Capital psicológico positivo e preferências comportamentais: Há uma ligação?

Dissertação de Mestrado apresentada ao Instituto Superior de Psicologia Aplicada para obtenção de grau de Mestre na especialidade de Psicologia Social e das Organizações.

How teachers' perceptions affect the academic and language assessment of immigrant children

Recent research evidences inconsistencies in teachers' practice regarding skills assessment of L2 students. Scientific evidence supports that less experienced teachers have lower orientation toward multiple task-tests for non-native students. Research questions: Whether school teachers as having different teaching training and unequal teaching experience with non-native students perceive differently a four-skills scale. Purpose of the study: This study intends to analyse the importance degree between the four skills/tasks: reading, writing, speaking and listening, in the perspective of school teachers. Method: 77 teachers, aged 32-62, with (and without) experience in teaching and adapting materials for immigrant students, divided into six groups according to their scientific domain. Assessment tools included a scale for judgement of four academic tasks adapted from the original “Inventory of Undergraduate and Graduate Level: Reading, Writing, Speaking and Listening Tasks (Rosenfeld, Leung & Ottman, 2001). Main Findings: 1) different degrees of importance attributed by teachers on tasks that should be included in academic and language test for immigrant students; 2) perceptions of teachers are determined by predictors in this order: scientific domain, experience with multicultural classes and lower prediction from teaching service and age; 3) different results between american and portuguese samples answering the same questionnaire.

The big four skills: Teachers’ assumptions on measurement of non-native students cognition

The four-skills on tests for young native speakers commonly do not generate correlation incongruency concerning the cognitive strategies frequently reported. Considering the non-native speakers there are parse evidence to determine which tasks are important to assess properly the cognitive and academic language proficiency (Cummins, 1980; 2012). Research questions: It is of high probability that young students with origin in immigration significantly differ on their communication strategies and skills in a second language processing context (1); attached to this first assumption, it is supposed that teachers significantly differ depending on their scientific area and previous training (2). Purpose: This study intends to examine whether school teachers (K-12) as having different origin in scientific domain of teaching and training perceive differently an adapted four-skills scale, in European Portuguese. Research methods: 77 teachers of five areas scientific areas, mean of teaching year service = 32 (SD= 2,7), 57 males and 46 females (from basic and high school levels). Main findings: ANOVA (Effect size and Post-hoc Tukey tests) and linear regression analysis (stepwise method) revealed statistically significant differences among teachers of different areas, mainly between language teachers and science teachers. Language teachers perceive more accurately tasks in a multiple manner to the broad skills that require to be measured in non-native students. Conclusion: If teachers perceive differently the importance of the big-four tasks, there would be incongruence on skills measurement that teachers select for immigrant puppils. Non-balanced tasks and the teachers’ perceptions on evaluation and toward competence of students would likely determine limitations for academic and cognitive development of non-native students. Furthermore, results showed sufficient evidence to conclude that tasks are perceived differently by teachers toward importance of specific skills subareas. Reading skills are best considered compared to oral comphreension skills in non-native students.

The goal orientations scale (GOS): Validation for portuguese students

Current research on achievement goals acknowledges that students can manifest different goal patterns. This study aimed to adapt and validate a self-report scale to assess the goal orientations of Portuguese students. A total of 2675 (age range 9–24 years) Portuguese students completed the Goal Orientations Scale (GOS). Through a cross-validation procedure, confirmatory factor analysis and descriptive statistics supports the existence of four different goal orientations: task, self-enhancing, self-defeating and avoidance orientations. The reliability and the internal validity estimates confirm that the GOS is an adequate instrument in assessing student goal orientations.

School engagement and burnout in a sample of brazilian students

Objective: Some studies have suggested that school engagement can be an ally in the prevention of psychosocial and occupational risks, to which students are exposed daily. The aim of this study is to estimate the impact of emotional, behavioral, and cognitive engagement on burnout syndrome among pharmacy undergraduate students. Methods: A total of 363 students enrolled in the pharmacy undergraduate program in the College of Pharmaceutical Sciences at Sao Paulo State University’s Araraquara Campus (UNESP) participated, 78.0% of whom were female. Mean age was 20.3 (SD = 2.7) years. The Maslach Burnout Inventory for students (MBI-SS) and the University Students School Engagement Inventory (USEI) were used. Confirmatory factor analysis was performed to assess the psychometric properties of the instruments. The data were included in a structural equation model in which burnout was considered the central construct. The impact of school engagement on burnout was based on the statistical significance of causal paths (β) evaluated by z tests (α = 5%). Results: The psychometric properties of the MBI-SS and USEI were adequate and the structural model also presented an adequate fit. Behavioral engagement (β = −0.56) and the emotional engagement (β = −0.71) explained 81.0% of burnout variability in the sample. Cognitive engagement was not found to contribute significantly. This data provides evidence of the impact of school engagement on burnout that can be used by educators and policymakers in charge of educational process. Conclusion: School engagement presented inverse and significant influence on burnout syndrome among pharmacy students.