ROLE OF COMMUNTIY PSYCHOLOGIST IN

VIOLENCE
COMMUNITY PSYCHOLOGY

“Community Psychology concerns the relationships of the individual to communities and

society. By integrating research with action, it seeks to understand and enhance quality of life
for individuals’ communities, and societies. Community psychology is guided by its core
values of individual, family wellness, sense of community, respect for human diversity, social
justice, citizen participation, collaboration and community strengths and empirical
grounding.”

COMMUNITY PSYCHOLOGIST

In community psychology, the psychologist is not necessarily concerned with the single
individual and their family. Working for the community means applying the psychology
discipline in a broader sense, to the entire community. Here, the psychologist assesses and
tries to fix community issues, viewing the community as their collective yet singular patient.
According to the American Psychological Association, “Community psychologists blend
research and practice, partnering with diverse citizens to plan and implement community
changes, advance social justice and use research to inform and evaluate this work.”

In this role, the community psychologist may discover a community issue with underage
pregnancy and consequently research methods of communally solving this issue. They might
also run into substantial crime and incarceration rates. To address this, they may consult with
community leaders and government officials in an attempt to reach out to this area of trouble
in the community. No matter the individual project they may be working on from day to day,
community psychologists are always focused on the understanding and subsequent
betterment of the community they are tasked to serve.

Community psychologists are interested in effective ways to prevent problems rather than
treat them after they arise. The field emphasizes promoting healthy functioning for all
members of a community rather than intervening when problems develop for a few of those
members. And they focus their research on factors at the neighborhood, community, and
societal level that support or impede healthy development rather than internal psychological
processes or biological factors.

BRINGING ABOUT SOCIAL CHANGE

One of the goals of a community psychologist is to analyse social change and to guide social
action towards resolving social problems like violence. This is an area where the approach
taken by community psychologist differs greatly from that in most other areas of psychology.
Rather than just focusing on efforts to change por support individuals so that they can better
adapt to the problems they are confronted with, community psychologist seek to create
positive change at the community and societal level in order to create a better world and
prevent problems in the future. Checkoway proposed six different strategies for achieving
social change:

1. Mass mobilization: This describes temporary movements in which large numbers of

peoples are amassed to bring attention to particular societal issues or problems like
aggression and violence. E.g. Rallies such as “Million Mom March” in 2000 which
brought attention to the need of tighter restrictions on handguns.

2. Social action: Social action strives to create powerful organization at the community
level, often through the development and activities of “grassroots organizations”.

3. Citizen participation this strategy aims to get citizens involved in their communities.

4. Public advocacy: This usually involves lobbying or applying pressure on public

officials to pass laws or influence social policies.

5. Popular education: Education and disseminating information to the community

members can be an important strategy for changing attitudes and beliefs and possibly
even behaviours. Educational interventions need to be culturally appropriate and
 delivered in a format that will be understood and accepted in the community
members.

6. Local services development: this refers to a process whereby people provide services
to their own local community, which serves the dual function of empowering
community members and providing needed action services.

PRINCIPLES OF EFFECTIVE PREVENTION/PROMOTION PROGRAMSS

CASE STUDY

For 2 years, Johnny, a quiet 13-year-old, was a human plaything for some of his classmates.
The teenagers badgered Johnny for money, forced him to swallow weeds and drink milk
mixed with detergent, beat him up in the rest room and tied a string around his neck, leading
him around as a “pet.” When Johnny’s torturers were interrogated about the bullying, they
said they pursued their victim because it was fun. (newspaper clipping cited in Olweus &
Limber, 2010, p. 124).

Bullying-related behaviours are prevalent worldwide (Craig et al., 2009; World Health
Organization, 2000). A recent cross-national study of school bullying surveyed 11-, 13-, and
15-year-old children during the 2005–2006 school year in 40 different countries in Europe
and North America. The researchers found that up to 45.2% of boys and 35.8% of girls
reported either being bullied, bullying someone else, or both. There was great variability
among countries, with some countries (generally in Northern Europe) reporting rates as low
as 8.6% for boys and 4.3% for girls. The two North American countries in the study, Canada
and the United States, were both in the middle of the range, with rates of about 22% for boys
and 17% for girls (Craig et al., 2009). Just as there is a wide variation in school bullying rates
across countries, rates also vary widely by schools. In some schools, these problems are far
less frequent than others.

Bullying can be conceptualized in ecological terms by using the individual and

environmental-level prevention equations presented earlier. Key preventive influences on
both of these problems are positive sources of relatedness and connectedness in both school
and home life; supportive friends, family members, and other caring adults; and coping skills
to deal with frustrations, setbacks, stress, conflict, and to accurately perceive emotional cues
in oneself and others. Bullying prevention requires multilevel, ecological approaches to
intervention (Ttofi, Farrington, & Baldry, 2008; Zins, Elias, & Maher, 2007).

Community psychologists are among those asking how it happens that certain schools are
organized so their levels of violence are lower than those of other schools. The following
conditions have been identified as conducive to low rates of school violence (Felner & Adan,
1988; Hawkins & Lam, 1987; Pepler & Slaby, 1994; Wager, 1993; Zins, Elias, & Maher,
2007):

1. School courses are perceived as highly relevant to students’ lives.

2. School rules and structures allow students some control over what happens to them at
school.
3. School discipline policies are viewed as firm, fair, clear, and consistently enforced.
4. A rational reward structure in the school recognizes students for their achievements.
5. Strong and effective school governance exists, with strong principal leadership.
6. Ongoing, positive contacts occur between students and adults.
 7. The curriculum includes education in social and emotional competencies.

These characteristics are the foci of a growing number of school-based prevention/promotion

programs. The largest preventive effects with regard to bullying come from comprehensive
school-wide efforts that create a climate of nonacceptance of bullying, a positive social norm
of disclosure, a track record of effective action in response to threats and incidents, and
curriculum-based training in social-emotional competencies (Elias & Zins, 2003; Zins, Elias,
& Maher, 2007). Firm, clear, school-wide policies, referral procedures, and staff training
must exist to deal effectively with student reports of problems.
REFERENCES

Schneider, F.W., Gruman, J. A., Couts, L.M.(2012) Applied Social Psychology :

Understanding and Addressing and Practical Problems. Second Edition. Sage Publications
India Pvt Ltd, New Delhi

Thomas, E., Hill, J. et al (2012) Community Psychology : Linking Individuals and

Communities. Third Edition. Wadsworth, Cengage Learning, USA.

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23/07/2019