pensions during the intervention year were compared to only one preintervention year. Comparison
with several years preceding the intervention (i.e., to determine if the decrease might be better ex-
plained by a trend toward fewer suspensions over the past few years) would offer more support peer
mediation’s role in the decreased suspension.
Despite methodological limitations, the existing literature tentatively supports the efficacy of
peer mediation and warrants more investigation. The present study extends the peer mediation liter-
ature on a number of dimensions. First, while much of the past peer mediation research has been con-
ducted in middle-class urban and suburban schools, the present study was conducted in a rural school
attended predominantly by children from low-socioeconomic status (SES) families. Srebalus,
Schwartz, Vaughan, and Tunick (1996) reported that youth violence seems to be on the rise in rural
areas, which highlights the need for conflict resolution strategies with this population. Given that rur-
al school counselors are often overtaxed and typically have neither the time nor the training to pro-
vide all services needed (Srebalus et al., 1996), it is especially important to identify interventions
that may alleviate the burden of dealing with poorly managed conflict in these settings.
Further, this study investigates a cadre approach peer mediation program. Although a few stud-
ies (e.g., Thompson, 1996) have investigated this approach, most published studies (see Johnson &
Johnson, 1996) implement a school body approach. An important question is whether students se-
lected as mediators in a cadre approach program realize more benefits than do other students in the
school. The present study addresses this question by comparing students selected as mediators to a
control group.
The final and perhaps most important distinction between the present study and much of the
previous peer mediation literature can be defined in terms of efficacy versus effectiveness as intro-
duced by Seligman (1995). Efficacy studies include controlled trials, often in a “lab” setting, where
the opportunity to detect an effect is optimized (Chambless & Hollon, 1998). To date, the more
methodologically rigorous peer mediation studies (e.g., Dudley et al., 1996; Johnson et al., 1994;
Johnson et al., 1995) could be classified as efficacy studies. Only students volunteered by their teach-
ers participated in the intervention, which allowed for random assignment to treatment conditions.
Such a study measures whether peer mediation has an effect with optimal circumstances (e.g., teach-
ers are motivated to facilitate, refer students, etc.). However, Seligman (1995) reports on a growing
recognition that such controlled trials might not capture the essence of actual practice. Once it is es-
tablished that an intervention is efficacious, research on how to make it effective in practice is need-
ed. Given tentative support that peer mediation may be efficacious (Johnson & Johnson, 1996),
would this intervention be as effective in a school where participation is not on a volunteer basis?
In the current study, school administration solicited peer mediation as a service to be imple-
mented in the entire school, and teachers did not have the option to exclude their students from se-
lection to serve as mediators. However, they did have the option to refer student disputants either to
peer mediation or to the principal. Given these circumstances, the present study might be viewed as
a unique opportunity to investigate the effectiveness of peer mediation in a setting where outcome
depended in part on teachers’ willingness to refer students to a program for which they had not vol-
unteered. Therefore, the present findings may better generalize to school-wide implementations than
would findings from studies based on self-selected participation. Seligman (1995) argued that em-
pirically validated effectiveness can be achieved only by accumulating and surveying numerous stud-
ies of live interventions.
Despite the applied nature of this study, certain measures were taken to improve methodology.
For instance, the authors used three years of baseline data for trend analysis. Also, this project ad-
dressed Carruthers et al.’s (1996) recommendations for planning an evaluation of a peer mediation
program. Importantly, the authors adhered to Carruthers’ recommendation to consider both process
and outcome. The procedure section details the process of adapting the intervention to better suit the
Peer Mediation 507