Summary
Abstract
Studies of school violence have been generally been informed either by social disorganisation or social control theory. However applications of social disorganisation theory to school violence sometimes make little attempt to control for individual differences in propensity to violent behaviour. This study of 2,616 Australian high school students uses multilevel modelling techniques to see whether various characteristics of the school (e.g. lack of clarity about school rules, school responsiveness to racism, school size, ethnic composition) are related to the risk of physical violence between students, once individual and family risk factors for violent behaviour have been taken into account. The results suggest that school characteristics and developmental factors both play an important role in shaping the risk of violence at school.