Discipline, Shaming and Antisocial Attitude in Philadelphia Middle Schools

Abstract

The U.S. school system has changed fundamentally in its basic approach to social control in recent decades, with harsh approaches to student discipline having increased in popularity despite data showing pronounced and steady declines in incidents of both school violence and juvenile delinquency. This study revisits a sample of students in the Philadelphia School District to examine how perceptions of school rules and administration are associated with antisocial attitudes among students who were recently disciplined. The analysis included measures of interdependency, shaming, and peer association derived from reintegrative shaming theory. Findings from multiple regression analysis show that students who perceived their sanction as reintegrative in the school context were less likely to hold antisocial attitudes. Implications of the findings are discussed.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

We would like to thank Eileen M. Ahlin and the four anonymous reviewers for their helpful comments on an earlier draft of this article.

Notes

¹Each “Part” is a different data set for different participants, such as parents, teachers and administrators, and students.

²We did not compare the punished student (our population/sample) with others who were not punished because RST posits the presence/experience of conflictive interaction between two parties as a necessary criterion. One would be the norm, the other deviant. The interaction could be either reintegrative, or disintegrative/stigmatizing. The current study uses “being punished” as the interaction that sets the basis for shaming, or for the type of shame experienced. If a student had not been punished, his or her answer to the “respect for students” or “fairness of rules” questions would most likely be general circumstances in the absence of any confrontation with school norms, or the shaming experience.

³Ideally these data would allow us to incorporate communitarianism measures at the neighborhood level and design a full model of RST. However, these data allowed only for the examination of the individual-level characteristics. That being said, RST posits that community characteristics would be mediated by the nature, or type of shaming. Given this, we did not feel strongly about the need for a neighborhood-level component to the study.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Joongyeup Lee

Joongyeup Lee is an Assistant Professor of Criminal Justice in the School of Public Affairs at Penn State Harrisburg. He received a Ph.D. in Criminal Justice from Sam Houston State University. His primary research interests are in criminological theory and police decision-making. His recent publications have appeared in Deviant Behavior and Policing: An International Journal of Police Strategies and Management.

Philip R. Kavanaugh

Philip R. Kavanaugh is an Assistant Professor of Criminal Justice in the School of Public Affairs at Penn State Harrisburg. He received his Ph.D. in Sociology from the University of Delaware. His primary research interests are in deviance and social control. His recent publications have appeared in Journal of Crime and Justice and Feminist Criminology.