Luana Sorrenti

Preliminary evaluation of a self-report tool for Learned Helplessness and Mastery Orientation in Italian students.

Learned helplessness (LH) is defined as a passive behavior characterized by an inability to learn that may affect the academic success of students. Conversely, students who show good motivation skills, optimism and perseverance are more focused on tasks and ‘mastery oriented’ (derived from Mastery Orientation, MO). The purpose of this study was to develop a self-report measurement of LH and MO - the Learned Helplessness Questionnaire (LHQ) - for the Italian scholastic context. We translated and adapted a student self-evaluation register, the Student behaviour checklist , and administered the questionnaire to Italian students in order to provide a preliminary factor structure. Exploratory factor analyses conducted support a two-factor model and acceptable internal reliability of the Italian LHQ.The results encourage the conduction of further analysis to assess the psychometric characteristics of the LHQ in depth.

The Mediating Role of Maladaptive Perfectionism in the Association between Psychological Control and Learned Helplessness.

Despite the extensive research on parental psychological control, no study has explored the relation between parental and teacher psychological control, maladaptive perfectionism and learned helplessness (LH). The purpose of this study was to investigate (1) whether perceived teacher psychological control predicts positively LH, (2) whether perceived parental psychological control predicts maladaptive perfectionism, and (3) whether the association between perceived parental and teacher psychological control and LH is mediated by maladaptive perfectionism. In a sample of 433 participants, 268 females (61.9%) and 165 males (38.1%), ranged in age from 13 to 19 years (M = 15.38, standard deviation (SD) = 1.18), it was found that teacher psychological control has a more relevant role in the prediction of LH than parental control. Moreover, maladaptive perfectionism was a full mediator of the relationship between perceptions of teacher psychological control and LH. These results extend previous studies on teacher psychological control and, for the first time, provide evidence for the relation with LH, identifying maladaptive perfectionism as a variable that accounts for the relation between teacher psychological control and LH.

Perceived parental psychological control and school learned helplessness: The role of frustration intolerance as a mediator factor:

The present study aims to investigate the relation between perceived parental psychological control, school learned helplessness and mastery orientation, and also to test frustration intolerance as a mediator in the relation between perceived psychological control and school learned helplessness. The sample consisted of 214 (86 male and 128 female) high school students with an age range between 17- and 19- years (M = 18.20; DS = 0.98). Results indicated that maternal psychological control positively predicts frustration intolerance, and that in turn, frustration intolerance positively predicts school learned helplessness. Furthermore, there was a significant indirect effect of frustration intolerance in the link between maternal psychological control and school learned helplessness, pointing to an important mediating role for frustration intolerance. Theoretical and practical implications are discussed.

Learned Helplessness and Learning Goals: Role played in School Refusal. A Study on Italian Students.

Literature on school refusal has shown a link between school refusal and poor school performance. However, there has been little investigation into the individual underlying factors, and specifically factors directly related to the learning process, such as the learning goals of students and their expectations of success and/or failure. The main purpose of the present study is to investigate the influence of Learned Helplessness (LH) and learning goals on school refusal. We hypothesized that LH and learning goals exert a unique role in predicting school refusal above and beyond the roles of academic achievement, age, and gender. The sample consisted of 201 Italian students with an average age of 11.93, with both low (57.2 % of students) and high (42.8 %) academic achievement. School refusal, LH, and learning goals were measured by means of questionnaires. The results confirm the hypothesis of this study; in fact, we found that learning goals and, above all, LH play a more predictive role of school refusal than academic achievement. These results extend previous studies on school refusal and, for the first time, they provide additional knowledge about this problem, analyzing the relationship between school refusal, learning goals, and LH, still neglected in the literature. Implications on the psychological well-being of students are discussed.

Tolleranza alla frustrazione e benessere psicologico: quale relazione?

L’obiettivo del presente studio e quello di analizzare la relazione tra le dimensioni del benessere psicologico e le credenze di intolleranza alla frustrazione. Si e ipotizzato che a piu alti livelli di intolleranza alla frustrazione (intolleranza emotiva, intolleranza al disagio, pretese/diritto, perfezionismo/realizzazione) corrisponda un minor indice di benessere psicologico e delle dimensioni che lo compongono. Sono state, inoltre, indagate eventuali differenze di genere e la possibile relazione con l’eta delle variabili considerate, allo scopo di ampliare le conoscenze scientifiche in un campo di indagine dai risultati ancora poco uniformi. Hanno partecipato alla ricerca 200 studenti universitari campionati negli Atenei della citta di Messina e di Reggio Calabria. Per la valutazione delle variabili considerate sono state utilizzate le versioni italiane del Psychological Well-being Scale (PWB) di Ryff (Ryff, 1989; Ruini et al., 2003) e del Frustration Discomfort Scale (FDS) di Harrington (Harrington, 2005a; Filippello et al., 2014). I risultati hanno in parte confermato le ipotesi di partenza. Relativamente alle differenze di genere, le donne presentano sia un minor benessere sia una maggiore intolleranza alla frustrazione, rispetto agli uomini. Per quanto concerne l’eta, si evince una correlazione negativa con le credenze di intolleranza emotiva, pretese/diritto e intolleranza al disagio. Infine, l’analisi di regressione ha messo in evidenza che alcune dimensioni dell’intolleranza alla frustrazione (intolleranza emotiva e intolleranza al disagio) sono negativamente predittrici del benessere psicologico; mentre, le credenze perfezionistiche (perfezionismo/realizzazione) lo influenzano positivamente. Ulteriori studi longitudinali sarebbero opportuni al fine di approfondire e confermare in maniera adeguata i risultati ottenuti.

Learning disabilities and social problem solving skills

Recent studies showed that children with learning disabilities present significant difficulties in learning as well as in social skills (Siperstein, 2009).Therefore, it was observed how it is difficult for these children to establish adequate relationships, especially to advise coping strategies to face interpersonal conflicts (Oliva & LaGreca, 1988). Accordingly to this argument and with reference to Agaliotis e Kalyva (2004, 2009), this study examines the preferences for strategies to solve an hypothetical conflict on a sample of children with LD in comparison to typical developing peers. They used the method of social story to conduct this research. In fact, researchers asked to the children, after they have listened a short story describing an interpersonal conflict interaction between adult and peers, which strategies they would have chosen if they were in the same situation and the strategies that would be most appropriate to resolve a conflict. Results obtained from the experiment corroborated literature data and demonstrated that children with LD, in comparison to typical developing peers, use and prefer dysfunctional coping strategies, aggressive or passive, also in relation to the partner interaction (adult or peers) to face interpersonal conflict.

Predicting risk of school refusal: examining the incremental role of trait EI beyond personality and emotion regulation

Research has not yet been deepened in the link between personality factors and risk of school refusal. Furthermore, previous studies fail to verify the direct relation between trait EI and the risk of school refusal. The present study examined personality traits, emotion regulation and trait EI for the contributory role they may play in predicting the risk of school refusal. The sample consisted of 311 participants, 112 males (36%) and 199 females (64%) with an average age of 14.19 (SD = .60), from a high school in the city of Messina (Sicily, Italy). Results show that the risk of school refusal is positively related to neuroticism and maladaptive emotion regulation strategies, while it is negatively related to the extroversion, agreeableness and conscientiousness and trait EI. Moreover, trait EI can be considered as a strong incremental negative predictor of risk of school refusal over and above personality traits and emotion regulation.

Learned helplessness and mastery orientation: The contribution of personality traits and academic beliefs

Abstract The present study examined the contribution of personality traits and academic beliefs (e.g. school self-efficacy, quality of life as a student) that may exert a role in predicting mastery orientation (MO) and learned helplessness (LH). The sample consisted of 196 students (111 males, 85 females) from a middle school (M age = 12.22; SD = .98) in the city of Messina in Sicily, Italy. Results show that the traits of conscientiousness, extraversion, openness to experience, and agreeableness correlate positively with high school self-efficacy, quality of life as a student, and MO, whereas they correlate negatively with LH. The trait of emotional instability correlates positively with LH and negatively with school self-efficacy, quality of life as a student, and MO. In addition, regression analyses showed that personality traits and academic beliefs (in particular, school self-efficacy) play an important role in explaining helpless behavior and mastery-oriented behavior. Theoretical and practical implications are discussed.

Chinese dyslexic children’s learning of an orthographically transparent language: Evidence for a facilitation effect.

The aim of the present research is to compare phonological abilities and visuo-spatial abilities in Chinese dyslexic children (CDC) vs. Italian dyslexic children (IDC). Specifically, 10 CDC, 10 IDC, 10 Chinese and 10 Italian children with typical development (TD) were administered instruments to assess reading, writing, visual-perceptual, and visual-spatial memory abilities. CDC showed lower performance in the reading task, in the text and sentence dictation tasks, in the visual-perceptual, visual-motor integration, and visual-spatial memory tasks, as compared to Chinese TD. IDC made more errors in the reading task and more phonological errors in the text and in the sentence dictation tasks, as compared to the Italian TD, but no significant differences emerged in visual-perceptual, visual-motor integration and visual-spatial memory abilities. The most important result is that CDC made significantly less errors in the reading task and in the phonological dictation task, despite they performed worse in the visual-perceptual, visual-motor integration and visual-spatial memory tasks, as compared to IDC. Indeed, CDC’ perceptual deficits do not appear to impair learning of reading and writing in a language with transparent orthography, despite those perceptual deficits represent a fundamental component of Chinese dyslexic children’s profile. Educational and practical implications are discussed.