Learned Helplessness and Psychological Adjustment II: Effects of learning disabilities and low achievement

Abstract

The present study, a continuation of Vala Ê s (2001), is concerned with two categories of low achieving students. The focus is particularly on the consequences of being diagnosed as having learning disabilities compared with not having such a diagnosis. The sample consisted of 1833 students with data collected in grades 4, 7 and 9. Multivariate analyses of variances and analyses of structural equation models showed that students with learning disabilities and low achieving students attributed success in mathematics and rst language to ability to a greater extent than other students. They also expressed lower performance expectations in mathematics and verbal skills and showed more helplessness and reported inferior psychological adjustment compared with other students. Moreover, students that were diagnosed as having learning disabilities (LD) and received special education showed more helplessness than the other low achieving children. They also reported lower academic expectations and lower self-esteem. In addition, the results revealed that boys showed more helpless behaviour, as assessed by teachers, than girls. However, on the other hand, girls reported more psychological maladjustment. The conclusion and request is that the process of selection (diagnosing the student as LD) and the organization and implementation of special education should be reconsidered.

Can the Relationship Between Rapid Automatized Naming and Word Reading Be Explained by a Catastrophe? Empirical Evidence From Students With and Without Reading Difficulties

“…Notably, >16% of the variance in RAN scores was accounted for by inefficient motivation, negative affectivity, anxiety, and depression. This account of the effect of RAN is in agreement with evidence that internalizing symptoms (Sideridis, 2007; Valâs, 2001) and dysfunctional cognitive-emotional processes (Bauminger & Kimhi-Kind, 2008; Conradi, Jang, & McKenna, 2014; Katzir, Lesaux, & Kim, 2009) are common among students experiencing academic difficulties, regardless of the nature of their core academic deficit. Although research linking cognitive and emotional regulation processes is still in its infancy and the current study was not designed to address this topic, our results are generally consistent with a generic shutdown of the system that controls reading performance, caused by the additive effects of limited cognitive resources and print-related skills and compounded by cognitive and emotion self-regulation difficulty.…”

Republication of “A Propensity Score Matching Analysis of the Effects of Special Education Services”

“…Special education is sometimes hypothesized to have stigmatizing effects on children, such that children so placed may be more likely to display task-avoidant, acting-out, or social-withdrawal behaviors (La Greca & Stone, 1990; Valas, 2001). Our estimates of special education’s ATT on children’s externalizing or internalizing problem behaviors fail to provide consistent evidence for this hypothesis.…”

Childhood Placement in Special Education and Adult Well-Being

“…Using this framework, adult well-being outcomes can be viewed as sociopsychological occurrences that are influenced by special education placement. For example, placement in special education is hypothesized to have stigmatizing effects on children, such that children are more likely to display learned helplessness behaviors (Valas, 2001). This psychological development may lead to poor educational attainment in the future.…”