Program Profile: Steps to Respect®

This is a schoolwide bullying prevention program that seeks to reduce bullying perpetration and victimization by increasing staff awareness and students’ social–emotional skills. The program is rated Ineffective.

. Despite some statistically significant findings, there were no statistically significant differences between students in intervention and control schools in self-reported bullying victimization, observed nonphysical bullying, self-reported bullying perpetration, and gossip victimization.

An Ineffective rating implies that implementing the program is unlikely to result in the intended outcome(s).

This program's rating is based on evidence that includes at least one high-quality randomized controlled trial.

This program's rating is based on evidence that includes either 1) one study conducted in multiple sites; or 2) two or three studies, each conducted at a different site. Learn about how we make the multisite determination.

An Ineffective rating implies that implementing the program is unlikely to result in the intended outcome(s).

This program's rating is based on evidence that includes at least one high-quality randomized controlled trial.

This program's rating is based on evidence that includes either 1) one study conducted in multiple sites; or 2) two or three studies, each conducted at a different site. Learn about how we make the multisite determination.

Program Goals/Target Population

Steps to Respect® is a schoolwide bullying prevention program for elementary students in third through sixth grades. The goals of the program are to decrease school bullying problems (perpetration and victimization) and increase students’ prosocial behaviors and beliefs by 1) increasing staff awareness and responsiveness, 2) fostering students’ socially responsible beliefs, and 3) teaching students social–emotional skills to counter bullying and promote healthy relationships. By implementing schoolwide antibullying policies and procedures, the program aims to intervene at the individual, peer, and school levels to foster a safe school environment and counter the detrimental social effects of bullying.

Program Components

The Steps to Respect® program includes a classroom-based curriculum for students in elementary school that is usually implemented across 3 consecutive years or grade levels. However, schools can also implement the program across 2 years (in grades 5 and 6), if desired. There are three grade-based levels of curricula, with level 1 taught in third or fourth grade, level 2 taught in fourth or fifth grade, and level 3 taught in fifth or sixth grade.

The curriculum consists of 11 weekly lessons that are approximately 1 hour long each. Lessons are delivered by students’ classroom teacher over a 12- to 14-week period. Teachers are provided semi-scripted skill lessons that focus on social–emotional skills for positive peer relations; emotion management; and recognizing, refusing, and reporting bullying behavior. Additionally, the program provides teachers with specific instructional strategies for large- and small-group discussions, skills practice, and games. Specifically, lessons aim to a) help students identify the various forms of bullying; b) provide a rationale and clear guidelines for socially responsible actions and nonaggressive responses to bullying (that reduce chances of continued victimization); c) train students in assertiveness, empathy, and emotion regulation skills; and d) allow students to practice friendship skills and conflict resolution. Lessons also provide techniques to teach children when and how to report bullying to adults.

After students complete each of the skill lessons (such as joining groups, distinguishing reporting from tattling, and being a responsible bystander), teachers implement a grade-appropriate literature unit. These are based on existing children’s books and provide further opportunities to explore bullying-related themes.

The intervention greatly relies on the participation of teachers, school administration, and support of all school staff to promote antibullying behavior and educate students about their responsibilities as bystanders to bullying. Additionally, the program provides a schoolwide program guide (i.e., a blueprint on how to implement schoolwide policies and procedures to encourage discipline practices that stop bullying problems before they escalate) and training for all school staff, delivered by trained program instructors.

Program Theory

Several underlying theories support the Steps to Respect® intervention, including the social–ecological approach and Crick and Dodge’s (1994) model of social behavior. The social–ecological approach to school bullying views youth behavior as being shaped by multiple factors within nested contextual systems, such as a school’s environment (Committee for Children 2001). Because many students become involved as bystanders to bullying in both helpful and harmful ways, the program emphasizes that all members of a school community must take responsibility for minimizing bullying. Thus, to reduce bullying and negative social interactions, the program seeks to increase student’s social competence and improve teacher responses to bullying by reinforcing policies about bullying and respectful behavior.

Crick and Dodge’s (1994) model of social behavior suggests that youth behavior reflects the interactions of beliefs and goals with cognitive–behavioral and social–emotional skills. Thus, when students have the proper social–emotional and bullying refusal skills (which are taught in the program), this can presumably help decrease rates of bullying and therefore improve school climate and connectedness.

In addition, the intervention is based on an underlying premise that peer norms, attitudes, and behaviors play a vital role in determining and maintaining rates of bullying behavior because bullying is seen as a social process strongly influenced by the reactions and behaviors of peers (Atlas and Pepler 1998; Brown et al. 2011). By clearly labeling bullying behaviors as unfair and wrong, students’ empathy (for other students victimized by bullying) and knowledge about their responsibilities as bystanders to bullying can improve attitudes about the acceptability of bullying.

Study

Frey and colleagues (2005) conducted a clustered randomized controlled trial to determine the impact of Steps to Respect® on reducing school bullying problems in six elementary schools located in the Pacific Northwest. Participating schools were located within two suburban districts and matched on school characteristics (i.e., size, ethnic breakdown, and percentage of students receiving free or reduced-priced lunch). Matched-pair schools were randomly assigned to the intervention (n = 3) or control condition (n = 3), with a matched pair in one district starting in the 2000–2001 school year, and the other two matched pairs in another district starting in the 2001–02 school year. Students and teachers assigned to the intervention condition received the Steps to Respect® program. Students and teachers in the control condition did not receive any type of training or classroom intervention. All third through sixth grade students in participating schools were invited to participate in the study (n = 1,126). Of this initial study sample, 70.0 percent were white, 12.7 percent were Asian American, 9.0 percent were Black, 7.0 percent were Hispanic American, and 1.3 percent were Native American.

Students were eligible for the study sample if they were observed for at least 40 minutes during pretest playground activity. Five hundred forty-four students (intervention group = 296 students; control group = 248 students) met this criterion and were included in the study analysis. Of this sample, 50.7 percent of students were male. There were no statistically significant differences between students in the total sample and students in the observation sample, based on baseline characteristics (such as ethnic background and English proficiency; however, the study authors did not provide the breakdown of baseline characteristics for the observed study sample, only for the initial study sample). The study authors reported that common reasons for incomplete data were students’ moving to another school or missing recess.

Data were collected through survey and observation methods. Observation data were collected across 2.5 months between October and December (pretest) and between April and June (posttest), using handheld devices. Student self-report survey data were collected in the fall around mid-November (pretest) and in the spring about 1 year after program implementation in late April or early May (posttest). Outcomes of interest included student-reported bullying behaviors (including direct bullying/aggression, indirect bullying/aggression, and bullying victimization) and observed playground behaviors (including aggressive bullying behavior and nonbullying behavior).

The CrimeSolutions review of this study focused only on the student-reported measures of direct and indirect bullying/aggression, student-reported victimization, and observed behaviors of bullying and nonbullying aggression. Student bullying behaviors were measured using items from the Student Experience Survey: What School Is Like for Me, which defined direct bullying/aggression behavior as a student participating in explicit bullying behavior (e.g., “I called kids names at school”), indirect bullying/aggression as a student participating in bullying behavior that could create harmful social effects (e.g., “I told my friends to ignore kids I was mad at”), and victimization as a student having been bullied by other students (e.g., “A group of kids at school called me mean names”). Observed playground behaviors were measured by the following five behavior categories: 1) bullying, 2) encouragement, 3) nonbullying aggression, 4) agreeable social behavior, and 5) argumentative social behavior. Bullying behavior was defined as physical, verbal, or indirect aggression involving either a discernible power imbalance between an aggressor and a target (or aggressors—that is, a group of children aggressing against a single child), or repeated aggression, during the same observation session, by a child toward a nonretaliating peer. Nonbullying aggression behavior was defined as physical, verbal, or indirect aggression that did not involve a discernible power imbalance or repeated nonreciprocal aggression.

Hierarchical linear models were used to determine differences in bullying behaviors between students in Steps to Respect® intervention and control schools. Chi-square analyses were used to determine observational differences between students in intervention and control schools. Subgroup analyses were conducted to examine grade and sex differences between students in intervention and control conditions.

Study

Low, Frey, and Brockman (2010) conducted a clustered randomized controlled trial to evaluate Steps to Respect®’s impact on reducing forms of playground relational aggression (such as gossiping), using the same study sample as in Study 1 (Frey et al. 2005). This study examined student playground observation data that were collected in the fall (October to December; pretest) and the spring (April to June; posttest), from the same six matched-pair elementary schools (intervention group = 3 schools; control group = 3 schools), located in the Pacific Northwest.

As in Study 1, the total observation sample consisted of 544 students, with 296 students in intervention schools and 248 students in control schools. Student demographics in this study (ethnicity and gender) were also the same as in Study 1. There were no statistically significant differences between intervention and control students in rates of perpetrated gossip or targeted gossip at pretest (i.e., baseline). However, there were gender and grade differences in rates of perpetrated gossip and rates of targeted gossip at baseline. Because these differences were statistically significant, covariates for gender and grade were entered as fixed level-1 variables.

Outcomes of interest included observed rates of exclusionary gossip perpetration and victimization. Both outcomes were measured using a coding scheme developed by study researchers (based on reviewing videotapes of playground behaviors in Toronto, Ontario, and in vivo observations on Pacific Northwest playgrounds). Gossip perpetration was defined as a student who was involved in slander/malicious exclusionary gossip (e.g., “Is the cootie girl in your class?”). Gossip victimization was defined as a youth who had experienced or was a target of derogatory talk or labels applied to a third party (e.g., “Did you hear Dan cheated on the exam?”).

Hierarchical linear model analyses were used to determine differences in rates of gossip perpetration and victimization between students in intervention and control schools. The study authors did not conduct subgroup analyses.

Study

Brown and colleagues (2011) conducted a clustered randomized controlled trial to determine the impact of Steps to Respect® on reducing bullying behaviors and improving school climate and connectedness. In this study, the researchers emailed district contacts to establish a selection pool of schools to participate, using the following criteria: 1) had socioeconomic and racial/ethnic diversity, 2) had an established liaison with the Committee for Children, 3) expressed a strong need or desire for school bullying prevention, and 4) were not currently implementing a school bullying prevention program. Schools considered as day schools, alternative schools, or private/parochial schools were excluded. To minimize cost, the study researchers focused on schools in three geographic areas located in north–central California. From these three geographic areas, 45 of the 96 districts expressed interest in the study; thus, schools within these districts were considered for inclusion.

The study researchers selected 34 schools to participate in the study. These schools were matched based on school and student characteristics (i.e., size, change in student enrollment from 2006 to 2007, number of teachers, percentage of students who spoke English as a second language, and percentage of students receiving free or reduced-price lunch) and were randomly assigned to either the intervention group or the waitlist control group. Between the random assignment periods and the start of the intervention program, two schools withdrew from the study. The study researchers were immediately able to replace one school (selecting a school from the original pool of eligible schools) but not the other. Thus, 33 schools were included in the analyses.

All students in third through sixth grade in participating schools were invited to participate in the study (n = 3,119). Of these students, 2,940 students were included in the study sample. Fifty percent of schools were from suburban areas, 25 percent were from rural areas, 15 percent were in midsized cities, and 10 percent were from small towns. About half (49 percent) of students in intervention schools were male, 52 percent were white, 7 percent were Black, 6 percent were Asian American, and 35 percent were of other or mixed race. In regard to ethnicity, 43 percent of students in intervention schools identified as Hispanic. For students in control schools, 52 percent were male, 53 percent were white, 6 percent were Black, 6 percent were Asian American, and 35 percent were of other or mixed race. In regard to ethnicity, 41 percent of students in control students identified as Hispanic. There were no statistically significant differences in student demographics (i.e., race, ethnicity, age) between students in intervention and control schools.

Data were collected at pretest and posttest (i.e., immediately following the end of the intervention) periods, using student and teacher surveys. Outcomes of interest included teacher-reported student social competency, teacher-observed physical bullying, teacher-observed nonphysical bullying, student-reported bullying perpetration, and student-reported bullying victimization. The study researchers developed the Teacher Assessment of Student Behavior Survey, a brief online survey to measure all teacher-reported and observed outcomes. Teachers were instructed to respond to survey items using the time frame “since the beginning of the school year,” which included items such as “Gets along with classmates,” “Pushed, shoved, or tripped a weaker student,” and “Spread rumors about another student.” Teacher responses were on a five-point Likert scale ranging from 1 (“never”) to 5 (“always”). Student-reported bullying perpetration and bullying victimization were measured using a revised version of Colorado’s Trust’s Bullying Prevention Initiative Student Survey, which included items such as “I teased or said mean things to certain students” and “A particular student or group of students spread rumors or told lies about me.” Student responses were on a four-point scale ranging from 1 (“strongly disagree”) to 4 (“strongly agree”).

Hierarchal linear model analyses were used to determine differences between students in intervention and control schools. The study authors did not conduct subgroup analyses.

Committee for Children trainers provided an onsite, 1-day training for all school staff (including teachers, administrators, paraprofessionals, support staff, custodial and cafeteria personnel, and bus drivers) to implement the Steps to Respect® curriculum. During the 3-hour training, trainers conducted an overview of program goals and key features of the program content (e.g., a definition of bullying, a model for responding to bullying reports). Teachers, counselors, and administrators received an additional 1.5-hour training in how to coach students involved in bullying. In addition, third through sixth grade teachers completed an orientation to classroom materials and instructional strategies. For schools that wish to train their own staff, training materials were also included in the Steps to Respect® Program Guide along with information on research foundations and a blueprint for developing a schoolwide policy and specific procedures.

Subgroup Analysis

At posttest, Frey and colleagues (2005) found that students in the intervention schools in grades 5–6 reported lower perceived difficulty in responding assertively to bullying, compared with students in the control schools in grades 5–6. Also, boys in intervention schools reported lower perceived difficulty in responding assertively to bullying, compared with boys in control schools. Boys in the intervention schools also showed a greater number of agreeable behaviors (i.e., starting a positive conversation), compared with boys in the control schools. These differences were all statistically significant. However, girls in the intervention schools and girls in the control schools showed no statistically significant differences on these measures. For additional findings from the subgroup analysis, please review Frey and colleagues (2005).

These sources were used in the development of the program profile:

These sources were used in the development of the program profile:

Committee for Children. 2001. Steps to Respect® Program Guide: Review of Research. Seattle, Wash.: Committee for Children.

Frey, Karin S., Miriam K. Hirschstein, Leihua Van Schoiack Edstrom, and Jennie L. Snell. 2009. “Observed Reductions in School Bullying, Nonbullying Aggression, and Destructive Bystander Behavior: A Longitudinal Evaluation.” Journal of Educational Psychology 101(2):466–81.

Hirschstein, Miriam K., Leihua Van Schoiack–Edstrom, Karin S. Frey, Jennie L. Snell, and Elizabeth P. MacKenzie. “Walking the Talk in Bullying Prevention: Teacher Implementation Variables Related to Initial Impact of the Steps to Respect® Program.” School Psychology Review 36(1):3–21.

Low, Sabina, Mark J. Van Ryzin, Eric C. Brown, Brian H. Smith, and Kevin P. Haggerty. 2014. “Engagement Matters: Lessons from Assessing Classroom Implementation of Steps to Respect: A Bullying Prevention Program Over a One-year Period.” Prevention Science 15:165–76.

Atlas, Rona S., and Debra J. Pepler. 1998. “Observations of Bullying in the Classroom.” Journal of Educational Research 92(2):86–99.

Crick, Nicki R., and Kenneth A. Dodge. 1994. “A Review and Reformulation of Social Information–Processing Mechanisms in Children‘s Social Adjustment.” Psychological Bulletin 115(1):74–101.