A Qualitative Method to Examine the Positive Impact of a Storytelling Intervention in Reducing Reactive and Proactive Aggression in Young Schoolchildren

 

Good afternoon everyone, today I wanted to share with you an article that studies how a storytelling intervention based on the Social Information Processing (SIP) model can reduce aggressive behaviors in schoolchildren. This takes me back to topic 1 of the subject, where we learnt about the different aggressions that can occur in school violence. Since bullying often involves reactive and proactive aggression, the study provides useful information into how we can reduce these aggressive behaviors and also help prevent bullying.

This study used the ReactiveProactive Aggression Questionnaire and developed an innovative group storytelling intervention based on the SIP model. The SIP model suggests that reactive and proactive aggression are linked to different cognitive processes (Crick & Dodge, 1996; Dodge & Coie, 1987). In other words, this model explains how children think in social situations. Specifically they go through five steps: noticing social cues, interpreting those cues, thinking of ways to respond, evaluating and choosing a response, and acting on it or better said, the behavior (Dodge & Crick, 1990). 

When we talk about bullying, it is important to understand there are two types of aggression that can be involved. The reactive aggression and the proactive aggression, topics which we discussed in class. Children who show reactive aggression, meaning they get angry and lash out quickly, often make mistakes in the first two steps. They tend to misread what is happening or think someone is being mean even when they are not. For example, they focus too much on angry faces and believe others are trying to hurt them, regardless of the context (Dodge et al., 1990). They get angry easily and tend to adopt aggressive behaviors in self-defense. As a result, they often feel frustrated, act impulsively and are more likely to be rejected by their peers. 

In contrast, children with proactive aggression perceive others’ intentions pretty well. However, they struggle in the later steps. They face difficulties when they are choosing their responses and acting on them. They value agressions as a tool to get what they want, such as rewards or power (Dodge, 1991). This type of behavior is common in some bullies and appears a bit later than reactive aggression, around age 6. It is often linked to a lack of empathy or guilt. They do not realize the negative consequences of their behaviors and how their actions can hurt other people.

As you can see these two types of aggression are quite different, meaning they need different types of approaches. One helpful method is storytelling, which can help children understand social situations better. Past research has shown that stories give kids insight into how others think and feel. It helps them develop the theory of mind, the ability to recognize people’s internal states (Symons et al., 2005). This ability helps them interpret better other’s intentions and reduce misinterpretations. 

Storytelling also improves language skills, which helps children understand more effectively what others say and avoid misunderstandings. When children become more aware of context through stories, they are less likely to focus only on negative aspects of a situation, which helps with emotional control and reduces impulsive behavior. In addition, stories build empathy  (Karniol,2012). Because they hear about characters with feelings, they start to feel what those characters feel and learn to see things from others’ perspectives. 

Taking this information into consideration, the authors wanted to see if storytelling would help reduce both reactive and proactive aggression. After conducting the research, the authors concluded that storytelling intervention is especially effective for children with reactive aggression, helping them manage anger, improve their social understanding and strengthen social communication. 

On the contrary, they found that proactive aggression requires a different approach. It needs to be paired with strategies that focus on developing empathy. Also, they suggested that teachers and school counselors should adopt storytelling interventions based on the social information processing model as part of anti-bullying programs in order to reduce proactive and reactive aggression among schoolchildren. After reading the article, I believe that storytelling can be a powerful tool in creating more compassionate and socially aware school environments and, most importantly, it can be useful in reducing aggressive behaviors, which play a major role in school violence. So, by reducing the aggressiveness, I think we can also help prevent school bullying. 

Fung, A. L. C., Wong, M. K., & Fu, L. (2023). A qualitative method to examine the positive impact of a storytelling intervention in reducing reactive and proactive aggression in young schoolchildren. Applied Research in Quality of Life, 18 (4), 1989–2010. doi: 10.1007/s11482-023-10174-z

Made by Diana Armeana Nicolaescu