Self-Understanding and Self-Esteem in Children with Learning Disabilities

Abstract

Little is known about the way children with learning disabilities (LD) develop an understanding of their disability. In this study, 95 students (23 elementary and 72 junior high) were interviewed to determine how they were informed about their learning disability and what they knew about it. Students were also administered two questionnaires, Harter's What I Am Like and Heyman's Self-Perception of a Learning Disability (SPLD). All students reported being told about their learning problems either by their parents, school personnel, or "no one." Contrary to our hypothesis, increased knowledge about LD was not associated with higher self-esteem. Understanding of one's LD was associated with actual and perceived scholastic competence, while global self-esteem was associated with perceptions of competence in nonacademic domains. Concerns about current measures of self-understanding and future directions for helping children with LD understand their disability and maintain their self-esteem are discussed.

Dyslexia and psycho‐social functioning: an exploratory study of the role of self‐esteem and understanding

“…Self-esteem is often associated with the child's understanding of their disability (Cosden, Elliott, Noble, & Kelemen, 1999), and understanding the circumscribed nature of reading and spelling difficulties appears to be associated with successful adult psycho-social functioning (Boetsch et al, 1996;. A full understanding of their reading difficulties may enable individuals to set realistic goals and thereby experience success rather than failure.…”

“…The Scottish norms are used for comparision in this study. The SPPC has been used in research involving with children with dyslexia (Snowling et al, 2007) and general learning disabled samples (Cosden et al, 1999;Rothman & Coden, 1995). Parental perceptions of their child's self-esteem were assessed using the Teacher's Rating Scale of Child's Actual Behaviour (Harter, 1985) as this measure is suitable for use not only by teachers, but also by other adults whose ratings would be considered informative.…”

Quantifying Changes in Learning Disabled Students’ Self-Esteem Following Special School Placement

“…Ther esearch in this area, however,h as been highlyd ivergent in focus and design. Thev ariable' self-esteem',f or example, has encompassedar ange of terms,i ncluding self-concept, self-image, ands elfperception (Bender &W all, 1994;Cosden et al 1999) and has been vieweda s multi-dimensionalo rg lobal ( Han et al, 2005;Kelly &N orwich,2 004;Weist, Wong, &K reil, 1998;Marsh &S havelson, 1985).T he age of participants has ranged from pre-school (Margalit,1998) to adolescence ( Howard&Tryon, 2005), although mosts tudiesh avet argeted elementarys chool children (e.g. Hane ta l 2005).P lacement has also varied among studies.R esearchersh ave, for example, explored self-esteemi nl earningd isabled (LD) children in public school settings (Han et al, 2005;Martinez &S emrud-Clikeman, 2004) and have compared theses ame children in public and private schools (Kelly &N orwich, 2004;Margalit,1 998).I ng eneral,f indings supportt he hypothesis that LD children, regardlesso fa ge and placement, havelower self-esteem (e.g.…”

“…Wheret hese findingsa re inconsistent, relatively stronger self-esteem in LD children hasb een attributed to moderating variables such as self-protection, socialc omparison, compensatoryc omparisons,a nd maturity. Fromt hese perspectives, the tendencyo fL Dc hildreni ns omes tudiest oo ver-estimatet heir academica bility mayfunction as ameans of self-protection (Heath &G len, 2005;Stone, 1997); comparisont oo thersi nt heiri mmediate referenceg roup may contribute to more positive self-perceptions of educational abilitiesi nc hildreni n specials choolst han those of theirc ounterparts in mainstreams chools( Kelly & Norwich,2 004);p ositive perceptions of non-academic attributes may compensate for academics truggles in LD children (Cosden et al, 1999);a nd older LD children mayf ormm orea ppropriate and practicals elf-perceptions (Sabornie, 1994).D ata provided by school counsellors (Howard&Tryon, 2002) suggestt hat LD students in general education classesa re mored epressedt han theirc ounterparts in speciale ducation classrooms.M eta-analysis of research usingp eer ratings (Ochoa &O livarez, 1995) yields moren egative perceptions of LD peersv ersusn on-LD peersi ne lementarya nd middles chools regardlesso f gender,g rade, sociometric measurement, and research design. Teacherd ata documents greater difficultiesw iths ociala nd emotionalf unctioningi np re-school children at risk for learning disabilities (Margalit,1 998) and in firstg raders (Gadeynee ta l.,2 004) and adolescents (Stone, 1997) diagnosed with LD.…”

Disability Awareness Training with a Group of Adolescents with Learning Disabilities

“…Recent research in learning disabilities has increased awareness about the comorbidity of LDs with social deficits and a lack of self-awareness with having a disability (Bauminger et al 2005;Schnizer et al 2007). Particularly alarming is the finding that students with LDs may not fully understand what having a learning disability means, which may contribute to social skill deficits in this population, such as difficulty maintaining healthy peer relationships or initiating meaningful social conversations (Cosden et al 1999;Fyson and Yates 2011;Higgins et al 2002). As one of the critical members within a collaborative team that provides socialemotional and behavioral services for students in special education, school psychologists need the knowledge and skills to help students with LDs understand their disability so they are better able to benefit from their education.…”