The Role of the Family in Shaping Self-Concept and Cognitive Styles in Hungary

The project studied the perception of parenting styles and their relation to self-development, cognitive styles, and individualisation in adolescence. Typical parenting styles of mothers and fathers were studied in five different maternal and paternal parenting backgrounds: warm authoritarian, warm democratic, cold neglectful, cold authoritarian, and neutral. Perception of different styles of parenting (for fathers: authority, 'maintaining distance' behaviour, reciprocity, enhancing self-reliance; for mothers: authority, unpredictable behaviour, mutual trust, achievement orientation, and enhancing self-reliance) were analysed in each group using the newly developed Hungarian Parenting Questionnaire (Sallay & Munnich, 1999). This questionnaire has a theoretical basis in the ideas of Harvey (1966, 1967), where the socialisation process is combined with self-development. This categorisation of paternal and maternal parenting backgrounds enabled Sallay to explore and describe in detail how diverse parenting styles contribute to self-development, the development of cognitive complexity, and individualisation. The results show that diverse parenting by mothers and fathers produces differing impacts in nuclear and divorced families and for males and females, taking into consideration such self-components as physical, active, psychological (capabilities, personality, emotions, roles, preferences), social and reflective selves. Cognitive self-complexity varied according to parenting styles and genders: maternal and paternal parenting proved to have the most significant impact on self-complexity in a warm, democratic family. With respect to individualistic tendencies, adolescent boys were most individualistic in a cold, neglectful paternal background in nuclear families as compared to other paternal and maternal family backgrounds and to females.

Promoting a functional physical self-concept in physical education: Evaluation of a 10-week intervention

Most physical education intervention studies on the positive effect of sports on self-concept development have attempted to increase schoolchildren’s self-concept without taking the veridicality of the self-concept into account. The present study investigated whether a 10-week intervention in physical education would lead to an increase not only in the general level of self-concept of endurance and self-concept of strength but also in its veridicality in those who had previously under- or overestimated their abilities. A total of 464 primary schoolchildren (246 boys, 218 girls, Mage = 11.9) either participated in the intervention or served as controls. The intervention group received endurance and strength training during physical education lessons carried out with a consistent individualized teacher frame of reference (iTFR). Results showed that this specific intervention was associated with increases not only in the general level of self-concept but also in its veridicality in under- and overestimators. Results are discussed in terms of didactic methods to promote functional self-concepts in physical education.

Veridicality of self-concept of strengths in male adolescents

Changes in physical self-concept and veridicality (i.e., the appropriateness of one’s self-perceptions to reality) during childhood and adolescence are related to performance in physical fi tness, exercise, and global self-esteem, particularly in male adolescents. This cross-sectional study examined the relation between the self-concept of strength and actual strength in groups of male adolescents ages 12 to 15 years. For this purpose, 889 male adolescents (M age = 13.2 yr., SD = 1.0) were questioned about their self-concept of strength, after which a test of strength was carried out. The results showed that the correlation between self- concept of strength and actual strength was higher in older (14- and 15-year-old) than younger (12- and 13-year-old) adolescents. There was a statistically signifi cant association between age group and veridicality, indicating that realistic self-concept is underrepresented among younger, but overrepresented among older adolescents. No association was found between the adolescents’ physical activity and veridicality. The consequences for further research on the development of veridicality in the physical domain are discussed.

Motor ability and self-esteem: The mediating role of physical self-concept and perceived social acceptance

Objectives: One important issue in sport and exercise psychology is to determine to what extent sports and exercise can help to increase self-esteem, and what the underlying mechanism might be. Based on the exercise and self-esteem model (EXSEM) and on findings from the sociometer theory, the mediating effect of physical self-concept and perceived social acceptance on the longitudinal relationship between motor ability and self-esteem was investigated. Design: Longitudinal study with three waves of data collection at intervals of ten weeks each. Method: 428 adolescents (46.3 % girls, mean age = 11.9, SD = .55) participated in the study, in which they performed three motor ability tests and completed paper-and-pencil questionnaires for physical self-concept and perceived social acceptance, as well as for self-esteem, at all three measuring points. Results: Using structural equation modelling procedures, the multiple mediation model revealed both physical self-concept and perceived social acceptance to be mediators between motor ability and self-esteem in the case of boys. In girls, on the other hand, the mediation between motor ability and self-esteem only takes place via physical self-concept. Conclusions: Gender differences in the relationship between motor ability and self-esteem suggest gender-specific interventions aimed at promoting self-concept.

An assessment of self-concept and violence within a delinquent adolescent population

The purpose of this study was to provide further data on the relationship between self-concept and violence focusing on a delinquent adolescent population. Recent research has explored the relationship between self-concept and violence with most of the research being done with adult populations. Within the literature, there are two opposing views on the question of this relationship. The traditional view supports the idea that low self-esteem is a cause of violent behavior while the non-traditional view supports the idea that high self-esteem may be a contributor to violent behavior. ^ Using a sample of 200 delinquent adolescents 100 of whom had committed acts of violence and 100 who had not, a group comparison study was done which addressed the following questions, (1) within a delinquent population of violent and non-violent adolescents, is there a relationship between violence and self-concept? (2) what is that relationship; (3) using the Piers-Harris Children's Self-Concept Scale, can it be determined that attributes such as behavior, anxiety, popularity, happiness, and physical appearance as they relate to self-concept are more predictive than others in determining who within a delinquent population will commit acts of violence. For the purposes of this study, delinquent adolescents were those who had official records of misconduct with either the school or juvenile authorities. Adolescents classified as violent were those who had committed acts such as assault, use of a weapon, use of deadly force, and sexual assault while adolescents classified as non-violent had committed anti-social acts such as, truancy, talking back and rule breaking. ^ The study concluded that there is a relationship between adolescent violence and self-concept. However, there was insufficient statistical evidence that self-concept is a predictor of violence. ^

Dyslexia: Success, Failure, and Self-Concept

The purpose of this study is to investigate the experience of college-aged students who have been diagnosed with dyslexia. Research has shown that many people with dyslexia experience a variety of social and emotional struggles throughout their education. Using qualitative research techniques, this study provides a description of the experience common among college students with dyslexia. Specifically, the study examines the experience of dyslexic students as it relates to attributions of successes and failures, locus of control, self-concept, and how personal knowledge about the diagnosis impacts their experience.

Parent-Child Interaction and Children's Self-Concept

This study is designed to investigate the relationships between marital communication, the quality of parents' ability to assist their children in joint problem-solving, and children's independent mastery attempts and perceived competence at problem-solving, and behavioral indicators of self-esteem. Couples' skill at regulating their own and their children's negative affect within the marital and parent-child family subsystems is hypothesized to predict the quality of their assistance, or scaffolding behavior, to their children during joint problem-solving. Further, the quality of parental scaffolding behavior is expected to predict children's independent mastery attempts, levels of perceived competence at problemsolving, and behavioral indicators of self-esteem. Families for the study will be those with children between 3 1/2 to six years of age recruited from subjects participating in a longitudinal study of communication in marriage being conducted at the Denver Center for Marital and Family Studies. Families will participate in three interaction tasks designed to tap parental scaffolding behavior during problemsolving with their children. Children will be administered self-report measures to tap their perceived competence at such problem-solving as those in the interaction tasks and parents will complete a questionnaire tapping the behavioral indicators of their child's self-esteem. Family interaction data will be coded with the use of a microanalytic coding system developed by this study, the Parent-Child Interaction Coding System. Marital communication data at three time points, premaritally, during the transition to parenthood , and concurrently, will be obtained from couples' interactions from the longitudinal study. The clinical significance of this study includes implications for training couples how to effectively regulate negative affect and offer their children sensitive assistance during joint problem-solving.

Social risk factors in Spanish youth and their impact on self-concept construction

This paper presents evidence from a psychosocial framework about the relationship among youth, work, and identity construction. The aims of this research were twofold. The first one was to analyze the working conditions of Spanish youth and their impact on individuals' biographies. The second one was to examine the effect of labor-related variables on construction / change of identity elements in Spanish youth. For this purpose, two research techniques were used: the Delphi method (103 experts sample from several entities and organizations closely related to our topic) and deep interviews (15 interviews with youths classified according to their relationship with the work market). Copyright 2007 by The Spanish Journal of Psychology.

Social anxiety and self-concept in adolescence

This study analyzes the relationships between social anxiety and dimensions of self-concept in a sample of 2022 (50.1% males) Spanish adolescents, ranging in age from 12 to 16 year-olds. The social anxiety was assessed by the Social Phobia and Anxiety Inventory (SPAI), and self-concept was measured with the Self-Description Questionnaire II (SDQ-II). Logistic regression analyses show that adolescents with social anxiety are more likely to negatively perceive their relationship with opposite sex peers and have lower scores in self-esteem than students without social anxiety. Furthermore, in most logistic models, students with social anxiety also show a higher probability of perceiving their relation with peers of the same sex in a negative way, considering worse student, less attractive and athletic, and more emotional instable than students without social anxiety. The relevance of sex and grade in the relationship between social anxiety and self-concept in adolescence is discussed.