At least one in five teachers “physically or emotionally abuses” students two to three times a month, a survey conducted by National Sun Yat-sen University found.
The survey, conducted late last year by associate professor Chen Li-ming (陳利銘), asked 604 teachers from 30 elementary, junior and senior high schools in 10 cities and counties how they had disciplined students in the prior six months.
Almost 72 percent said they had treated students in ways that the survey defined to be physically or emotionally abusive at least during that period.
Meanwhile, 20.4 percent said they had done so two to three times a month.
“Withholding permission to eat lunch” was the most common form of “physical abuse,” which was administered as a punishment by 1.16 percent of respondents, the research found.
Other measures that it defined as physical abuse included confiscation of personal items without returning them, locking a student in a closed space or tying them to a chair or other object, or hitting with the hand or an object, which were each used by 0.83 percent of respondents, while pinching or hair-pulling were each employed by 0.66 percent, the survey showed.
Forms of emotional abuse included ignoring students (7.78 percent), consequences for incorrect answers (4.3 percent), mocking a student’s appearance (0.66 percent) and badmouthing a student’s family (0.50 percent), it said.
“The percentage of teachers found involved in cases of abuse and bullying is shockingly high,” Chen said.
While the percentage of those who said they abused students more than once is similar to statistics gathered abroad, which range from 2 percent to 19 percent, the percentage of teachers found to have abused students at all is much higher than in other nations, where the rates are 20 percent to 30 percent, compared 71.7 percent of teachers in this survey, he said.
The survey shows that there is a higher chance of abuse of elementary-school students compared with older students, he said.
“Elementary-school teachers are more likely to resort to disciplinary measures and abusive behavior to manage a class,” he said. “This might be because of the power imbalance and difference in physical strength between the teacher and students.”
Teachers more often use emotional abuse than physical abuse, he said.
“While many regulations focus on physical abuse of children, they might ignore the damage caused by emotional abuse,” he said.
The authorities should consider introducing criteria to remove teachers who emotionally abuse students, he added.
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