During middle childhood, help seeking and avoidance are two ways children deal with academic problems. For this study, the dominant view of help seeking as a strategy of self-regulated learning was elaborated to consider it a way of coping framed within the Self-System Model of Motivational Development. This framework allows for the consideration of (1) the opposite of help seeking (help avoidance) as a motivated way of coping, (2) the central role of teachers, and (3) the operation of multiple self-system processes in shaping students' coping behaviors. Self-report, teacher-report, and school record data from 765 3rd through 61 h grade students and their teachers were analyzed to determine the structure of help seeking and avoidance, the antecedents and consequences of these ways of coping, and developmental differences that may account for age-related changes in coping. Data were available from two time points, the fall and spring of one academic year, allowing for concurrent and change over time analyses.

The current study developed a comprehensive theoretical framework of joint multiple contextual influences (JMCI framework) to guide empirical investigation of combine influences of social contexts on children's academic outcomes. Drawn from several general frameworks, four models of joint social influences were proposed: Independent, Interactive, Differential, and Sequential. Using a motivational framework, all four models were tested empirically for joint effects of parents and teachers on children's self-perceptions (relatedness, competence, and autonomy) and classroom engagement. Overall, this study provided some empirical support for every category of models proposed in the JMCI framework. The joint influences of parents and teachers on children's self-perceptions were mostly independent and unique. Most joint influences were additive: one social context couldn't buffer or amplify the effects of the other context. Only joint effects of Non-Supportive parents and Supportive teachers interacted in their influences on children's competence: Supportive teachers were able to safeguard and counterbalance the negative influences of Non-Supportive parents. The study also indicated that self-system processes are possible pathways through which parents and teachers exert their influences on children's academic engagement and that this influence depends on the age of the developing child. The study also suggested that children's engagement may be a mechanism that mediates the relationship between parents' and teachers' contexts.

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The purpose of this study was to ascertain if formal early childhood education was related to the likelihood of later criminal activity. The secondary data analysis within this study did support inferences for four specific crime factors. This study found that preschool attendance lessened the incurrence of future criminal activity in crime categories of total numbers of damage offenses, total numbers of theft offenses, total numbers of damage alone offenses, and total numbers of injury and theft offenses.

The purpose of this study was to compare and analyze test scores on the Woodcock-Johnson Psycho-Educational Battery (Battery) and the Wechsler Intelligence Scale for Children -- Revised (WISC-R) for a sample of subjects classified as learning disabled and a sample of subjects classified as gifted and talented. Subjects were randomly selected and included 51 school-identified learning disabled students and 46 school-identified gifted and talented students. All subjects were administered the Woodcock-Johnson Tests of Cognitive Ability (WJTCA), the Woodcock-Johnson Tests of Achievement (WJTA) and the WISC-R. The specific areas of investigation for each sample included: (a) performance on the Achievement-Aptitude Profile of the Battery, (b) comparability of full scale scores, (c) performance on the Cognitive clusters of the Battery, (d) performance on the Achievement clusters of the Battery, and (e) the magnitude of Verbal-Performance Scale Score discrepancies on the WISC-R. Results indicated that the majority (74.5%) of the subjects classified as learning disabled and a few (10.9%) of the subjects classified as gifted and talented evidenced a moderate or severe deficit on the Achievement-Aptitude Profile. The subjects classified as learning disabled scored significantly higher on the Full Scale score of the WISC-R than on the full scale score of the WJTCA, while the difference between full scale scores was not significant for the subject classified as gifted and talented. An important finding was that scores obtained on the Reasoning cluster were invalid for subjects in both samples. Further analyses indicated that the alternative clusters, Oral Language and Broad Reasoning (Woodcock, 1983) provided a more accurate appraisal of abilities for each sample. Overall, the study provided insights regarding test performance on the Battery and the WISC-R for these two diverse samples.

The American school system currently faces gaps in achievement between its low-income, minority students and their higher-income, white peers. These gaps exist both in academic and socioemotional skills, are present by kindergarten entry, and persist throughout students' school careers. One proposed strategy through which these gaps may be reduced is through the promotion of student motivation and engagement. In the primary and secondary school settings, these constructs are promoted through teachers' motivational support of students' psychological needs for relatedness, autonomy, and competence. However, the development of these factors prior to kindergarten entry has not been as well studied. Data from 333 students and their 98 preschool classrooms were used to examine whether highly motivationally supportive preschool experiences can buffer the negative effects of risk in order to support the development of a high sense of motivation and engagement that is sustained across the transition to kindergarten. In terms of normative changes, results indicated that both engagement and disaffection declined across the kindergarten transition. High maternal education was a consistent predictor of increases in engagement and motivation and declines in disaffection across the kindergarten transition. While need support did not consistently buffer the loss of engagement or enhance declines in disaffection, it did seem particularly beneficial for boys, whose motivation and disaffection outcomes tended to improve after preschool experiences characterized by high warmth. Additionally, children's declines in frustration across the kindergarten transition were enhanced by well-structured preschool experiences. Details of analyses, results, strengths, limitations, and implications for future research are discussed.

The relationship of family environment and children's goals in sport is not a well established area of research and although findings to date are equivocal, links between various dimensions do appear to exist. The aim of this study was to explore the relationship between family environment, particularly the perception of achievement orientation within the family, and the youth participants' goal orientation in hockey. The sample consisted of fifty-five female senior school hockey players, as well as their parents, that attended independent girls' schools in the Pietermartizburg and Durban areas. No significant relationship was found between the perception of achievement orientation in the family and the youth participants' goal orientation in sport. There were however, indications that other aspects of social climate within family environment, as perceived by the participants, influence youth goal orientation in sport. Findings also revealed links between positive parental involvement and intrinsic motivation, and perceived parental pressure and pressure experienced by the hockey players. The results are discussed in terms of the literature reviewed, and the implication and the limitations of the study are discussed, concluding with recommendations for future research. / Thesis (M.A.)-University of KwaZulu-Natal, Pietermaritzburg, 2004.

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A dissertation submitted to the Faculty of Arts at the University of Zululand, (South Africa), in fulfillment of the requirements for the Master of Arts in Research Psychology degree, 2004. / The purpose of the study was to examine certain aspects of educational and occupational development in adolescent females. Specifically, the aims were: (1) to ascertain the nature of occupational aspirations of black adolescent girls, (2) to determine the relationship between black adolescents self esteem and occupational aspirations, and (3) to find out whether parents' level of education has an influence on black adolescents' occupational aspirations. Subjects were 161 black girls, aged between 14 and 23 years, from two schools (one a private school and the other a government school) in the township of Atteridgeville, west of Pretoria. The overall results on the educational aspirations of this sample of adolescent girls indicated that these girls intend to graduate from, high school and achieve higher levels of education beyond high school. Occupational aspirations were assessed on the basis of their training requirements, on the first choice of occupation, which the students wanted more than the others; a majority of them aspired to occupations necessitating a degree. The type of schooling did play a role in influencing occupational aspirations, it is thus important to acknowledge that socioeconomic factor is the important variable , since socioeconomic influences which children go to public schools and which go to private schools. It was interesting to find that individual value for educational aspirations and social approval for educational aspirations were significantly related, and that the individual value for occupational aspirations and social approval for occupational aspirations were significant. The t-test for equality of means showed that the government school girls were slightly higher than the private school girls on school ability, while the private school girls were significantly higher on occupational aspirations than the government school girls

Children's classroom engagement is important for their learning and academic achievement. Extending Kindermann's (2007) study of peer influence on adolescents' engagement to an ethnically homogeneous sample, the current study examined how different aspects of diversity affect the peer influence process. Three types of diversity were considered: ethnic diversity existing at the school level, relational diversity at the peer network level, and motivational diversity at the group level. Ethnic diversity was observed in the student body as well as among school teachers and staff. Relational diversity was measured by z-scores resulting from binomial tests reflecting how closely two pair of individuals were connected in the peer network. Finally, motivational diversity was measured as the dispersion (SD) around peer group mean engagement levels, thereby reflecting the diversity of engagement within each peer group. The results indicated that adolescents in this ethnically diverse middle school were overall highly engaged; their engagement patterns were comparable to previous findings from homogeneous samples consisting largely of European American adolescents. Also consistent with prior findings, the mean engagement levels of students' peer group members were a significant predictor of changes in adolescents' own engagement, which suggests peer influence on adolescents' classroom engagement. Although previous literature suggests that individuals in diverse settings tend to be less well connected to one another, the adolescents in this ethnically diverse school were well connected with their peers. Unexpectedly, almost all students' peer groups were ethnically diverse. When the impact of relational diversity was examined to see whether strongly connected individuals exerted more influence on each other than weakly connected individuals (differential influence hypothesis), the results indicated that the strength of connections among peer group members did not appear to play a significant role in the magnitude of their influences on each other's changes in engagement. Nevertheless, the present study suggested new pathways and methods to examine differential peer influences. Finally, the impact of motivational diversity of peer groups was examined using a moderated model based on an interaction effect between peer group motivational diversity and individuals' initial engagement. The results indicated that the positive impact of peer group motivational diversity was moderated by individuals' initial engagement status, such that initially low engaged adolescents benefited from diversely engaged peer groups, whereas peer group motivational diversity had a comparatively small negative effect on initially highly engaged students.