, to further investigate teachers'understanding of the relevance of theory to explain their aggressivebehaviour toward students may require a narrative methodologyrather than survey.

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