Preschool anxieties: Constructions of risk and gender in preschool teachers’ talk on physical interaction with children

Background and previous research

In 2015, 83 per cent of all Swedish children aged 1–5 attended preschool (Swedish National Agency for Education, 2017a). For the most part, children encounter women staff. Only some 3 per cent of graduated preschool teachers are men (Swedish National Agency for Education, 2017b). Today, preschool is a natural environment for Swedish children, and it needs to offer good care and good learning opportunities. In order to achieve this, a national curriculum for preschools has been implemented (Swedish National Agency for Education, 2011). Despite this development, the gender imbalance of the staff has remained constant. Since the 1970s several attempts to recruit more men have been made, with little success (Granbom and Wernersson, 2012; Nordberg, 2011). During the recent years, one reason given for why the preschool profession does not attract men is the risks men run of being suspected of child abuse (Heikkilä, 2015).

Ulrich Beck’s (1992) notion of the risk society emphasises that individuals have a need to control and push away fears, and that this need has escalated during modernity. If his description is correct, it would be fair to say that we live in a culture of fear, in which it becomes ever-more important to protect what is deemed valuable at any cost. This is underscored by a search of the Swedish daily newspaper database Mediearkivet, which reveals that articles on risk and children have increased from some 7000 in the year 2000, to more than 70,000, 15 years later (cf. Lindqvist and Nordänger, 2007). As shown by Cameron (2001), different countries can view risks in relation to children in very different ways, where educators in Anglo-Saxon countries, at the time of her study, were more likely to become suspected of inappropriate touching of children compared with those in Scandinavian countries. The work of educators can be affected when suspicions directed towards adults in children’s presence, gain a foothold. Teachers might avoid physical contact with children (Andrzejewski and Davis, 2007) and start looking at themselves as potential perpetrators (Jones, 2003).

Suspicions directed towards adults in preschool are to a high degree gendered. Research has shown that men are especially exposed (Berill and Martino, 2002; Eidevald, 2014; Jones, 2001b; King, 2004; Nordberg, 2005; Åberg and Hedlin, 2012), although women also risk being subjected to suspicions (Andrzejewski and Davis, 2007; Jones, 2004; Åberg and Hedlin, 2012). A quantitative study from Denmark found that 56 per cent of male teachers and 21 per cent of female teachers claimed they had changed their behaviour due to a perceived increased risk of being accused of paedophilia (Munk et al., 2013). In Sweden, preschools’ risk prevention work is supported nationally by means of legislation that mandate and demand preschools to check the criminal record of new employees. This law has now been incorporated in the general Education Act (Swedish Education Act, 2010). At a local level, preschools regulate the work of temporary staff, for example, by not letting them work alone with children (Eidevald, 2016). The physical environment of preschools is also sometimes modified to increase transparency, so that adults’ physical contact with children cannot be concealed (cf. Eidevald, 2016). Internationally, there are examples of preschools using far-reaching regulation of adults’ physical conduct, for instance, through detailed rules on hugging (Cushman, 2009).

Research has suggested that inexperienced and newly educated preschool teachers express more concern of being suspected of touching children inappropriately, compared with more experienced teachers (Brody, 2015; Eidevald, 2014). In this article, we want to examine this area closer, and our aim is to investigate how preschool student-teachers at the end of their education, and newly graduated preschool teachers, reason about risks and anxieties connected to the physical interaction between teachers and children.

Theory

Theoretically, our study relies on a constructionist perspective on gender. While essentialist perspectives on gender argue that maleness and femaleness are inherent properties, constructionist perspectives maintain that masculinities and femininities are dependent on actions and social interaction (Sabbe and Aelterman, 2007). Through the repetition of such actions, the preschool profession has historically been associated with women and femininity (Hedlin and Åberg, 2013; Warin and Gannerud, 2014). This means that women and men in preschool can face different expectations. A man choosing an occupation coded as feminine can expect reactions which his female colleagues do not encounter. As reported by Sargent (2005), women’s bodies commonly are associated with loving care, while men’s bodies are seen as threatening, which means that physical contact with children and young students may be a particularly sensitive issue for men.

In alignment with how we define gender, we also see touch as a relational practice. Derrida (2005) argues, with reference to Aristotle, that touch contrary to the other senses has no determined object. While the object of vision is colour and the object of hearing is sound, the object of touch has many different traits. In fact, in line with Yi-Fu Tuan (2005) it could be argued that touch has the ability to modify and change its object, something other senses cannot do. The ability to physically affect and change an object is one aspect of the relationality of touch. Touch can only emerge through interaction and relations. This makes touch hard to fathom and rationalise. It always exceeds its own boundaries by its dependence on other senses (Classen, 2005) and by coming into existence only when different objects meet (Tuan, 2005). Touch is thus created in a borderland, where the border itself is a paradox; touch could not exist without the border, but the border cannot represent touch by itself (Derrida, 2005). As argued by Barad (2012) the ambiguity of touch disrupts identity, making it ‘radically queered’. Touch, we would argue, is closely associated with the emotions emerging from touching practices. Following Ahmed’s (2004) thinking on affective economies, emotions never rest solely within an individual or an object, but must rather be understood as effects of the encounter between different objects (human and non-human). That is, the affinity between touch and emotions further underscores the unpredictable character of the anxieties about touch expressed by the informants.

In this article, our constructionist approaches to touch and gender are fused in the notion of relational touch. We have been inspired to use this concept by educational researchers Stronach and Piper (2008) (cf. Piper and Stronach, 2008). To them, relational touch underscores that touch is a contextual, composite and unpredictable practice. Stronach and Piper (2008) have used the concept in opposition to the ’no touch’ trend in the British school system. They argue that bureaucratic and organisational attempts to limit teachers’ physical interaction with children have negative effects on their emotional contact. Relational touch is thus an ideal that encompasses the pedagogical and ethical aspects of touch. It accounts for human rather than organisational needs.

Departing from Stronach and Piper (2008), here we do not want to use the concept as a tool for detecting progressive pedagogical practices. Instead, we use relational touch as an analytical concept emphasising the ‘plural, displaced, and metonymic’ (Stronach and Piper, 2008: 34, note 17) character of touch. For us the concept is useful in that it captures the unpredictability and complexity of touch. We also want to contribute to developing the concept by incorporating gender into the analysis. Even if Stronach and Piper (2008) argue that the gender of the teachers matters for relational touch, they do not elaborate on this in their analysis. As discussed above, it is evident that touch in preschool is closely associated with notions of femininities and masculinities. However, to grasp fully the changing and relational character of touch, it is not enough to conceive of gender by means of a static binary gender model. Our understanding of relational touch entails an understanding of gender as dependent on actions (Butler, 1990). Similarly, touch itself needs movement to emerge (Classen, 2005), something only actions can create.

Self-angst

One of the themes that emerge from the empiric material is what we call self-angst. This refers to informants turning their concerns about touch towards themselves, in a self-reflective, often self-critical way. In the introductory quote of the article, the newly graduated preschool teacher Åsa says that earlier she thought that women could pose no danger to children, in relation to touching practices. Self-reflectively, she states that she has come to realise that this way of thinking is stereotypical, a representation of traditional thinking where women’s closeness to children is perceived as natural and harmless. Implicitly, she thus criticises the link between women and what Connell (2005) has called ‘emphasised femininity’, that is, traits that underscore differences between women and men. Connell (2005) argues these differentiations maintain the gender order. At the same time though, Åsa states that it is professionally important for her to give children a lot of physical contact. She objects to teachers and pedagogical ideas that emphasise restrictive touching practices, of which she argues she has encountered a lot in teacher education.

So, while being aware that her physical closeness to children iterates a particular version of femininity to which she is opposed to on a cognitive level, Åsa is also self-reflective about the fact that during her teacher training she was more suspicious of male than of female students. In the interview, she says that she knows it is not okay to suspect men of wanting to become preschool teachers for the wrong reasons, but that she has felt this in relation to men whom she found were not engaging enough in their training. What we find interesting here is how Åsa’s emotional concerns over touch circulate, involving relations with men, children and parents and, also importantly, how her thinking on touch comes full circle when she exclaims in self-disgust: ‘… it’s awful to think like that…’. She is worried that she assesses men and women differently.

The ‘concern over oneself’, that is, introspective reflections on one’s thoughts and reactions, which Åsa expresses, also recurs in other students’ narratives. Petra provides another example of this.

Petra is a young woman who obtained a full-time position immediately after finishing the teaching programme. By the time of the research interview, she had worked at the preschool for approximately 4 months. The preschool faces some challenges: it is under-staffed partly due to sick leave, the child groups are big partly due to a large influx of newly arrived refugees to Sweden, and resources are scarce. Despite being newly graduated and newly employed, Petra has immediately been given a lot of responsibility for her section of the preschool. She is also the only staff member with a teaching degree. In our conversation, Petra speaks at length about her concern about being inadequate. At the same time, though, she is filled with energy and optimism; she is convinced that she will pull through, despite the demanding conditions at the preschool. Apart from the inadequate organisation, Petra airs her concern about physical interaction with children. Some of the kids want to be ‘too close’, and while not minding hugging the children, Petra has issues with acts of exaggerated intimacy from some of the children. It is difficult to find the right balance, to know what level of touch is ‘just right’. Furthermore, there are some situations that are particularly sensitive, such as toilet situations. When asked what aspects of work she finds the most difficult to handle, this is what she says:

The worry Petra expresses over her own actions, and the uncertainty of how to handle the toilet situation with the child, is framed by the concern created in her by media reports on child abuse. The concern over her own actions is thus linked to a concern over what substitute staff might do to the children.

In a study on male educators, Foster and Newman (2005) coined the concept of identity bruising. They use it to describe what happens to a teacher who feels suspected of inappropriate touching. Suspicions from others are hurtful; they constitute a blow to the educator’s self-esteem. As research shows that men are more likely to become suspected of inappropriate touching than women (Eidevald, 2016; Piper and Stronach, 2008), Petra may run less risk of being suspected, and she states that no one has expressed concerns over her actions. This does not mean, however, that Petra is unaffected by the current widespread talk on child abuse. As asserted by Tobin (1997), the moral panic on touch started with gay men, but it has turned into a more general fear which affects all preschool staff. Petra’s concern for how her interaction with children is perceived by others thus becomes something that injures her self-esteem, and creates her sense of insecurity in relation to bathroom situations. Petra is vulnerable, due to the current situation at her preschool, and due to the big responsibility she has to carry largely alone, despite being young and newly graduated. Compared with Åsa, who claims she actively seeks physical closeness with children, Petra’s sense of ‘injury’ is enhanced by her uncomfortable reactions to children seeking to touch her. While the media reports she has read or heard about have revolved around men, they still impact on her in that her thinking on her own actions makes her more aware that touching can potentially involve risks. Her vulnerability certainly differs from that of educators who encounter outright suspicion. Still, there is a risk that the worry she actually feels is sustained by the poor working conditions at her workplace.

Anxiety over men

While the case with Petra above indicates that also women can be affected by media reports highlighting men as offenders, some of the male informants stated that they had experienced outright suspicions or measures to prevent them from physically engaging with children. The male preschool teacher Per, who in one way or another has been involved in preschool work since upper secondary school, says that he had a very difficult experience in upper secondary school. During a practice placement at a preschool, one of the regular staff took him aside to her office and started to question Per on his relation with one of the children. Per, who argues that he in fact was trying to support the child who was alone and marginalised by the peer group, says that this accusation was very offensive to him. Although the event didn’t affect his choice of professional career, he says that it still impacts him, despite the fact that several years have passed since it occurred.

The majority of the preschool teachers and students we have met let us know that they have worked or trained at or know of preschools that have implemented different restrictive policies on touch. These are often targeted at students or substitute staff who cannot perform work tasks that might be considered sensitive, for example, changing diapers or being left alone with a child. The case of Oskar illustrates this point. He says that he is forbidden to change the diapers of some of the children in the preschool section where he works, something which concerns him. He says that this ban has to do with the traditional beliefs of some of the parents:

By the time of the interview Oskar has only been employed for a month. Despite him telling something that might be called gender discrimination according to the Swedish Discrimination Act (2008), he describes his situation as a practical rather than a pedagogical or professional problem. He says he is somewhat concerned, but overall he argues that if people are met with respect and dialogue, things will be sorted out.

It is evident from our interviews that preschool touch policies differ greatly, if any are in place. At Oskar’s preschool a touch policy had been negotiated by his superior, colleagues and parents before he started working at the preschool, ruling Oskar out from changing diapers for some of the children. For Per, formal restrictions on touch seem to be rather negotiable or flexible. On one hand, he describes how he, as a substitute teacher, is absolutely prohibited from changing diapers. On the other hand, he says that when children and parents have gotten to know him, he was allowed to change diapers during a practical placement. For Oskar, proving his ‘innocence’ through dialogue seems not to be a possibility; he has already been assessed as unsuitable in relation to some children.

In order to prevent sexual assaults on children, educators need to perform risk assessments of new colleagues. As argued by Jones (2004), in an era of ‘no touch’ policies it becomes vital that teachers are assessed as ‘safe’. However, ‘safe’ is not a neutral or static concept. As Per’s and Oskar’s narratives demonstrate, what is deemed ‘safe’ is an ongoing negotiation through the interaction among teachers, management, parents and children. Implied in the notion of ‘safe’ is, as Tait (2001) argues, its opposite, ‘the dangerous teacher’. That is, policies and measures to regulate touch are based on a mindset in which danger is viewed as an inherent aspect of touch. Potentially dangerous adults need to be identified and isolated, as Oskar is separated from some of the children. However, this strategy may in turn produce other ‘risks’, for example, the risk of men leaving the profession, or children who fear physical contact (Tait 2001).

Gender-equal anxiety

As the previous sections show, anxieties over touch often target men, but women are not unaffected by the discourse of risk prevention. Perhaps the clearest proof of the asymmetrical risk assessment of women and men is that several women in our study stated that they pity men. Simone, who argues that she has developed restrictive touch behaviour during the course of her education, says:

Already in the 1990s, Tobin (1997) argued that suspicions had spread from first being directed towards gay men, then to men in general and after that, also towards women. Around the same time, however, a Danish study stated the debate on the risks of enrolling male preschool teachers ‘seems totally incomprehensible in a Danish context’ (Jensen, 1996: 25). In Cameron’s (2001) review, she found that the response to cases of child sexual abuse in both Denmark and Norway had been to support men from not being discouraged from the profession, which was concurrent with the equal opportunities agenda of the Nordics. Based on our study, we would argue that this model for gender equality still impacts the way anxieties over touch are construed in Swedish preschools. However, if it earlier revolved around ‘supporting men’, now in an era of anxiousness, it includes ‘blaming women’, too.

Petra (same woman as quoted above) elaborates on why she as a woman fears suspicions, despite the fact that media reports so often depict men as perpetrators:

Oskar (same man as quoted above) states:

Several of the informants, both men and women, express themselves in a similar manner as Petra and Oskar do, arguing that it is ‘as common’ for women to assault children as for men to do it. Men are perceived to be unjustly exposed, and the media is partly blamed for sustaining prejudice towards men by giving more attention to the cases in which men have molested children. The informants’ comments that women are as likely to be perpetrators as men are, challenge the culturally well-established, stereotypical image of the sexual offender as a man. Media reports are mistrusted, and as in the case of Petra, informants do not seem to want to direct suspicions at a man they know well.

With Ahmed (2010) the ‘male perpetrator’ can be understood as another object of relevance for relational touch. The fact that informants do not accept the ‘male perpetrator’ as a ‘touch truth’ indicates precisely the relational character of touch. It’s evolving and changing. Ahmed (2010) argues that people reach for that which is proximate to them in order to establish positive emotional bonds, and that this proximity in part relies on how others have valued certain objects. Emotions thus always bear historical traces. When informants thus use ‘women’ as an object to negotiate the stereotype of the male offender, they are trying to change history, and the Swedish gender equality discourse is what enables them to attempt this.

At a national level, critical masculinity scholars have shown that political attempts to enhance gender equality have revolved around getting men to take a larger responsibility for children and family (Klinth, 2002). This has been done through appealing to and trying to inspire men, rather than by adjusting society and the social security system so that more gender-equal effects are created. Within this discourse an image of the Swedish man as a good, gender-equal father has been established. This idealised image has been exempt from any notion of ’danger’ and has been built on ethnic and class-based stereotypes which transfer all the negative aspects of men’s parenting to immigrant and working-class men (Gottzén and Jonsson, 2012). This discourse has been reiterated in the measures taken to recruit men to preschools. On one hand, the need for male role models, especially for boys, has been emphasised. On the other hand, it has been argued that men are needed in order to break with traditional gender stereotypes (Nordberg, 2011). Sociologist Keith Pringle (2012) argues that Sweden has made the mistake of not paying enough attention to research showing that men are strongly overrepresented as sexual offenders, and that gender – neither class nor ethnicity – is the common denominator for the men assaulting children. Pringle (2012) makes the case that Sweden should look more to the United Kingdom, a country which, according to him, has discussed this in a much more serious manner for many years. We are afraid, however, that exclusively focusing on the potential danger posed by men risks both undermining teachers’ important physical relational work with children and sustaining the ‘no touch’-culture that several studies have shown is proliferating in the United Kingdom and other Anglophone countries (Jones, 2001a; Piper and Stronach, 2008).