CHAPTER 3: Methodology
3.3. Participants
3.3.1. Criteria for selection of target school
In light of resource constraints for this study, it was deemed cheaper, quicker and expedient to select a single school as the site for this study. This school was purposively selected based on a number of specific criteria, as follows:
• High school comprising of adolescent learners: adolescent learners were selected as bullying increases with the transition from primary school to high school (Pellegrini &
Long, 2002). There is a paucity of South African research on bullying across all high school grades and research has produced conflicting prevalence rates within these grades across studies (Flisher et al., 2006; Neser, 2005; Neser et al., 2003; Reddy et al., 2003). Studies on South African high school learners indicate that learners from lower grades experience more bullying behaviour than learners from higher grades (Flisher et al., 2006) and that the prevalence of bullying is higher across all grades in
comparison to international studies (Neser, Ladikos et al., 2004). In addition,
developmental differences in the impact of bullying and trauma across all grades and ages need to be considered. The target population therefore included learners across all grades within this high school.
• A single sex boys’ school: given the resource limitations of this study, gender was eliminated as an independent variable so as maximise the statistical power of the analysis. A single sex school was accordingly targeted. In addition, research indicates that boys are involved in more physical forms of violence than girls. Based on the current definition of PTSD Criteria A, which necessitates that “the person experienced, witnessed, or was confronted with threatened death or serious injury, or threat to the physical integrity of self or others” (Turnbull, 1998, p. 25) it was likely that male bullying would precipitate more obvious trauma symptoms and thereby meet the objectives of the study.
• South African demographics: in order to maximise the relevance of the findings for other schools in the province (even though the results are not statistically
generalisable), a school that reflected the KwaZulu-Natal population demographics (in terms of race and social class variables) was identified.
• Ownership of the study: the target school should demonstrate the fullest possible ownership of the study and its outcomes. This would ensure the school’s complete support in the execution of the study and importantly, maximise the possibility of the results being meaningfully used to inform the school’s anti-bullying/victimisation intervention strategies, including the Life Orientation Curriculum.
• Size of the learner population: a relatively large learner population was considered vital so as to maximise the statistical power of the analysis. Key considerations
included the findings of prior research which indicates that between 17.8% and 39% of learners are bullied in KwaZulu-Natal (Flisher et al., 2006; Reddy et al., 2003) and further that the distribution of the four bully roles is uneven (Flisher et al., 2006; Liang et al., 2007; Neser et al., 2003). For these reasons, it was important to target a relatively large boys-only school with as large a learner population as possible (within the
constraints imposed by the preceding three selection criteria), so as to maximise cell size for the purpose of statistical analysis.
• History of bullying: an ideal target school was one with a demonstrated history of bullying, as this would maximise the possibility of discerning relationships between bullying and trauma, in line with the study objectives.
3.3.2. Research setting and access
The above criteria were used to purposively identify an urban public boys’ high school in the Durban Metropolitan region, which contains approximately 59 other high schools. The school principal was approached and his formal permission was obtained to conduct the research at the school. While the learner population comprised of 781 learners from grades 8 to 12, the research population comprised approximately 620 learners from grades 8 to 11 (excluding grade 12 learners). Grade 12 learners were not included in the study as they are 17 years and older which does not make them suitable for the Trauma Symptom Checklist for Children (TSCC-A), the measure which was used in this study. In addition, the school principal was not comfortable with including grade 12 learners in this study as the fieldwork was thought to be disruptive to preparations for their final examinations.
3.3.3. Population demographics
The school is a single sex, multi-racial school and comprises 83% black learners, 10% Indian or coloured learners and 7% white learners. The demographics of learners at this school thus closely reflect the demographics of the KwaZulu-Natal population, i.e. 85% Black, 2%
Coloured, 8% Indian or Asian, and 5% White (Statistics South Africa, 2001). These learners emanate from a suburb where the majority of families are from middle and lower income socio-economic groups.
3.3.4. Sampling strategy
Saturation sampling was used to select a probability sample from the defined study
population. This ensured that the findings are generalisable to the school population within tolerated and specified levels of statistical error. The inclusion of all learners from grades 8 to 11 was also considered essential so as to preclude perceptions of any form of discrimination against learners, and consequently any inclusion/exclusion bias which might contaminate the study findings. The inclusion of all grade 8 to 11 learners in the sample was also important in setting the platform for ownership and buy-in from learners for possible interventions arising from this study, which would take place in the 2010 academic year.
3.3.5. Sample size and demographics
Formal parental consent for participation was requested and no parents prevented their children from participating in the study. The questionnaires were administered to all students in grades 8 to 11 who were at school on the day that fieldwork was conducted with their class, and provided that they were willing and had volunteered to participate. The final sample for this research study accordingly comprised of 509 grade 8 to grade 11 boys, with thirteen questionnaires being excluded from analysis as they were inaccurately and/or incompletely answered.
The sample (n=509) consisted of 75.8% black, 9.6% white, 9.1% Indian, 4.1% coloured, 0.4%
Asian, and 1.0% other learners. Learner cohorts were spread relatively equally across grades and academic streams (A to F&G). The age range of the sample was from 12 to 17 years, with grade 8 ranging from 12 to 16 years, grade 9 from 14 to 17 years and grades 10 & 11 ranging from 15 to 17 years. The mean age of study participants was 15.23 years (SD=1.21) and 24.5% of the learners had repeated a grade.