Factors Associated with Teachers' Beliefs on Discipline

This study examined characteristics associated with teachers' views on discipline, comparing discipline styles based upon gender, ethnicity, age, years of experience, inservice versus preservice status, school level, and number of offspring. Participants were 201 predominantly white and predominantly female students at a large university who were either preservice or inservice teachers. The participants completed the Beliefs on Discipline Inventory, which assessed their beliefs on classroom discipline by indicating the degree to which they were interventionists, noninterventionists, or interactionalists. Overall, the highest proportion of respondents had an interactionalist orientation, followed closely by an interventionist orientation. Older respondents were more interventionist and less noninterventionist than were younger respondents. Those who had the most teaching experience were more interventionist and less noninterventionist than those with less experience. Inservice teachers were more interventionist and less noninterventionist than were preservice teachers. Secondary school teachers were more interventionist and less interactionalist than were elementary school teachers. There were no differences in intervention, nonintervention, and interactionalism with respect to gender, ethnicity, and number of offspring. (Contains 47 references.) (SM)