The Impact of Personal Values, Gender Stereotypes, and School Climate on Homophobic Bullying: a Multilevel Analysis

• Published in: Sexuality research & social policy Vol. 18; no. 3; pp. 598 - 611
• Main Authors: Bacchini, Dario, Esposito, Concetta, Affuso, Gaetana, Amodeo, Anna Lisa
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: New York Springer US 01-09-2021; Springer Nature B.V
• Subjects: Adolescents; Attribution; Behavioral Science and Psychology; Bullying; Classrooms; Discrimination; Gender roles; Gender stereotypes; High risk; Homophobia; Multilevel analysis; Perceptions; Psychology; School environment; Secondary school students; Secondary schools; Selfenhancement; Selftranscendence; Sexual Behavior; Social environment; Social Sciences; Stigma; Teachers; Transcendence; Values; Victims; Homophobic bullying; Teacher support; Stereotyped attributions; Individual values; School climate; Multilevel approach
• ISSN: 1868-9884; 1553-6610
• DOI: 10.1007/s13178-020-00484-4

Introduction
Schools are among the most homophobic social contexts, where students who do not conform to gender norms are at high risk of stigma and discrimination.
Method
Using a multilevel approach, the aim of the current was to examine whether adolescents’ engagement in homophobic bullying behavior was associated with personal values and stereotyped victim-blaming attributions at individual level, and perceptions of school as a community and frequency of teachers’ reaction to bullying incidents at classroom level. Data were collected in 2010. The sample consisted of 2718 Italian middle and high school students (53.2% females; mean age = 15.36,
SD
 = .85) from 144 classrooms.
Results
Results showed that self-transcendence values reduced the risk of engaging in homophobic bullying, whereas both self-enhancement values and stereotyped victim-blaming attributions were positively associated with homophobic bullying. At classroom level, only negative perceptions of school as a community had a unique positive contribution on homophobic bullying, over and above other individual and contextual factors. Two cross-level interactions were found, indicating that self-transcendence values had a significant effect in decreasing homophobic bullying in classrooms where teacher support was perceived as low, whereas stereotyped victim-blaming attributions had a significant effect in increasing homophobic bullying in classrooms where teacher support was perceived as high.
Conclusion
These findings provide further support to the social-ecological perspective as a useful guiding framework for understanding the complexity of factors predicting homophobic bullying.
Policy Implications
Efforts should be made to develop clear anti-bullying school policies explicitly dealing with the issue of homophobic bullying.