Simon Larose

Kindergarten Disruptive Behaviors, Protective Factors, and Educational Achievement by Early Adulthood.

This study examined whether 2 aspects of disruptive behaviors (i.e., hyperactivity-inattention and aggressiveness-opposition) observed in kindergarten predict noncompletion of high school by early adulthood. Also investigated was whether other personal characteristics such as anxiety or prosociality as well as parent child-rearing attitudes and teacher management style exert a compensatory or protective role with respect to these predictive links. A community sample of 4,330 children participated in this study. Results showed that hyperactivity-inattention made a stronger contribution to predicting noncompletion of high school than did aggressiveness-opposition. However, prosociality and 2 parental child-rearing aspects (i.e., pleasure and discipline) played a compensatory role in this process. Theoretical and preventive implications of these results are stressed in the discussion.

Social support processes: mediators of attachment state of mind and adjustment in late adolescence.

This study examined the mediational link between attachment state of mind, social support processes and personal adjustment. The Adult Attachment Interview was administered to 62 adolescents during their college transition. At the end of high school and during their first semester in college, students completed questionnaires pertaining to primary and secondary appraisals; coping and personal adjustment were assessed through self- and peer-report questionnaires. A dismissing tendency was related to difficulty in getting assistance from peers and teachers and to peer-reported withdrawal. A preoccupied tendency was associated with stress regarding the transition, distrust in potential supporters, difficulty seeking help from teachers, and loneliness. Moreover, stress, distrust and help-seeking mediated the link between preoccupied attachment and loneliness, whereas the relation between dismissing attachment and withdrawal was not mediated by help-seeking. Cognitive and behavioral attachment processes are discussed.

Another look inside the gap: Ecological contributions to the transmission of attachment in a sample of adolescent mother-infant dyads

Ecological contributions to attachment transmission were studied in a sample of 64 adolescent mother-infant dyads. Maternal sensitivity was assessed when infants were 6 and 10 months old, and infant security was assessed at 15 and 18 months. Maternal attachment state of mind was measured with the Adult Attachment Interview (AAI) after the 1st assessment. Ecological variables considered were maternal education and depression, paternal support, and infant maternal grandmother support. Results indicated that when the contribution of ecological variables was statistically controlled for, sensitivity was a significant mediator and state of mind no longer contributed to infant security. Sensitivity also mediated an association between maternal education and infant attachment, suggesting that attachment transmission is embedded in a more global process of infant attachment development.

Distinguishing Developmental From Chronic Career Indecision: Self-Efficacy, Autonomy, and Social Support:

Career indecision can be divided into two categories: developmental and chronic indecision. The former is generally viewed as a developmentally normal problem resulting from a lack of information on the self and on the world of work, whereas the latter is defined as a pervasive inability to make a decision about one’s career. The goals of the present study were to test the validity of this typology of career indecision and to explain these types of indecision as a function of self-efficacy, autonomy, and support from parents and friends. Based on a 3-year longitudinal design with college students (N = 325), results provided validity for this typology by revealing the presence of two indecision groups (chronically undecided and developmentally undecided) and a group of students who are decided. In addition, results indicated that self-efficacy and autonomy are important dimensions that make it possible to distinguish between these three groups.

Family Correlates of Trajectories of Academic Motivation During a School Transition: A Semiparametric Group-Based Approach

The present study examined whether academic motivations, conceptualized from the stance of self-determination theory, fluctuate over time in a homogeneous or heterogeneous fashion during a school transition. Three objectives were pursued: First, motivational trajectories were studied using the conventional, homogeneous approach. Second, the group-based, semiparametric approach to developmental trajectories was used to study heterogeneous motivational trajectories. Third, family factors were compared across trajectory groups for each type of motivation. Results suggested that most types of motivation tend to fluctuate differently over time for distinct groups of individuals. Furthermore, students characterized by problematic motivational trajectories perceived their parents to be less involved in their scholastic work and less autonomy supportive than those of other students. Results are discussed in terms of their implications for research and theories on motivation and parenting.

Attachment, Social Support, and Loneliness in Young Adulthood: A Test of Two Models

This study tested the validity of two models predicting states of loneliness: the social network mediation model and the cognitive bias model. The social network mediation model posits that personal dispositions influence states of loneliness through various dimensions of the social network. According to the cognitive bias model, states of loneliness are not explained by social network characteristics but rather by a negative cognitive filter related to personality. Unique aspects of the study included testing these two models while selecting attachment security as a personal disposition variable and using reports from participants and friends to assess social support. A new model combining processes outlined in both previous models (which we called the cognitive-network model) was found to be the best representation of our data. Discussion centers on the implications of this model for social support research and interventions.

Leaving home for college: A potentially stressful event for adolescents with preoccupied attachment patterns

Sixty-two high school students, 28 of which were planning on leaving home to attend college, completed the Adult Attachment Interview and self-report questionnaires pertaining to their relationship with their parents. Compared to their autonomous counterparts, preoccupied students who had left home reported having a more negative relationship with each parent and experiencing more family-related stress. However, they reported having more contact with each parent. In contrast, no attachment differences with regards to perceptions of the parent-adolescent relationship were found among students who lived at home while in college. This suggests that individual differences related to attachment state of mind in adolescence may be magnified by a stressful life experience.

Attachment State of Mind: Implications for Adjustment to College

The main purpose of this study was to examine the associations between attachment state of mind and adjustment to college. A related aim was to examine the moderating role of attachment state of mind in the relation between parental control and school adjustment. One-hundred two college freshmen completed the Adult Attachment Interview and a measure of parental control. They also completed a measure of college adjustment at the very beginning and at the very end of their freshman year. The findings showed that pre-occupation with attachment is related to poor adjustment after 1 year in college and to a general deterioration in adjustment and in grades during the freshman year. Preoccupation with attachment also accentuates the negative relationbetween parental psychological control and social adjustment. Dismissing attachment tendencies were found to be unrelated to college adjustment.

Attachment Style Dimensions, Network Orientation and the Process of Seeking Help from College Teachers:

In this study, a model was tested positing that attachment style dimensions affect the individual’s social support network orientation, which, in turn, influences the process of seeking help from teachers. Data from two independent samples of college students using global and dyadic interaction reports of the quality of their help-seeking behaviours were used to assess the model. Evaluation by the EQS method indicated acceptable levels of fit, with the models explaining 49 percent and 23 percent of the variance in help-seeking behaviours. The results are discussed in light of the relations between attachment and social support theories.

NONINTELLECTUAL LEARNING FACTORS AS DETERMINANTS FOR SUCCESS IN COLLEGE

This article presents the results of two studieshypothesizing that nonintellectual learning dispositionsare as important as intellectual assets in predictingthe success of college students. The first study was conducted with a low-risk francophonepopulation (N = 298) and indicated that the Test ofReactions and Adaptation in College (TRAC:nonintellectual dispositions) predicts the collegesuccess of first-year students above and beyond thatpredicted by the high school rank (academicdispositions) and a French-language measure of aptitude(intellectual dispositions). The latter measure added noadditional variation to the high school rank in predictingsuccess. These results were replicated in a second studyconducted with an American student population who wereacademically at risk (N = 179) and using the Scholastic Aptitude Test as a measure ofintellectual dispositions. Findings are discussed interms of their implications for selection, screening,and intervention for first-year collegestudents.