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Measuring School Climate: Factor Analysis and Relations to Emotional Problems, Conduct Problems, and Victimization in Middle School Students

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Abstract

School climate is a complex and multifaceted construct, and there are varying perspectives regarding the precise factors that comprise this construct. The two aims of this study were to examine the empirical structure of an existing school climate measure and to test the relations between specific school climate factors and emotional problems, conduct problems, and peer victimization (i.e., bullying). Using a sample of 2,108 middle school grade students (grades 6–8) from ten schools randomly split into two analytic samples, three factors (Authoritative Structure, Student Order, and Student Support) emerged in exploratory factor analyses and were cross-validated using confirmatory factor analysis. Using the combined sample, student perceptions of classroom orderliness and the authoritative actions of teachers and school staff were each uniquely and inversely related to emotional and conduct problems as well as victimization. Potential theoretical and clinical implications for school-based interventions targeting school climate and related outcomes in middle school are discussed.

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Notes

  1. As a preliminary step, a CFA of the purported nine-factor structure of the school climate measure was tested. This model failed to converge on an admissible solution. Further, examination of the alphas for the purported factors was all generally poor, with seven of the nine factors below .70. Altogether, alphas ranged from .27 to .77 (Mα = .55). This initial test provides a rationale for our split-sample EFA and CFA approaches in our primary results.

  2. As described in more detail in the following confirmatory factor analysis section, this final item reflecting teacher–student decision making about rules did not load significantly on this factor and is dropped from subsequent analyses. As such, we have chosen to name this factor Student Support in order to best characterize the content of the retained items.

  3. Given that school climate can be thought of a common characteristic of a whole school rather than as one individual’s perception of that characteristic, we used a random intercept-only multilevel model to examine how much variance in school climate is accounted for between schools compared to that within schools. Intraclass correlations (ICCs) can be calculated from these models and indicate what proportion of the total variance in scores on each of the three school climate variables is attributable to the particular school in which the youth is enrolled. Notably, these ICCs were relatively small and expressed as percentages are 7.2, 7.5, and 19.3 % for Authoritative Structure, Student Order, and Student Support, respectively. Overall, these values suggest much greater variability in perceptions of students within a given school than across schools.

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Acknowledgments

Funding for this research was provided in part by The Health Foundation of Greater Cincinnati. We would like to thank Dr. Cricket Meehan for assistance with data management and the many graduate and undergraduate research assistants who assisted with data collection. Finally, we would like to thank the school systems, school personnel, and students who participated in this project.

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  1. Department of Psychology, Miami University, 90 N. Patterson Ave., Oxford, OH, 45056, USA

    Anna H. Hung, Aaron M. Luebbe & Paul D. Flaspohler

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  1. Anna H. Hung
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Hung, A.H., Luebbe, A.M. & Flaspohler, P.D. Measuring School Climate: Factor Analysis and Relations to Emotional Problems, Conduct Problems, and Victimization in Middle School Students. School Mental Health 7, 105–119 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12310-014-9131-y

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