Self-injury in adolescence: The perception of teachers

Abstract

Self-inflicted violence is a problem between teenagers around the world and in Brazil. This paper analyzes how elementary and high school teachers identify self-injuries in students and which interventions are made after discovering the cases. It is research of quantitative and qualitative approaches that investigates sociodemographic aspects of twelve brazilian teachers who agreed to participate in the study, through an online questionnaire, with open and closed-ended questions, about their perception and reactions to the occurrences of self-harm among adolescents. Closed-ended questions were analyzed using descriptive statistics (frequency and percentage) and open-ended questions were grouped by theme. The participants were between thirty-two and forty years old, six to fifteen years of teaching and at least two years in the researched school. All declared that they did not feel prepared to deal with cases of self-injury, reporting a lack of training and information material; of these, eight teachers have already taught to a student who practiced self-injury, and this action is often informed by another person and not directly perceived by the teacher. The study points to the need to build dialogue between the Education and Health sectors, for the planning and implementation of actions aimed at health promotion, teacher training and monitoring of students and family members.