Psych 470

Week 12 Cont'd

Overall, examinations of school effects have focused on factors at the:

1. Individual (micro) Level

1. intrapersonal characteristics

1. motivation and self-efficacy
2. educational attitudes and beliefs

• developmental changes in the transition to adolescence often attributed; e.g., change from evaluation orientation from mastery orientation
• these changes related to increased test anxiety, learned helplessness response to failure, lower intrinsic and academic motivation

1. Focusing only on intrapersonal factors often leads to individual targeted solutions and/or individual blaming for educational underachievement

1. Example: Academic Beliefs Systems Model and Ethnic Minorities

• Some researchers suggest that African American students place a lower value on academic achievement due to historical discrimination (e.g., Fordham & Ogbu, 1986).
• More research, however, has shown that African American students place as high a value on education as White students (e.g., Mickelson, 1990; Steinberg, Dornbusch, & Brown, 1992).
• Nevertheless, Black students have consistently performed less well academically than their White counterparts (National Center for Education Statistics, 1995).
• Recent work points to the idea that African American and White students differ in perceptions about the relationship between education and positive outcomes (i.e. success, happiness, etc.) for Blacks and for Whites (Mickelson, 1990).
• African American youth did not differ from other groups in their positive beliefs about the value of education for people in general, but those students who had had experiences which suggested that education did not always lead to success or happiness for members of their racial group did poorer academically.

2. Gender and Math/Science

• Traditionally, boys have both performed higher and are represented more in fields related to math and science (although this is changing)
• There is some research related to spatial ability and analytic skills differences between boys and girls; it is unclear whether this is "inherent" or learned
• More recent research on gender and educational outcomes have focused on contextual explanations for performance differences
• This work suggests that school environments have different expectations and respond differently to boys and girls (e.g., Madon, et al., 1996)
• Attributions about academic effort and success in subject areas
• Evaluations of ability

1. Interpersonal Level - Classroom Processes (see Duffy and Wong Chapter 8)

1. teacher student- interactions and individual peer interactions
2. contact theory
3. self-fulfilling prophecy

1. School (macro) Level

1. school structure

1. school size

• School size has been found to be the second most important factor in a number of research studies (e.g., Fowler et al., 1991)
• Large schools advantages- "Bigger is better" movement of early sixties - (Howley, 1997; Garbarino, 1980)
• variety, diversity, comprehensiveness, economy, specialization units, democracy - mostly based on principles of economy (Ornstein, 1991)
• Related to more tracking (Lee & Smith, 1997)
• Small schools - achievement, participation (Rotheram, 1999; Barker & Gump, 1964);
• Barker's & Gump's (1964) research Big School, Small School - suggests size is related to pressure to participate; sense of responsibility; relationship of size and school level ability

- Is it possible to have too few students?

• Barker & Gump (1990); Ornstein, 1990 - student participation peaked at class sizes of 76-115 and dropped off in classes below 20.
• Too many students - diffusion of responsibility and increased competition;
• Too few- little support of extracurricular

1. A Person-Environment Transactional Approach to Examining School Effects

1. Alienation in schools

1. School context is distinctive in that engagement in present activities linked to future outcomes. When discrepancies are sensed between school tracks and pathways to adult success, commitment to school may lessen.
2. Concept of alienation originally employed by Marx to capture sense of social separation between the worker and his/her work, leaving work devoid of meaning and purpose. Later writers linked issues of alienation and marginalization, loneliness, distrust, estrangement.
3. Seeman identified 5 basic meanings of alienation: 1) powerlessness – inability to influence events; 2) meaninglessness – the sense of being unclear as to what one ought to believe in order to act intelligently; 3) normlessness – social norms broken down and no longer able to regulate behavior, 4) social isolation- sense of being apart from goals and beliefs; 5) self-estrangement- loss of intrinsic meaning in one’s work, absence of pride/commitment in daily activity.
4. This is seen as more likely for adolescents now because youth access to workplace is increasingly delayed. The outcome or end product – working and producing – are less accessible.
5. Difficulty in finding meaning in school tasks can lead to detachment-dropout. Experience of failure, isolation from desired group also can contribute to weakening of attachment. Finn (1989) participation-identification model; Rutter’s (1986) work suggests role of schools themselves – social processed, disciplinary style, depersonalization. Kulka (1982; Kagan, 1990) suggest classroom culture plays role – attitudes toward school and participation.

1. Developmental changes and school transitions

1. When looking at secondary schools and their impact on students, issues of social ecological characteristics of the secondary school, including population size, composition, and social climate, have been topics of recent concern.
2. For young adolescents, problems of transition especially important. There is evidence of decline in school achievement and participation following the move into secondary school (Eccles & Midgley, 1989; Simmons & Blythe, 1987).
3. Environmental discontinuity seen as issue- high schools are apart from primary school environment, larger, more complex organization, teaching dispersed.
4. Some research demonstrates the impact of school transitions for early and late adolescents. Simmons and Blythe (1987) compared students in different school system structures (traditional elementary-junior high-high school versus K-8).
5. Early transition related to greater negative change, especially among females.

What are the factors related to these negative outcomes?

- Systematic changes in school environments with the transition to middle and high school

• Class structure
• task structure
• grouping practices
• evaluation techniques
• teacher-student interaction

• Comparisons of middle/junior high and elementary classrooms:
• More emphasis on discipline and control
• Less egalitarian (in terms of student choice and self-management)
• Less personal and positive teacher-student interaction
• Organizational practices (tracking, public evaluation of work)
• The results?
• More social comparison and negative competition
• Judgements of students based on single evaluative criteria
• Less teacher efficacy and student efficacy
• Less cognitive demand on students
• E.g., comparisons of creative or expressive skills demands on students in upper elementary versus early middle school (Mitman, et al., 1984)

• So what is the "right" school environment for adolescents?
• Settings that are structured so that they complement the developmental needs of the students within it