John G. Freeman

The Health Behaviour in School-aged Children (HBSC) study: methodological developments and current tensions

Objectives:To describe the methodological development of the HBSC survey since its inception and explore methodological tensions that need to be addressed in the ongoing work on this and other large-scale cross-national surveys.Methods:Using archival data and conversations with members of the network, we collaboratively analysed our joint understandings of the survey’s methodology.Results:We identified four tensions that are likely to be present in upcoming survey cycles: (1) maintaining quality standards against a background of rapid growth, (2) continuous improvement with limited financial resources, (3) accommodating analysis of trends with the need to improve and adapt questionnaire content, and (4) meeting the differing requirements of scientific and policy audiences.Conclusions:While these challenges are not trivial, the structure of the HBSC network and its long-term experience in working through such challenges renders it likely that HBSC can provide a model of other similar studies facing these tensions.

An analysis of the relationship between information and communication technology (ICT) and scientific literacy in Canada and Australia

Despite the lack of substantial evidence for improvement in the quality of teaching and learning with information and communication technology (ICT), governmental organizations have pushed ICT as a means of providing broad-scale training to meet the demand for a skilled workforce, centred upon a hypothesized ICT-scientific literacy relationship. To better understand this possible association, this study used data from the 2006 administration of the Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA 2006) to determine the extent to which scientific literacy is predicted by a host of ICT-related variables, after adjusting for student demographic characteristics. The findings suggest that, once demographic characteristics have been accounted for, students with prior experience with ICT, who browse the Internet more frequently, and who are confident with basic ICT tasks earned higher scientific literacy scores. Gender differences existed with respect to types of productivity and entertainment software used; this difference may be attributed to personal choice and initiative to learn ICT. Furthermore, the way in which students are using computers in schools, towards attaining learning outcomes, may have a stronger effect on scientific literacy than how often computers are accessed.

The relationship of schools to emotional health and bullying

Objectives:To examine the extent to which school climate and school pressure could predict other aspects of adolescents’ lives, most particularly their emotional health and bullying. Furthermore, the study sought to investigate if these relationships were consistent across countries.Methods:Participants were 11-, 13-, and 15-year-olds from 26 European countries/regions, Canada, the United States, and Israel. Participants completed surveys focusing on health behaviours and lifestyles, using a contextual framework. Using cluster analytic techniques, three clusters were created varying on school pressure and perceived school climate. These clusters were then examined using variables not used in the clustering.Results:Students in the cluster having the most positive relationships to school outcomes, including academic achievement, truancy, teacher and peer support, also had the most positive emotional health and the lowest incidence of bullying. Similarly, those in the poorest cluster in terms of school also had the poorest outcomes in terms of emotional health and bullying.Conclusions:These relatively small but significant associations suggest that schools may have a small role in supporting children’s emotional well-being and ameliorate the presence of bullying.

The Role of Interest in Fostering Sixth Grade Students' Identities As Competent Learners

Abstract The combined works of John Dewey and Jerome Bruner provide a framework spanning a century of educational thought which can inform curriculum decisions concerning students’ educational development, especially for middle school students whose waning of motivation toward school has been well documented by researchers and has long concerned parents and teachers. This framework, combined with recent contributions of motivation and interest researchers, can create broad understandings of how to collaboratively construct effective educational contexts. As early as 1913, Dewey specifically looked at the pivotal role of students’ genuine interests in Interest and Effort in Education. Our current research focus on how students’ interest can inform curricular contexts marks the recent shift showing an increased use of interest in education research since 1990. In this article, we discuss our study of a team-taught double classroom of sixth grade students whose interests were determined through a series of brainstorming sessions, and individual and focus group interviews. Students’ interests fell into six categories centering around subject areas such as Drama, Science, and Animal Studies. Learning contexts were constructed around four of these subject areas. Students participated in their first or second choice of subject area group. We found significantly higher scores on measures of Affect and Activation if students participated in their first choice group. We found intra-group unities of preferred and dispreferred ways of learning which distinguished each group from the class as a whole. Finally, our findings indicated that students reliably described their genuine interests over time. Students’ interests were found to be effective tools for informing curriculum decisions in the creation of sixth grade learning contexts.

Structural Determinants of Youth Bullying and Fighting in 79 Countries

PURSPOSE The prevention of youth violence is a public health priority in many countries. We examined the prevalence of bullying victimization and physical fighting in youths in 79 high- and low-income countries and the relations between structural determinants of adolescent health (country wealth, income inequality, and government spending on education) and international differences in youth violence. METHODS Cross-sectional surveys were administered in schools between 2003 and 2011. These surveys provided national prevalence rates of bullying victimization (n = 334,736) and four or more episodes of physical fighting in the past year (n = 342,312) in eligible and consenting 11-16 year olds. Contextual measures included per capita income, income inequality, and government expenditures on education. We used meta-regression to examine relations between country characteristics and youth violence. RESULTS Approximately 30% of adolescents reported bullying victimization and 10.7% of males and 2.7% of females were involved in frequent physical fighting. More youth were exposed to violence in African and Eastern Mediterranean countries than in Europe and Asia. Violence directly related to country wealth; a 1 standard deviation increase in per capita income corresponded to less bullying (-3.9% in males and -4.2% in females) and less fighting (-2.9% in males and -1.0% in females). Income inequality and education spending modified the relation between country wealth and fighting; where inequality was high, country wealth related more closely to fighting if education spending was also high. CONCLUSIONS Country wealth is a robust determinant of youth violence. Fighting in affluent but economically unequal countries might be reduced through increased government spending on education.

Cross-National Measurement Invariance of the Teacher and Classmate Support Scale

The cross-national measurement invariance of the teacher and classmate support scale was assessed in a study of 23202 Grade 8 and 10 students from Austria, Canada, England, Lithuania, Norway, Poland, and Slovenia, participating in the Health Behaviour in School-aged Children (HBSC) 2001/2002 study. A multi-group means and covariance analysis supported configural and metric invariance across countries, but not full scalar equivalence. The composite reliability was adequate and highly consistent across countries. In all seven countries, teacher support showed stronger associations with school satisfaction than did classmate support, with the results being highly consistent across countries. The results indicate that the teacher and classmate support scale may be used in cross-cultural studies that focus on relationships between teacher and classmate support and other constructs. However, the lack of scalar equivalence indicates that direct comparison of the levels support across countries might not be warranted.

Does the school performance variable used in the International Health Behavior in School-Aged Children (HBSC) Study reflect students' school grades?

BACKGROUND Given the pressure that educators and policy makers are under to achieve academic standards for students, understanding the relationship of academic success to various aspects of health is important. The international Health Behavior in School-Aged Children (HBSC) questionnaire, being used in 41 countries with different school and grading systems, has contained an item assessing perceived school performance (PSP) since 1986. Whereas the test-retest reliability of this item has been reported previously, we determined its convergent and discriminant validity. METHODS This cross-sectional study used anonymous self-report data from Austrian (N = 266), Norwegian (N = 240), and Canadian (N = 9,717) samples. Students were between 10 and 17 years old. PSP responses were compared to the self-reported average school grades in 6 subjects (Austria) or 8 subjects (Norway), respectively, or to a general, 5-category-based appraisal of most recent school grades (Canada). RESULTS Correlations between PSP and self-reported average school grade scores were between 0.51 and 0.65, representing large effect sizes. Differences between the median school grades in the 4 categories of the PSP item were statistically significant in all 3 samples. The PSP item showed predominantly small associations with some randomly selected HBSC items or scales designed to measure different concepts. CONCLUSIONS The PSP item seems to be a valid and useful question that can distinguish groups of respondents that get good grades at school from those that do not. The meaning of PSP may be context-specific and may have different connotations across student populations from different countries with different school systems.

Social Competence of Adolescents with Learning Disabilities: Interventions and Issues

Publisher Summary Lacking social competence can cause adolescents to feel isolated and to be denied opportunities to grow socially, cognitively, and physically through hanging out with friends, working in collaborative learning groups, and engaging in their interests with peers. Friendships are an integral part of social development for adolescents and can be distinguished conceptually as well as empirically from social status or peer acceptance. The researchers concluded that their relationships showed less intimacy, empathy, and stability as well as more conflict than did the relationships of non-disabled adolescents. It is thought that social interactions become more complex and intense through adolescence into adulthood. Deficits in social skills, such as difficulties in conversing with peers, may mean that adolescents with LDs are less able to seek or find the social support from peers that can enhance adjustment and reduce stress. The major strength of the program is in its isolation and understanding of vital components of social competence. These basic skills are fundamental for adolescents to master if they are to be successful in social interactions.

Validity Evidence based on Internal Structure of Scores of the Emotional Quotient-Inventory: Youth Version Short (EQ-i: YV-S) in a Spanish Sample

The purpose of this study was to analyze the reliability and validity evidence of scores on the Spanish version of EQ-i: YV-S in Spanish adolescents. The total sample was comprised of 508 participants from Grades 7 to 12, 241 males (47.4%) and 267 females (52.6%), each of whom completed the questionnaires on two separate occasions. Three [intrapersonal (α = .83, CR = .86, and McDonald Omega = .86), stress management (α = .83, CR = .86, and McDonald Omega = .85) and adaptability (α = .82, CR = .85, and McDonald Omega = .85)] of the four scales had acceptable internal consistency. Exploratory Factor Analysis (EFA) and Confirmatory Factor Analysis (CFA) were used with FACTOR and EQS version 6.1 software to examine validity evidence based on internal structure drawn from the scores on the EQ-i: YV-S, supporting the multidimensionality of the questionnaire. Three models were tested; the best fit to the data was the hierarchical model (S-Bχ2 / df = 2.11, CFI = .93 and RMSEA = .047), which hypothesized that the four specific factors (interpersonal, intrapersonal, stress management, and adaptability) were explained with a second-order factor, Emotional-Social-Intelligence (ESI). Finally, significant positive correlations were found between general self-concept and EQ-i: YV-S [interpersonal (r = .153, p < .001), intrapersonal (r = .235, p < .001), stress management (r = .145, p < .001), adaptability (r = .311, p < .001) and ESI (r = .360, p < .001)]; ESI showed significant direct power prediction of the general self-concept (.52) as demonstrated through structural equation modeling.

Cross-national trends in perceived school pressure by gender and age from 1994 to 2010

BACKGROUND Pressure within school can be a critical component in understanding how the school experience influences young peoples intellectual development, physical and mental health and future educational decisions. METHODS Data from five survey rounds (1993/1994, 1997/1998, 2001/2002, 2005/2006 and 2009/2010) were used to examine time-, age- and gender-related trends in the amounts of reported school pressure among 11-, 13- and 15-year-olds, in five different regions (North America, Great Britain, Eastern Europe, Nordic and Germanic countries). RESULTS Across the regions the reported perceptions of school pressure did not change between 1994 and 2010, despite a temporary increase in 2002 and 2006. With the exception of children at 11 years of age, girls reported higher levels of school pressure than boys (Cohens d from 0.12 to 0.58) and school pressure was higher in older age groups. These findings were consistent across countries. Regionally, children in North America reported the highest levels of school pressure, and students in the Germanic countries the lowest. CONCLUSION Factors associated with child development and differences in societal expectations and structures, along with the possible, albeit, differential impact of the Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA), may partially explain the differences and trends found in school pressure. School pressure increases alongside the onset of adolescence and the shift from elementary school to the higher demanding expectations of secondary education. Time-related increases in school pressure occurred in the years following the release of the PISA results, and were larger in those regions in which results were less positive.