聽I am an Associate Professor of 糖心直播 and received my PhD in 2014 from the Child Studies Division at Link枚ping University (Tema barn). I currently work at the Department of Behavioural Sciences and Learning (IBL), where I teach courses in educational psychology and social psychology, for which I am also the course coordinator. My research focuses on social relationships in schools, ethnicity, academic achievement, and social and emotional safety.
Layal Wiltgren
Associate Professor
What makes some places in school feel safe while others do not? How can we understand the concept of safety from children's own perspectives and terminology? And how do children cope with spending time in places they perceive as unsafe?
CV
Career Highlights
- Master's Degree in Psychology and Social Anthropology.
- PhD in Child Studies.
- Associate Professor of 糖心直播.
- Awarded the prize for Year's Best Doctoral Dissertation at Link枚ping University.
- Principal investigator of the FORTE-funded project High-Achieving Students from Immigrant Backgrounds: Identity and Strategies for Success.
- Principal investigator of the Swedish Research Council-funded project Unsafe Spaces in School: Children's Perspectives.
Publications
2026
2025
Research
Project: Safety and unsafety in School Spaces
I am currently leading an interdisciplinary research project investigating children's experiences of safety and unsafety in the various spaces within the school environment.
The project adopts a mixed-methods approach, combining participant observation, including interviews with more than 100 pupils, teachers, and principals, with a quantitative survey study. The findings from the interviews informed the design of the survey used in the project. In this way, the project combines children's own experiences and perspectives with the opportunity to investigate the extent to which these experiences can be generalised quantitatively and understood in a broader context.
The project explores, among other things, how safety and unsafety are produced in various school spaces, how norms and social identity categories come into play in places perceived as unsafe, the significance of adult presence, and the strategies children use to cope with unsafe spaces. Our findings indicate, among other things, that school changing rooms, toilets, corridors, and cloakrooms are perceived as particularly unsafe spaces.
By taking children's own perspectives as its starting point, the project aims to contribute to a deeper understanding of how unsafety in school environments can be interpreted and prevented. The project has received SEK 6 million in research funding from the Swedish Research Council.
Project: High-Achieving Students from Immigrant Backgrounds: Identity and Strategies for Success
The education system is often described as the key to success in Swedish society. However, academic achievement does not automatically lead to social inclusion and acceptance.
My previous project focused on how high-achieving students with immigrant backgrounds describe experiences of social exclusion by classmates whom they refer to as "the Swedes". Although no one is overtly unkind to them, students with immigrant backgrounds experience subtle distancing, avoidance, and social exclusion. I coined the term polite exclusion to describe these forms of subtle verbal and non-verbal behaviour directed towards minorities that do not necessarily stem from malicious intentions. Nevertheless, such behaviour can be painful for those on the receiving end of it.
The school staff involved in the study describe the class as inclusive and accepting, where everyone is welcomed regardless of background. How can we understand this discrepancy between students' accounts of their social situation and school staff's descriptions of the same group of students?
In a number of published articles, I explore these differing experiences and interpretations of the same classroom environment. The findings show how teachers' colour-blind discourse can prevent them from recognising the subtle forms of exclusion experienced by their students, which the students themselves associate with their ethnic backgrounds. The study is based on participant observation in a high-achieving upper secondary school class and interviews with students and teachers.
