NCJ Number
206197
Date Published
May 2003
Length
70 pages
Annotation
This Australian study systematically examined secondary school students' understanding of procedural safeguards, particularly those related to the preservation of children's rights in disciplinary encounters with adults.
Abstract
Five secondary schools and colleges participated in a series of studies. All of the schools were in the Melbourne metropolitan area, representing a range of socioeconomic levels and type of school. A total of 1,116 students participated in the various studies. The school levels represented ranged from grades 6 through 12 and two samples of first-year university students. The method for obtaining the students' judgments about procedural safeguards involved the use of an interactive computer program that permitted the students to make judgments about appropriate procedural safeguards for adult/child interactions. The interactions focused on the informal and familiar disciplinary interaction between a mother and child; the distant, formal, and unfamiliar situation of proceedings in a magistrate court; and a disciplinary interview at school, where teacher-student interactions can be both informal and formal, familiar and unfamiliar. For each of these types of disciplinary interactions, students were asked about the relative importance of procedures for a young person's rights and interests. The major findings of this study are related to the students' strong and persistent preference for procedural safeguards that are related to the context in which a disciplinary encounter occurs, as well as to a student's own age and gender. Overwhelmingly, the students gave the highest priority to safeguards that ensure adults will behave toward youth in an even-handed, fair, and clearly stated manner. Such procedures were preferred over safeguards that ensure a youth active participation or a voice in the proceedings. Essentially, the students preferred to rely on an authoritative adult who acts fairly, rather than on a structure that provides for the youth's input in the proceedings. It should be of concern for those who develop procedural policies for public institutions that young people give such low priority to the participatory procedures that are designed to give people an active voice in the procedures that affect their lives. This suggests that policymakers need to know far more about young people's views on the social processes that adults have constructed to interact with youth who are in trouble or in need of advocacy. 15 figures, 6 tables, and 56 references