Japanese children’s perspectives on the

5.2.1 Group activities vs. Person centred approach

Analysis of the interview data revealed that peer supporters did not use or adopt the person-centred approach for their daily activities. In short, in terms of support levels of peer support schemes (see Figure 1.3, 1.4 and 1.5), peer supporters did not have much opportunity to be engaged in individual support level activities. Through the interviews, none of the peer supporters mentioned their experiences of being involved into one-to-one support in their school. Rather, peer supporters actively were engaged in other group activities, such as fund-raising, at both group support level and the whole-school support level.

Interestingly, most peer supporters mentioned that they often needed to speak in front of people in order to give feedback about peer support activities in school assemblies. This meant that peer supporters had more opportunities to speak in front of other pupils than to provide one-to-one support. Even though peer supporters had been given the peer support training sessions by JPSA trainers, Japanese peer supporters did not have opportunities to be engaged in individual support level activities. This means peer supporters did not use their counselling skills and minds at all. In fact, one peer supporter said, “Well, other pupils did not consult me much” (Ken, p22), and none of them shared any experiences about one-to-one support. This would imply that the schools found it impossible to set up structures within which one-to-one consultations could take place. Furthermore, it would appear that the other pupils would have felt very reluctant to disclose experiences of being bullied to another pupil in the role of peer supporter. Culturally such behaviour would be viewed as shameful and showing signs of weakness. Pupils would be unable to admit that they were not able to cope within their peer group.

As mentioned in Chapter 2, regarding the types of peer support approach used in the UK, Houlston et al (2009) showed that many secondary schools were engaged in individual support level activities, such as “Befriending” (73.2%), “Mentoring” (84.5%), “Mediation” (45.4%), “Counselling” (30.9%), and “Others” (8.2%). Unfortunately, no Japanese studies have investigated the breakdown of the types of peer support, therefore, it is difficult to make even a wild guess about the extent to which Japanese peer supporters engage in helping behaviours, whether with individuals or groups. This was confirmed in the present study where there was no reported evidence that any one-to-one peer support actually took place.

According to the interview data, peer supporters reported their various activities in a school, which were mainly related to group activities, such as cleaning campaigns, fund-raising activities, greeting activities, anti-bullying dramas, and school summits. These group activities are useful and widely used in schools as a method for enhancing responsibility for one’s environment and for strengthening the norms of the group. In terms of Hofstede’s theory (2005), school activities and schemes have been influenced by the cultural context directly and indirectly, thus it is natural that peer support activities have also been linked to and affected by the cultural values and social contexts (e.g. collectivisms). However, by no stretch of the imagination can they be defined as ‘peer support’. A more accurate definition of these activities would be that they form part of citizenship education and/or personal and social development (PSD) for the peer supporters (as opposed to, for example, victims of bullying). Furthermore, these group activities seemed to have nothing to do with the person-centred approach that the pupils in the present study learned during their training. This implies that it is necessary to change the current training sessions, provided by JPSA, into more effective ways to match the school culture and social needs of vulnerable children.
From Table 2.9, generally the peer support training sessions (of JPSA) were designed to help children (peer supporters) to learn counselling and communication skills. Through role-play sessions, peer supporters were trained to experience helping other pupils using a person-centred approach. The role-play sessions aimed to encourage peer supporters to gain counselling skills and also to increase their interpersonal awareness, which would help them to work as a peer supporter. In fact, the findings in the present study indicated that the peer supporters had acquired very few, if any, person-centred skills at all.
So how do we explain the fact that the JPSA training is so widely regarded across Japan? Some other studies (e.g. Taniguchi & Ura, 2003) stated that after the JPSA training sessions, peer supporters improved their social behaviours and self-esteem. Based on such evidence, the JPSA style training sessions, based on the person-centred approach, came to be widely accepted. However, in the present study, Japanese peer supporters did not provide any one-to-one support with other pupils, and this implied the disconnection between current peer support training and actual practices. The findings from the present study indicate that the school system itself prevented the peer supporters from applying their person-centred skills in supporting peers who had been bullied or who were suffering difficulties in their peer relationships. So the JPSA training had no effect on the users of the peer support systems. This appears to be a finding that JPSA trainers/ coordinators are unwilling to acknowledge.
As mentioned above, the group activities, such as cleaning and greeting campaigns and fund-raising, cannot be considered to be peer support. Furthermore, these activities bore no relationship to the training. The peer supporters had been trained to listen actively, not to clean the classroom! In this vein, it seems to be more beneficial to substitute citizenship education and PSD training materials for the current JPSA style peer support trainings. It would effectively support peer supporters to improve their social and communication skills, which help them to carry on their group support and whole school support activities. In short, the training sessions do not need to be counselling based (Rogers’ model) approach, and peer supporters need to effectively gain and develop their necessary skills, which match their actual group activities.
This seems to be a critical suggestion for any educators and researchers who have been engaged in the developments of peer support activities in Japan, to reconsider the validity of the current training sessions. Even if it had been acknowledged that there are many facts about disconnections between current peer support trainings and the actual practices, it seems to be unavoidable to review and change the current training schemes.
5.2.2 Lack of empathy and Judgemental attitudes

The present study found that Japanese peer supporters tended to show their negative and judgemental views about other pupils and also their attitudes and comments seemed to lack empathy. Their role was rather perceived as one of monitoring and policing deviant pupils rather than providing emotional support for pupils with relationship difficulties, such as being bullied or socially excluded. As mentioned above, in peer support schemes, peer supporters did not have opportunities to be engaged in individual level support activities. However, all peer supporters were generally required to receive the training sessions, which encouraged them to develop counselling knowledge and skills to use them during the activities. Since their training sessions were based on the person-centred approach, peer supporters were expected to show their appropriate attitudes towards other pupils in their activities and daily life in a school. Especially, some specific qualities and attitudes, such as “respectful”, “non-judgemental”, and “willing to admit to mistakes”, needed to be gained by most peer supporters to follow Rogers’ model of peer support. In this regard, Cowie and Wallace (2003) stated the qualities of a good peer supporter (see table 5.1), and the training sessions aimed to encouraged peer supporters to gain and develop their emotional and behavioural skills.

Table 5.1: The qualities of a good peer supporter

*trustworthy *doesn’t judge you *listens and doesn’t tell you what to do *friendly and approachable *won’t tell anyone what you have told him, even if you are fighting and he could use it against you *kind *honest but not critical

(Cowie and Wallace, 2003)
In short, these specific qualities and attitudes are generally required as a peer supporter, and peer supporters are supposed to apply these attitudes and skills for their practices. However, the peer supporters in the present study did not demonstrate these qualities to any extent.
The peer supporters in the present study, by contrast, provided no evidence that they had internalised any of Rogers’ core conditions in their interactions with their peers. Instead, they demonstrated judgemental, disapproving attitudes towards anyone who deviated from the norm and showed no empathy for anyone in distress. In fact, they denied that there were any relationship difficulties in their school and reported that there was no bullying. In this study, several peer supporters believed they were privileged over other pupils. In a sense, “privilege” is the meaningful word in terms of Japanese peer support activities. In fact, one of the peer supporters clearly mentioned that she believed it is necessary to have hierarchical relationships among pupils. She believed that peer supporters needed a similar power as teachers, because of their duties to take the lead for others during the activities. Furthermore, the peer supporters in the present study appeared to be very preoccupied with themselves and their own personal development. They were very concerned with their own image and how they appeared to others, for example, when they engaged in public speaking during school assemblies.
As mentioned earlier, Japanese peer supporters did not have much opportunity to be engaged in activities at the individual support level. Rather, they were actively engaged in the group and whole school activities. From this perspective, it seemed not necessary for peer supporters to apply counselling minds and skills, rather, peer supporters would need to take the lead for others using other kinds of qualities and attitudes. That is to say, the qualities of the peer support activities in Japan seemed to be different from the qualities of the western style peer support approach.

As mentioned in section 2.8, in Japan, peer support activities seemed to be divided into two different qualities of activities; one is strongly based on Rogers’ model approach (counsellor’s’ role) such as peer counselling, befriending and peer mentoring, the other is based on citizenship orientated approaches (group leaders’ role) such as greeting campaign, clearing campaign, and fund-raising activity. From table 5.1 (Cowie and Wallace, 2003), the qualities of a good peer supporter seemed to be different from the group leaders’ qualities. For example, the group leader needs to take the leadership for others, thus group leader is often required to tell others what to do, to give directions, and also need to critically judge the others occasionally. In a sense, some Japanese style peer support (e.g. group leaders’ role) need to be classified and acknowledged as a different activity from the western style peer support. This issue will be discussed later in the details in the section 5.5, considering the cultural influences.

From the interviews, peer supporters often reported they energetically encouraged other pupils to join their peer support activities. For example, in the greeting campaign, peer supporters said “Good morning” to other pupils whenever they came across the school gate. It was natural that some pupils might greet back to the peer supporters, but other pupils might ignore them. For another example, during the cleaning campaign, some pupils might be supportive, but other pupils might not be supportive at all. The fact that some peer supporters reported anger at those who did not return their greetings is further evidence of their lack of empathy for other pupils’ feelings. In most cases, peer supporters appeared to perceive their role as one of being a mini-teacher or prefect whose purpose was to ‘improve’ negative behaviours. In this sense, the peer supporters reported tendencies to think and feel both positively and negatively about other pupils. Their lack of empathy, however, prevented them from developing strategies for understanding their peers and for helping them with their difficulties. In fact, the interview data showed that peer supporters reported many judgemental comments and attitudes toward other pupils, something like, “badly behaved pupils”, “bad boys”, “misbehaved pupils”, “pupils are reluctant to…” and “their character is gloomy and sombre”. However, even though, peer supporters mentioned many judgmental comments, their ultimate goal was to contribute to the emotional and behavioural well-being of pupils. This they radically failed to do. The interviews clearly showed how judgemental peer supporters were of “these badly behaved pupils”. They showed no capacity to understand why such pupils were not conforming to the rules of the school.
As a consequence, peer supporters in the present study, tended to show their judgemental comments and attitudes towards other pupils. Peer supporters seemed to not apply some specific qualities, such as “respectful”, “non-judgemental”, and “willing to admit to mistakes”.

Also, the training sessions based on the person-centred approach were not reflected in the attitudes of the peer supporters or content of their peer support activities. Hence there were gaps and disconnection between the content of the JPSA training sessions and their implementation and roll-out. This implies that it is necessary for JPSA to reconsider the content of training sessions and peer support activities drastically.

5.2.3 Disapproval of emotional problems

The early detection of children’s emotional and behavioural problems (e.g. bullying, social isolation and school refusal) is essential for tackling the issues more effectively and successfully. Peer support, as an anti-bullying method, is widely viewed in the literature as playing a critical role in providing support for victims of bullying, and identifying bullying incidents at an early stage. Since all peer supporters had received the training sessions, they were supposed to be sensitive to pupils’ emotional and behavioural issues, especially bullying. However, the present study showed that only one peer supporter (Helen), out of fourteen interviewed reported that there was any bullying in their school. As mentioned in the previous section, Japanese peer supporters seemed to focus on some other duties and roles (peer-led group activities), rather than engaging with individual emotional and behavioural problems. Thus, the majority of peer supporters clearly stated that there was no bullying without hesitation. Again, this confirms the failure of the training to prepare the peer supporters for the reality of peer relationships in their school, given that bullying is recognised as a major issue in Japanese schools.

5.3 Perceived generation gap

Peer supporters shared their views about advantages and disadvantage of peer support, based on their experiences. Especially, in terms of the effectiveness of peer support practices, peer supporters often mentioned their superiority over the teachers, and their perceived superiority seemed to be strongly related to a generation gap between teachers and pupils. In a sense, because of the generation gap between teachers and pupils, peer supporters reported that they had more knowledge of their peer group than the adults did.

Interestingly, since the late 90’s, many studies have been conducted on peer support in Japan, but no studies highlighted or emphasised the peer supporters’ perceived advantage over teachers in understanding pupils’ feelings and thoughts. In fact, their perceptions were misconceived since they seemed to have very little insight into the personal issues of their peer group. Only a few articles and books described pupils’ potential as a peer supporter, suggesting that it would be easier for a peer supporter to correctly grasp other pupils’ inner worlds as they were, because they both shared the same status as the pupil. In this regard, Kiba (2012) mentioned that children have the ability to provide various support for children’s specific issues, where teachers and adults generally are not able to reach. However, the present study did not support such a view.
5.3.1 Teachers’ view vs. pupils’ views

The interviews revealed that most peer supporters believed there were some differences between teachers’ views and pupils’ views. The present study found that peer supporters strongly believed they were in a good position to understand pupils’ views over the teachers’. This seemed to encourage peer supporters to think they embodied pupils’ views and played a role to enrich pupils’ school life. In fact, several peer supporters mentioned how important it was for them to carry on peer support activities, in terms of pupils’ views. For example

“...pupils are able to do various activities in terms of children’s views”

(Alex, p7),

“pupils can think about their school life in terms of pupil’s viewpoints”

(Paul, p7),

“I think it is nicer to speak and take actions in terms of pupils’ views”

(Lucy, p9).

That is to say, peer supporters seemed to believe that one of their important roles was to reflect pupils’ views in their activities, which enrich pupils’ school life. In fact, in the present study, peer supporters were not directly questioned about their strengths and effectiveness as a peer supporter, instead, they were questioned about “why do you think we need peer support systems in school?”, which was based on semi-structured interviews. Then, they kept mentioning how accurately they could understand pupils’ views, compared to the teachers’ ability of perception. This implied that peer supporters highly valued their role as a peer supporter because of their good understanding of pupils’ views over teachers.
5.3.2 Pupils’ closeness and Teachers’ blindness

The present study also found that peer supporters emphasised their superiority in communication with reference to their perception of “teachers’ blindness”. The interview data clearly indicated the fact that due to time constraints, communication between pupils and teachers was generally limited, which meant, peer supporters were able to spend more time with other pupils than teachers did. As described by Ellie (p.77), some pupils went to somewhere beyond sight of the teacher before they engaged in forbidden activities such as smoking a cigarette. Despite this, peer supporters were often able to witness their engagements in forbidden activities. This kind of episode highlighted the teacher’s blindness, and confirmed that peer supporters had superiority over teachers in that there were more opportunities for peer supporters to see what was going on behind the scenes. Unfortunately, in their role as mini-teachers, the peer supporters missed an opportunity to understand why some pupils were rebellious.

As prior bullying studies (The Japanese Ministry of Education Japan, 2014; Yamawaki, 2006; Kanetsuna, 2002; Morita & Shimizu, 1994, etc.) mentioned, one of the characteristics of school bullying was “the invisibility of bullying”. Most bullying tended to occur out of eyeshot of teachers and school staff. This resulted in long delays in tackling bullying and offering support to children who were involved. The findings of the present study revealed that the peer supporters were in denial about the existence of bullying in their school, so were unable (or unwilling) to provide any form of support for the victims of bullying.
5.3.3 Friendships among pupils and Negative attitudes toward teachers

The present study found that peer supporters believed that they had an advantage in relationships and friendships over teachers, which were reflected in various ways. The relationships sometimes seemed to be an important factor for peer supporters to smoothly encourage other pupils to join and take the lead in their activities. Especially, peer supporters believed they gained trust from other pupils, thus as a friend, they managed to encourage other pupils to join the activities successfully.

In addition, the majority of peer supporters described that pupils tended to have negative views about their teachers because pupils were at the rebellious age (period of negativism), which has been recognised as a set of behavioural traits, especially for teenagers (Kokubu, 1999). Pupils often negatively perceived the teachers’ words, and also they tended to feel a sense of compulsion when teachers gave them advice. In terms of facilitating emotional and behavioural well-being in school, this tendency, typical of adolescents, made it difficult for pupils to follow teachers’ advice.
From the viewpoints of the perceived generation gap, three key superiorities of peer supporters were revealed, and also these were translated into the following ways.
1. Teachers’ view vs. pupils’ views;

Peer supporters highly valued their role as a peer supporter because they believed that they had a good understanding of pupils’ views, even though this was not confirmed by their attitudes as revealed in the interviews.

2. Pupils’ closeness and Teachers’ blindness;

There were more opportunities for peer supporters to see what was going on behind the scenes. Unfortunately, they failed to use their training to help others or to deepen their understanding of what it is like to be a young person in the school context.

3. Friendships among pupils and negative attitudes toward teachers;

Relationship and friendships seemed to be an important factor for peer supporters to smoothly encourage other pupils to join and take the lead for their activities.

Generally, there was less information about how peer supporters think about their own strengths in their practices. Because very little Japanese research explored the experiences of young people who practiced peer support by employing qualitative methods that captured their thoughts and feelings in depth. Therefore, the data from this thesis provides the first summary of peer supporters’ perceived experiences in Japan. In this vein, the present study has contributed to deepening the knowledge in these unrevealed research topics.
5.3.4 Roles of peer support and cultural backgrounds

As Suzuki (1989) mentioned, the word ‘Education’ in Japanese is ‘Kyoiku’. The Japanese Kanji character of ‘Kyoiku’ consists of ‘Kyo’ = 教 (to teach) and ‘Iku’ = 育 (to foster). The balance of ‘Kyo’ (to teach) and ‘Iku’ (to foster) is an important issue in Japan and it has been discussed for a long time (The Japanese Ministry of Education Japan, 2001; Ikeda, 2014).

If teachers strongly focused on ‘Kyo’ (to teach), their attitudes and the attitudes of their pupils and any trained peer supporters would also be influenced by this philosophy that reinforces a top-down approach in education. Especially in secondary school, pupils may easily have negative feelings toward such an approach, and this would contaminate or fail to provide opportunities to exchange their opinions (from the teacher’s side).
On the other hand, in most peer support programmes, pupils, especially peer supporters have been encouraged to have initiative and autonomy as much as possible. They have actively made efforts to support other pupils through an empowerment-based approach although this study demonstrates that this interpretation of peer support training, in the single-site, school setting where I recruited was not adhered to.
One of the main objectives of peer support programmes is to provide pupils with opportunities to solve/challenge their issues with developing their own abilities; with the cooperation of others and friendships (Kawabata & Ikejima, 2011, Makinae, 2013). In short, peer support programmes seem to be aimed for ‘Iku’ (to foster pupils), rather than ‘to teach’. This seems to be a suitable approach with teenagers; secondary school pupils, who are strongly influenced by their peers.
As described in chapter one, in Japan, education tended to heavily focus on the academic outcomes, which would be highly possible to be reflected as a top-down approach, by teachers’ attitudes; which were often very persuasive. Considering the pupil-teacher relationships, peer support programmes have the potential to tactfully provide pupils with an opportunity to accelerate/foster their own emotional and behavioural development. Unfortunately, in the present study, there was no evidence that the peer supporters were actually doing this.
Peer support programmes, according to the JPSA, play a critical role to balance the way of education; ‘to teach’ and ‘to foster’. Consequently, peer support appears to be a unique scheme, which is firmly based on the advantage of the pupils’ peer relations. This reinforces their friendships and keeps good relation with teachers. Again, however, in the present study there was no evidence that the peer supporters were actually putting such ideals into practice.
As mentioned, none of the prior studies explored the peer supporters’ views about the relationships between teachers and children and did not discuss the potential advantages of pupils over the teachers’. However, Yokozawa (2002) conducted an interesting study about the relationships between peer supporters and their peer support supervisors (teachers). This study was not designed to explore the advantages and disadvantages of the roles of each peer supporter and supervisor. Rather, Yokozawa showed how supervisors (teachers) could effectively provide the support for peer supporters. Yokozawa concluded that through supervision, the supervisors gained good understandings of peer supporters; which lead to supervisors’ awareness of the value of learning from peer supporters. This also supports the idea of the pupils’ superiority in relationships in terms of adults’ views.
As mentioned above, in the present study, pupils believed they had an advantage in relationships over teachers. One of the participants shared her feeling that she treasured her friends and believed it was a long lasting friendship, which indicated how strongly pupils valued their peers and friendships (Michelle, p34). This seemed to correspond to the ideas of fellow feelings and conformity, which are promoted especially during pre-adolescence (Costanzo, 1966). The collectivism cultural background of pupils in Japan, suggests that there is no doubt that pupil’s friendships and peer relations strongly influence their daily activities and social norms in terms of both emotional and behavioural aspects. (In fact, peer support programs themselves, have often been developed in a unique way, which were strongly influenced by Japanese culture (collectivism).
The present study found that several peer supporters could involve their friends, who did not want to join, into the volunteer activities because of peer pressure and encouragements from other close friends. These examples highlighted how friendship and peer pressure contributed to the development of pupils’ attitudes and behaviours in a positive way, which also created supportive environments and relations. However, this peer-related power; friendships and peer pressure, often worked negatively in school, especially in school bullying. As several studies (Jimerson et al, 2010; Morita et al, 1999; Salmivalli, 1997; Morita & Shimizu, 1997; Olweus, 1993) reported, in bullying incidents, the majority of pupils could not take actions against bullies. Even pupils who would like to give support to victims, tended to remain silent as passive bystanders, because of negative group norms and peer pressure. So again, the JPSA training had not provided the peer supporters with sufficient skills to challenge the power of bullies.
As similar episodes, the present study showed that the pupils who were willing to help others, often could not take action because of peer pressure (Graham, p16). These episodes are consistent with the findings of previous studies (e.g. Ojala and Nesdale, 2004), where if the majority of (close) friends did not want to contribute to something good, then, others followed their friends’ behaviours (opinions). Pupils appeared to be keen on the power of peer pressure, and they understood how strongly peers could influence individuals as well as groups, both positively and negatively. In fact, in bullying studies (e.g. Takemura, 1999), regarding the question ‘When you are bullied, whom you want to ask for help?’ the majority of secondary school pupils chose ‘friends’ (61.9%), rather than teachers (26.1%). Other similar studies confirmed this finding too, and these indicated that pupils believed/knew friends (peers) were a powerful medium to change their social norms and situations in school positively and negatively.
Considering the findings of my study, in light of previous research in this area, it was claimed that peer support programmes in Japan appeared to play two critical roles, in terms of relationships (friendships) among pupils. Firstly, peer support provides opportunities to the majority of pupils; especially bystanders, to contribute to the development of positive social norms and supportive school environments through the activities. Considering the Salmivalli’s participant role theory (section 2.2.2), it would be beneficial to have more opportunities to encourage other pupils to act in a positive way, which reinforce the positive behaviour in classrooms. As a prevention method, it appeared to be a suitable and effective approach to change the negative group norms into positive group norms.

Secondly, peer support provides opportunities to the majority of pupils; especially bystanders, to develop their emotional and behavioural well-being. As described in chapters one and two, currently children’s poor social skills are critical issues (Kawabata & Ikejima, 2011; Kato et al, 2011; The Early Childhood Education Central Council for Education, 2007). Many children showed an inability to express themselves properly and lack the communication skills necessary to maintain good relationships with others, which seems to be related to school bullying, school refusal and children’s low self-esteems. Several studies showed that peer support programmes contribute to the improvement of these troubled situations (Takahashi & Kurihara, 2011; Kurihara et al, 2010; Kawabata & Ikejima, 2011; Seto & Mori, 2009; Takeuchi, 2008). For example in Japan, peer support activities were often applied into existing daily activities (e.g. cleaning up the classroom, greeting campaign) and school events (e.g. volunteer work, sports festivals). This provides an opportunity to introduce peer support activities into the pupils’ lives (Nakabayashi, 2005). From the above, peer support programmes in school appear to be a unique scheme, which maximise children’s ability and extend potentials to contribute to developments of children’s emotional and behavioural well-being individually and collectively. Peer supporters (children) strongly believe effectiveness of peer support programs in terms of their experiences. However, the findings from the present study indicate that the peer supporters did not achieve such aims since they showed little awareness of the personal and social needs of their peer group.