Causes of Violence by High School Students: A Teachers and Principals Perspective

This study aimed to investigate the causes of violence of students from the teachers and principals’ perspective. This study uses a survey method and the sample was consisted of 191 subjects, including 141 teachers and 50 principals respectively, who were selected by simple random and stratified sampling. In order to collect data, a questionnaire consisting of 40 items, with five-point Likert scale was used. Statistical analysis of the data was done through calculating frequency, percentage, mean, standard deviation, one-sample t-test, and independent-sample t-test, using SPSS version 20. The results showed that all external factors such as family, media, personal characteristics, society, and victimization play an important role in the incidence of violence in students. The role of family and victimization of students in the incidence of this phenomenon is more than any other factors. Internal factors such as the characteristics of teachers, school management and school structure have an influential role in the incidence of violence of students as well. The principal is more effective than other factors in this phenomenon. The results also showed that internal factors of school are more effective than outside factors of the school in the incidence of violence. However, school principals consider external factors to be more effective in the incidence of violence compared with teachers. In this regard, principals consider the following items to be more effective in the incidence of violence: families, victimization, society, personal characteristics, and media, respectively. While teachers, consider the following items to be more effective in the incidence of violence: victimization, family, personal characteristics, society, and media. The findings also showed that women compared to men, considered external factors to have more effect in the violence, while men believed that internal factors are more effective in the incidence of violence in students. It seems that to prevent and control the violence phenomenon, the spread and revival of the social work services at the society level and within schools is necessary and vital.