Helping to Cope with School Violence Tragedies - Essay Example

Helping to Cope with School Violence Tragedies Introduction: Although the contemporary concept considers mass murder as the key descriptor of school violence, school violence is about a range of things from bullying to aggravated assault, from suicide to homicide. Suicide is, indeed, a form of violent behavior, and studies confirm that a significant number of mass murderers have contemplated suicide before thinking about murder. Suicide and suicidal gestures are important risk factors for many kinds of violence. Students, however, complain most about nonfatal victimization and fights. Even one violent death at school is unacceptable, and schools must work on prevention. Children are dying in record numbers from accidents, homicides, and suicides. Unlike the usual stresses and conflicts that are a part of everyday life at home and at work, acute crisis episodes frequently overwhelm traditional human coping skills and result in dysfunctional behavior. This creates a state of disequilibrium that results in intense fears and highly anxious states (Stephens, R. D., 1994). There is growing awareness by school administrators that school violence could occur at their school. Planning and preparation will be necessary to manage those crises and to attend to the emotional as well as physical needs of staff and students. School administrators have a tendency to underestimate the initial and long-term impact of trauma. Children's reactions to trauma, however, would not be impacted by this underplay, and they would typically fall into the following key areas, fear of the future, academic regression, behavioral regression, nightmares and sleeping difficulties. Teachers and parents who are provided with emotional support and who are educated on children's typical reactions to trauma will be much better prepared to assist their students and children. These violent tragedies would not affect the children only, since the school population of students also comprises of adolescents. Adolescents, in particular, who have been traumatized, are more at risk for depression, suicide, reckless behavior, and substance abuse. This population demands help to cope up with the disaster or the trauma from the violence. Unfortunately, the mental health services provided by professionals in schools are extremely inadequate (Canada, M. et al., 2007). The CDC reports that 15% of the male students are involved in physical altercations, and males are more likely to fight on school property. Students in lower grades, ninth grade and below, are more likely to be in a fight on school property than students in higher grades. Assaults against teachers are a form of school violence that needs serious attention. Bullying, which has become a serious concern as of late, may include relatively benign forms of social interactions or may even include more serious forms which threaten bodily harm (Poland, S., 2003). School shootings are significant in that they get publicized, and many students are indirectly affected with such a tragedy, and this needs to invoke coping skills to survive the trauma. Literature is sparse in this area, and in 1993, Lockwood had a study done on middle and high school students. This study examined the reasons for, and circumstances of, violence at school in this age group. The findings are significant. The first finding revealed that most violence was the results of minor insults or altercations that escalated until it resulted in extreme violence. The major goal of the violence was revenge or retribution for the insult. Most students polled in this study stated that such use of violence for retribution was morally acceptable and was not considered to be an indication that the violent student had an absence of values (Lockwood, A. T. 1993). This is a matter of concern, and this immediately points to moral values that act as etiologic agents for such incidents. Examination of all shootings between 1996 and 1999 reveals a pattern. The shooters are all male. This is not inconsistent with the majority of violent offenders, who are in fact predominately male. The shooters had all had interests in violent media and/or violent video games. The shooters had all experienced some form of social humiliation or rejection prior to the shooting, including being called "gay" or "fat," or being rejected by girlfriends or teased by high-status adolescents, such as, athletes in the school. The most significant finding is that all shooters indicated some mental health problems and difficulties such as depression, poor coping skills, and aggression were common without any specific universal pattern of mental illness. This signifies that any of several emotional difficulties may contribute to such shootings, rather than one particular type of emotional difficulty. Shooters are children or adolescents who evidence emotional and behavioral problems, troubled social status, social humiliation and/or rejection, and who may be avenging what they perceive as insults or degradation. Their anger at these slights may be encouraged or given a form of expression by their continual exposure to violent mass media and violent video games (Poland, S., 2003). These inferences may further be supported by another report released by the U.S. Secret Service in the fall of 2000 in cooperation with the U.S. Department of Education, on the basis of 37 incidences of school shootings. The key points although similar to the findings in the previous report are very intriguing. The perpetrators told other students of their violent plans, the majority of the perpetrators were bullied, and the majority of the perpetrators were suicidal. Their recommendations were that the schools should have threat assessment teams. Concerning school violence and studying these factors, it should be emphasized that violence in the schools can be prevented, and the prevention efforts must address the origins (Poland, S., 2003). With an analysis of these incidents to answer why these occur, the sociocultural aspect of violence in children can be examined from the theoretical perspective. It has been observed that many young people do not understand the finality of death. Psychological theoreticians have outlined that by about age 13, children are in the advanced stages of intellectual development and should understand the permanence of death, and that death is a biological process. Practically, however, the common finding is that all children and even many adolescents do not understand the finality of death. Moreover, these children are born and brought up in a society where violence is glamorized. Many times children who commit violent acts are simply carrying out what they see on television or at the movies. Many children also see violent acts in their homes and neighborhoods and believe that through violence you can get your way. We must reduce violent behavior that is modeled for young people not only through the media but in our homes, schools, and communities (Kim, YS., Leventhal, BL., Koh, Y., Hubbard, A., and Boyce, WT., 2006). The prevention points lie in the school and the community, and the highlighted ones are clear, implementation of violence prevention, anger management, and problem solving curriculum (Mytton, JA., DiGuiseppi, C., Gough, DA., Taylor, RS., and Logan, S., 2002). For adolescents, adult help and guidance is a must in such situations. The schools must begin to teach children at an early age through curriculum programs at every grade level that if they are feeling unsafe and especially if someone is talking about homicide or suicide, they must get adult help instantly. Experience suggests that between third and fifth grades a major portion of children stop looking to adults for help. These programs must ensure that all children and adolescents must know when and where to get adult help. Many authors have termed American school violence as the tip of the iceberg in American society, and this can be pointed as the indicator of a pervasive undercurrent of violence that is part of the American cultural identity. School violence, from that point of view is two-pronged in the sense that it is both a problem of violence-prone individuals and those youngsters likely to be victimized with such incidence . There are many explanations offered for school violence. Most of these explanations are speculative, but also instructive. The greatest numbers of violent incidents are reported in the teen years. The characteristics of this age specific for such incidences are many, impulsivity, searching for a place for oneself; idealism and extremism; highly developed fantasy; and violence as a compensatory mechanism. One can add to these features, the stage-specific dynamics, the exposure to violence in the family and the community, prevalent drug or alcohol use, the wide availability of firearms, prejudice based on difference, and the inability to resolve conflict in any way other than physical, and the resulting mix is potentially lethal (Redlener, I., Garrett, AL., and Thomas, GA., 2007). While the question of coping arises, it can be bilateral. It may be directed to people as a part of preventative measure to violence that might have occurred in the future otherwise. Coping may be a tool for them for their mental status that would lessen the anger and impulsivity, so a violence event may be stopped. However, when violence occurs in the school environment, those who are caught within such turbulence would suffer from mental trauma, and they should receive help to cope up with such situations. All of these life-threatening or fatal events can produce acute crisis episodes and posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD). Therefore, it is critically important for all mental health and public health professionals to provide early responses in the form of lethality assessments, crisis intervention, and trauma treatment. Crisis intervention is a known method of intervention for several decades. Obviously, these interventions belong to accidental-situational group of interventions in the school violence setting, since the affected individuals are overwhelmed by unexpected life events, such as death of a loved one, of one who was acquainted, or other major trauma. The light of hope that emanates from literature is that individuals in crisis are somewhat open to suggestions, more so than they would normally be. Therefore, immediately after a violent event that is potentially traumatic, professional interventions to help them cope would have a specifically beneficial effect (Bonanno GA., 2004). The consequences for such exposed individuals directly or indirectly can be psychologically far-reaching and devastating. The psychological effects left aside, any one sensible would suffer from loss of productivity and fear of loss of sense of safety and security. The physical squealae are not worth ignoring either, but following such a traumatic event, the psychological consequences of PTSD may be really crippling for the individual who suffers from it. People vary in terms of their reactions to a traumatic event. When two people experience the same traumatic event, one may cope in a positive way and experience a manageable amount of stress, while the other person may experience a crisis state because of inadequate coping skills and a lack of crisis counseling. In fact, in reality, exposure to disaster is not always crippling for all, and many people recover rapidly or complain of no or minimal disruption in their functioning. In psychological terminology, they demonstrate resilience to the highly possible negative effects of the crisis. Resilience, therefore is a result of coping skill to face critical incidents, disaster, or crisis that may arise from a school violence event, and this can be defined as the ability of an individual to rapidly and effectively exit from psychological perturbations associated with such events (Van der Kolk BA, McFarlane A, van der Hart O., 2002). Crisis intervention has been shown to lead to early and smooth resolution of acute stress disorders or crisis episodes, and this also provides a turning point for the individual, who is strengthened out of such experience. Crisis and traumatic events may be a danger or warning signal, or even, they may be an opportunity to sharply reduce emotional pain and vulnerability. However, the ultimate goal of crisis intervention is to bolster available coping methods or to guide and help individuals reestablish coping and problem-solving skills where they are promoted to take concrete steps toward managing their feelings and depending on that, developing an action plan to survive. Crisis intervention has been demonstrated to reinforce strengths and protective factors for those who feel overwhelmed and paralyzed by a traumatic violence event. In addition, this strategy aims to reduce lethality and potentially harmful situations and provides baselines for referrals to community agencies. Two key factors determine the possibility of a person to escalate into a crisis state following the experience of multiple stressful events. These are the individual's perception of the situation or event and the individual's ability to utilize traditional coping skills. Roberts and coworker in 1995 noted the individual variations in ability to cope, and violence events as crisis precipitants have different levels of intensity and duration. Therefore, as expected, despite an intense crisis or stressor precipitant, some individuals would cope very effectively utilizing their inner strengths. On the other hand, to be able to reach this stage, many other individuals need to learn new resources and coping skills through a skillful crisis intervention (Roberts, A. R. (Ed.)., 1995). Meeting the emotional and psychosocial needs of the direct or indirect victims of the school violence incidents is the major challenge for a school district and community. Following a school violence disaster, the school staff members and other adults may need psychological help to cope with the aftermath. On the youngsters, these events may have long lasting effects in the form of anxiety, feeling of loss of control, depression, sleep disturbances, developmental regression, and as mentioned, PTSD. How the coping can be achieved Provision of appropriate counseling builds the pathway for return to normalcy. The term resilience means bouncing back from a traumatic experience. Another coping method is resistance that refers to the ability of the individual to withstand manifestations of clinical stress, distress, impairment, and dysfunctions associated with critical school violence incidents. Resistance, thus, can be viewed as a psychological immunity to distress and dysfunction. The notion of creating resistance is a pre-incident proactive step toward prevention of crisis. This can be an organizational intervention and indicate preparedness to face disaster, and literature supports this to be a powerful antidote to posttraumatic reactions that are adverse and is a strong proactive coping tool against psychiatric morbidity. This can also be achieved by policies and training in coping that outline steps and methods to deal with critical events before they take place (Flannery RB Jr, Everly GS Jr., (2000). Fig 1. Roberts' Crisis Intervention Model (Roberts, A. R., 2002) Persons in crisis need to ventilate, to be accepted, and to receive support, assistance, and encouragement to discover the paths to crisis resolution. It is useful for the client to understand the specific personal meaning of the event and how it conflicts with his or her expectations, life goals, and belief system. Thoughts, feelings, and beliefs usually flow out freely when a client in crisis talks. The crisis clinician should listen carefully and note any cognitive errors or distortions or irrational beliefs (Rose S, Bisson J, Churchill R, Wessely S., 2001). The skilled crisis intervener should display acceptance and hopefulness in order to communicate to persons in crisis that their intense emotional turmoil and threatening situations are not hopeless, and that, in fact, they will survive the crisis successfully and become better prepared for potentially hazardous life events in the future. To be able to do this, Roberts' model is a useful model to help the sufferers cope. At the initial encounter, a thorough assessment is conducted that includes lethality, dangerousness to self and others including suicidal risks, and immediate psychosocial needs. It is also important to make a psychological contact with the victim, and a genuine rapport is established by conveying genuine respect for the client, acceptance, reassurance, and demonstration of attitude that is nonjudgmental. The dimensions of the problem can then be examined accurately in order to define the problem to identify the precipitating event. The client is then encouraged to explore the feelings and emotions. Past coping attempts are then explored and assessed. Based on this assessment, an action plan is generated, and by implementation of that, the cognitive functioning is restored. A followup plan is then created and revisit scheduled (Roberts, A. R., 2002). In this relation, assessment of suicidality is very important, since PTSD is a well known cause of suicidal attempts, some of which may be successful. Lethality determinations are important, since they also belong to the spectrum of school violence as is homicidality. Many a cases, nonlethal violence such as bullying may affect self esteem to such a degree that the victim may commit suicide. Schools are obvious environments to provide a community's response since these institutions are designed to support a child's and adolescent's development and to address the problems of young people through programs. Suicide is an important mental health and public health problem worldwide (World Health Organization, 2002). Adolescents, and even children, commit suicide, and an even greater number of youths attempt or seriously think about suicide as the solution to their life's difficulties. There is a possible suggestibility or imitation factor and subsequent contagion effect in suicidal behavior. The survivors of suicide need assistance. Many youths in our schools are, in fact, traumatized by the suicide of their peers. Coping skills to life events that promote lethality can prevent many suicides (Leenaars, A., Wenckstern, S., Appleby, M., Fiske, H., Grad, O., Kalafat, J., et al., 2001). Conclusion: This can be achieved through strategies. The first is through provision of realistic preparation and setting appropriate expectations, developing stress management and coping skills, and providing realistic preincident training. All of these may be conducted through programs in the schools. The second method is through promotion of group cohesion and encouraging students to achieve social support. A social support system buffers stress. These groups may be utilized for risk communication that would foster transmission of information and deference of rumor, reassurance, motivation, a sense of connectedness. The third strategy could be strengthening positive cognition that could weaken stress and trauma. The fourth strategy could be building self-efficacy (Everly GS Jr, Lating JM., 2005). On the other hand creating environment in the school for expression of feelings and discussion about the causes of violence in an interactive fashion may also help the psychologists to detect the potential lethal students, who can be violent, and identification and application of coping strategies on them may guide them in a path where they can better manage their anger and impulse and tolerate their frustration, where such incidences of school violence would be reduced to a minimum, if not abolished. Reference List Bonanno GA., (2004). Loss, trauma, and human resilience: have we underestimated the human capacity to thrive after extremely aversive events Am Psychol.;59:20-28. Canada, M. et al., (2007). Crisis Intervention for Students of Diverse Backgrounds: School Counselors' Concerns. Brief. Treat. Crisis Interven.; 7: 12 - 24. Everly GS Jr, Lating JM., (2005). Integration of cognitive and personality-based conceptualization and treatment of psychological trauma. Int J Emerg Ment Health. 2005;7:263-276. Flannery RB Jr, Everly GS Jr., (2000). Crisis intervention: a review. Int J Emerg Ment Health;2:119-125. Kim, YS., Leventhal, BL., Koh, Y., Hubbard, A., and Boyce, WT., (2006) School Bullying and Youth Violence: Causes or Consequences of Psychopathologic Behavior Arch Gen Psychiatry; 63: 1035 - 1041 Leenaars, A., Wenckstern, S., Appleby, M., Fiske, H., Grad, O., Kalafat, J., et al. (2001). Current issues in dealing with suicide prevention in schools: Perspectives from some countries. Journal of Educational and Psychological Consultation, 12, 365-384. Lockwood, A. T. (1993). The wells of violence. Focus in Change, 20,3-6. Mytton, JA., DiGuiseppi, C., Gough, DA., Taylor, RS., and Logan, S., (2002). School-Based Violence Prevention Programs: Systematic Review of Secondary Prevention Trials. Arch Pediatr Adolesc Med; 156: 752 - 762. Poland, S., (2003). Congressional Testimony: School Violence From the Perspective of a National Crisis Response Consultant. Cypress-Fairbanks Independent School District, Houston, TX Redlener, I., Garrett, AL., and Thomas, GA., (2007) Safer Schools in an Age of Mass Violence: Back to the Basics of Public Health. Disaster Med Public Health Preparedness; 1: S4 - S5. Roberts, A. R. (Ed.). (1995). Crisis intervention and time-limited cognitive treatment. Thousand Oaks, Roberts, A. R. (2002). Assessment, crisis intervention and trauma treatment: The integrative ACT intervention model. Brief Treatment and Crisis Intervention. Rose S, Bisson J, Churchill R, Wessely S., (2001). Psychological debriefing for preventing post traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). Cochrane Database Syst Rev. Stephens, R. D. (1994). Gangs, guns and school violence. USA Today, 122(2584), 29-32. Van der Kolk BA, McFarlane A, van der Hart O., (2002). Psychotherapy for posttraumatic stress disorder and other trauma-related disorders. In: Stein D, Hollander, E, eds. Textbook of Anxiety Disorders. Washington, DC: American Psychiatric Publishing; 2002. World Health Organization. (2002). World report on violence and health. Geneva: Author. Read More