Raymond L. Debus

Self-Concepts of Young Children 5 to 8 Years of Age: Measurement and Multidimensional Structure.

A new, adaptive procedure for assessing multiple dimensions of self-concept for children younger than 8 years and related theoretical issues were examined

Do self-concept interventions make a difference? : a synergistic blend of construct validation and meta-analysis

Traditional reviews and previous meta-analyses of self-concept interventions have underestimated effect sizes by using an implicitly unidimensional perspective that emphasizes global self-concept. In contrast, this research employed a synergistic blend of meta-analysis and multidimensional construct validation to evaluate the impact of self-concept interventions for children in 145 primary studies (200 interventions). Overall, interventions were significantly effective (d = .51, 460 effect sizes). However, in support of the multidimensional perspective, interventions targeting a specific self-concept domain and subsequently measuring that domain were much more effective (d = 1.16), suggesting sole reliance on global self-concept is inappropriate for evaluating interventions designed to enhance a specific component of self-concept. Other moderators (e.g., feedback, experimental design, target population groups) also influenced effect sizes in ways useful to the design of new interventions. Methodologically, this research also demonstrates the use of both fixed and random effects models and incorporation of multiple outcomes from the same study.

Self-handicapping and defensive pessimism : exploring a model of predictors and outcomes from a self-protection perspective.

The present study is centrally concerned with self-handicapping and defensive pessimism (comprising defensive expectations and reflectivity), the factors that predict these strategies, and the associations between these strategies and a variety of academic outcomes. Major findings are that task orientation negatively predicts both self-handicapping and defensive expectations and positively predicts reflectivity; uncertain personal control positively predicts defensive expectations, and to a lesser extent, self-handicapping; and an external attributional orientation is positively associated with self-handicapping, and to a lesser extent, defensive expectations. Both self-handicapping and defensive expectations are negatively associated with self-regulation and persistence, whereas reflectivity is positively associated with these outcomes. Students high in self-handicapping received lower end-of-year grades than did students low in self-handicapping and were less likely to be in attendance 1 year later.

Subject-Specific Components of Academic Self-Concept and Self-Efficacy.

Abstract The internal/external (I/E) frame of reference model posits that academic self-concept in a particular subject is based in part on how achievement in that subject is perceived to compare with achievements in other school subjects. Support for the model comes from Australian, Canadian, and U.S. studies, but not from a recent Norwegian study. The Norwegian study, however, used a self-efficacy measure instead of a self-concept measure. In the present investigation the I/E model was evaluated with both self-concept and self-efficacy responses, but support for the model was found only for self-concept responses. The results were interpreted in relation to the role of frames of reference used in forming self-concept and self-efflcacy responses.

Self-handicapping and defensive pessimism : a model of self-protection from a longitudinal perspective

Abstract This research places self-handicapping and defensive pessimism (comprising defensive expectations and reflectivity) into a single conceptual and analytic framework that models the full self-protective process across time. Data on two occasions collected during students’ (n=328) first two years at university show: performance orientation positively predicts self-handicapping, defensive expectations, and reflectivity; task-orientation negatively predicts self-handicapping and defensive expectations and positively predicts reflectivity; uncertain personal control positively predicts defensive expectations and reflectivity; and an external attributional orientation positively predicts self-handicapping and defensive expectations. Although both self-handicapping and defensive expectations negatively affect academic outcomes, the negative effects of self-handicapping were more marked. In contrast to these counter-productive strategies, reflectivity had positive effects on academic engagement.

Evaluation of the Big-Two-Factor Theory of Academic Motivation Orientations: An Evaluation of Jingle-Jangle Fallacies

Academic motivation orientation research has consistently found two factors, typically called Performance (or Ego) and Learning (or Mastery or Task) that appear to overlap substantially with other factors coming from different theoretical perspectives. Similar to related work in the Big Five Theory of Personality, we posit a Big-Two-Factor Theory of academic motivation orientation and evaluate the implicit but largely untested assumption that selected motivation constructs can be represented as higher-order (HO) Performance and Learning factors. We collected test-retest data (multi-item scales designed to measure 8 motivation constructs - Ego, Competition, Mastery, Intrinsic, Cooperation, Individual, Approach Success, and Avoid Failure) from a diverse group (N = 606) of able students in grades 3-6 (M age = 9.7 years). Confirmatory factor analyses (CFAs) provided support for each of the 8 scales. HO CFA models fit the data reasonably well for each time considered separately and demonstrated well-defined, HO Learning and Performance factors. For the combined T1 and T2 data, however, the substantial test-retest correlations for first-order factors were not fully explained by the HO factors. Gender differences in the eight specific scales were captured by the two HO factors, thus supporting Big-Two-Factor Theory.

A Quadripolar Need Achievement Representation of Self-Handicapping and Defensive Pessimism

From need achievement and self-worth motivation perspectives, self-handicapping and defensive pessimism (comprising defensive expectations and reflectivity) are integrated into a quadripolar model reflecting the motives to avoid failure and approach success. Consistent with hypotheses, defensive expectations and self-handicapping reflected failure avoidance (with self-handicapping bordering failure acceptance); reflectivity was marked by high failure avoidance and high success orientation; and, self-concept essentially reflected success orientation. This quadripolar model was consistent across students’ (n = 328) first and second years at university. Interpretation of these constructs in terms of failure avoidance and success orientation was validated through structural equation modeling in which self-handicapping, defensive pessimism, and self-concept differentially predicted a variety of academic outcomes.

Diffusion Effects: Control Group Contamination Threats to the Validity of Teacher-Administered Interventions.

Within-class experimental designs (with experimental and control groups in the same classroom) are subject to diffusion effects whereby both experimental and control students benefit from the intervention, thereby contaminating the control group and biasing evaluations of intervention effects. Although the problem has been recognized, most previous demonstrations have been anecdotal. In support of diffusion effects, we show that a classroom intervention resulted in higher academic self-concepts for internal (within-class) controls compared with external (between-class) controls. The construct validity of the interpretation of this difference as a diffusion effect was supported by observer and teacher comments and ratings of teacher success in focusing the intervention on experimental students and by different patterns of results for teachers who were more or less successful in maintaining this focus. Potential dangers in sole reliance on internal within-class control groups may outweigh advantages of this expedient experimental design.

Alternative Factor Structure for the Revised Self-Consciousness Scale

Confirmatory factor analysis (LISREL; Joreskog & Sorbom, 1989) of data drawn from a sample of middle and senior school students was used to examine a variety of factor structures proposed in previous studies to underlie self-consciousness. Examination of the content of the Revised Self-Consciousness Scale (Scheier & Carver, 1985) suggested an alternative factor structure. This alternative structure comprised 2 private self-consciousness factors: Rumination on the General Self and Monitoring of Specific Aspects of Self. The public self-consciousness measure was retained as originally formulated with the exception of 1 item that was excluded from the final structure. This model of self-consciousness fit the data better than the 4 previously proposed structures.

Performance and Mastery Orientation of High School and University/College Students: A Rasch Perspective.

This investigation assesses performance and mastery orientation from a Rasch perspective among high school and university students and provides a complementary approach to the factor analytic methods typical in goal theory research. Data shows that both school and university students are high in mastery orientation relative to performance orientation, and there is broad agreement for the separation of performance and mastery orientation. However, there are fewer school—university differences on performance orientation than mastery orientation, with university students more mastery oriented than high school students. Although performance orientation holds up well from a psychometric perspective, data indicates that for both school and university samples, mastery orientation items do not adequately differentiate high— from low—mastery-oriented students. Finally, the Rasch approach suggests that for both school and university students, there may exist a hierarchical structure to performance and mastery orientation. Implications for goal theory and the measurement of goal orientations are discussed.