Nature

popular because of their misconduct while others are seen as rebellious for the same behaviors. These students may rebel against teachers, parents, and other authority figures who attempt to shape their behaviors in order to gain peers’ admiration (Farmer et al., 2014).

Students with challenging behaviors can struggle to negotiate friendships with their peers (Farmer et al., 2014). These struggles may involve sportsmanship, personal space, and emotion management. Struggles often take place on school grounds because of continuously evolving social interactions. As such, the challenge of meeting students’ social and behavioral needs is a broader responsibility than many individuals realize.

Bullying is a concerning school issue, and the harm bullying can do to students is great. Although bullying occurs within the context of peer interactions, educators should not view bullying as a simple tension among peers. The words bully and peer are opposites. A peer is considered an equal—a person of the same social standing as oneself—whereas bullying means the bullied student lacks the elements of equality and free choice.

Researchers R. Matthew Gladden, Alana M. Vivolo-Kantor, Merle E. Hamburger, and Corey D. Lumpkin (2014) confirm that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention released the first federal definition of bullying, which has three components: (1) unwanted aggressive behavior, (2) an observed or perceived power imbalance, and (3) repetition of bullying behaviors. Ongoing evaluation of bullying among students in K–12 schools has revealed that all age groups are impacted by bullying; however, bullying seems to be most prominent between the ages of twelve and eighteen. No single profile or demographic of students seems to be bullied over others. Most bullying behaviors occur on school grounds, which makes teachers important in the prevention of bullying among peer groups. Unfortunately, many students with challenging behaviors like those George has also struggle with low academic achievement and are subjects of intense bullying (Gladden et al., 2014).

Nurture is quite involved because it encompasses a person’s entire environment and how that environment impacts the person’s behaviors. While nurture encompasses the environment, nature involves genetic or hereditary factors that can impact behavior. In other words, genetics can play a part in one’s behavior. Some students are born with or acquire challenging behaviors associated with biological conditions that can contribute to these behaviors (Scott, 2017). Biological factors such as neurological, genetic, and biochemical factors, or a combination of these, can

impact behavior. Congenital defects and low birth weight are biological risk factors for children and youth that can contribute to challenging behaviors (Hallahan et al., 2019). Prenatal exposure to environmental toxins, alcohol, or drugs can contribute to various types of disabilities, such as ADD, emotional and behavioral disorders, and learning disabilities.

Neuroimaging techniques such as magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) show researchers that relatively consistent abnormalities appear in several areas of the brain among people with ADD (Hallahan et al., 2019). The frontal lobe, basal ganglia, and cerebellum are the most notable. Researchers have also discovered abnormal levels of dopamine and noradrenaline in individuals with ADD. These chemicals, or neurotransmitters, assist in sending messages between neurons in the brain. There are also structural differences (sizes of various areas of the brain) and functional differences between the brains of people with learning disabilities and those without. While there is not definitive evidence of a neurological basis for all students who are identified as having a learning disability or ADD, evidence points to heredity as playing a strong role in both ADD and learning disabilities, particularly in the case of severe or profound disorders (Hallahan et al., 2019).

Whether neurological difference or heredity factors relate to an individual’s diagnosis with ADD or a learning disability, it is rare to find a relationship between one specific biological factor and challenging behaviors. Students with ADD can exhibit challenging behaviors because of the characteristics of ADD, which can include inattention, hyperactivity, and impulsive behaviors. Oftentimes, ADD occurs simultaneously with other behavioral and learning difficulties, including learning disabilities and emotional and behavioral disorders.

Although some challenging behaviors result from biological factors, it is important to find strategies to support the students, and to remember that while everyone is born with a biological predisposition or temperament, there is no direct relationship between temperaments and disorders. As we said earlier, challenging behaviors are any behaviors, or actions, that impede the learning of the students themselves or their peers. Whether students’ challenging behavior is a result of nature, nurture, or both, students with challenging behaviors need interventions and strategies to help them be successful academically and socially (Scott, 2017). Teachers can use positive and proactive instruction to effectively set students up for success, rather than waiting for them to fail and then responding to that.