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Fostering Cross-Cultural Friendships with the ViSC Anti-bullying Program

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Contextualizing Immigrant and Refugee Resilience

Part of the book series: Advances in Immigrant Family Research ((ADIMFAMRES))

Abstract

It was examined whether the implementation of a whole-school anti-bullying program is able to increase cross-cultural friendships among 450 non-immigrant and 607 immigrant youth aged 10–14 years (M = 11.64 years, SD = 0.80). Over a period of one school year, teachers received three in-school trainings and implemented a 13-week social competence project in their classes. The social competence project was structured to foster the cross-cultural friendship potential in the classes by utilizing equal status, common goals, cooperation, and authority support. To investigate program effectiveness, a cluster randomized control study was realized, and longitudinal social network data were gathered. In total, 2-wave longitudinal data set was available from 11 intervention schools (53 classes, N = 719) and 5 control schools (27 classes, N = 338). Reciprocal and unilateral same-cultural friendship preference indices were calculated based on the social network data. Controlling for several class-level variables, multilevel growth modelling revealed no program effects regarding reciprocal same-cultural friendship preferences. However, a buffer effect on unilateral same-cultural friendship preferences among Turkish immigrant youth was found. The value of real-world teacher-led contact interventions to foster cross-cultural friendships is discussed.

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Acknowledgments

The implementation and evaluation of the ViSC program in Austria was funded by the Austrian Federal Ministry for Education, Arts and Cultural Affairs between 2008 and 2011. The writing of the present study was supported by the Oesterrreichische Nationalbank Anniversary Fund, project number 16605 awarded to the first author.

We are very grateful to the whole ViSC project team consisting of Dagmar Strohmeier, Christiane Spiel, Eva-Maria Schiller, Elisabeth Stefanek, Petra Gradinger, Takuya Yanagida, Christoph Burger, Bianca Pollhammer, Katharina Derndarsky, Marie Therese Schultes, and Christine Hoffmann for their invaluable work during the intervention studies conducted in Austria. We also want to thank the ViSC coaches and teachers who implemented the program in their schools and classes. We thank all schools and students who participated in the program and in the longitudinal evaluation studies.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. School of Medical Engineering and Applied Social Sciences, University of Applied Sciences Upper Austria, Linz, Austria

    Dagmar Strohmeier & Elisabeth Stefanek

  2. University of Vienna, Vienna, Austria

    Takuya Yanagida

  3. Theology School, Church of Cyprus, Nicosia, Cyprus

    Olga Solomontos-Kountouri

Authors
  1. Dagmar Strohmeier
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  2. Elisabeth Stefanek
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  3. Takuya Yanagida
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  4. Olga Solomontos-Kountouri
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Correspondence to Dagmar Strohmeier .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Center of Social and Cultural Pyschology, University of Leuven, Leuven, Belgium

    Derya Güngör

  2. School of Medical Engineeringand Applied Social Sciences, University of Applied Sciences, Upper Austria, Linz, Austria

    Dagmar Strohmeier

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Strohmeier, D., Stefanek, E., Yanagida, T., Solomontos-Kountouri, O. (2020). Fostering Cross-Cultural Friendships with the ViSC Anti-bullying Program. In: Güngör, D., Strohmeier, D. (eds) Contextualizing Immigrant and Refugee Resilience. Advances in Immigrant Family Research. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-42303-2_12

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