Le sentiment d'appartenance à l'école : un regard conceptuel, psychométrique et théorique

Parce qu’il est notamment lié à des facteurs de réussite scolaire et d’adaptation sociale (Eccles & Roeser, 2009; Finn, 1989; Janosz, Georges, & Parent, 1998), le sentiment d’appartenance des élèves est considéré comme étant un élément de première instance qui doit d’être développé et maintenu par les professionnels de l’éducation (MELS, 2012). L'objectif général visait à approfondir notre compréhension du sentiment d’appartenance à l’école. Pour répondre à cet objectif général, trois articles de recherche distincts ont été élaborés. Le premier article présente une analyse conceptuelle visant à clarifier la compréhension du concept de sentiment d’appartenance à l’école. La méthode conceptuelle privilégiée dans cet article est celle de Walker et Avant (2011). La recension des écrits et les référents empiriques répertoriés indiquent que ce concept est de nature multidimensionnelle. L’analyse des données indique quatre attributs définitionnels. L’élève doit : (1) ressentir une émotion positive à l’égard du milieu scolaire; (2) entretenir des relations sociales de qualité avec les membres du milieu scolaire; (3) s’impliquer activement dans les activités de la classe ou celles de l’école; (4) percevoir une certaine synergie (harmonisation), voir même une similarité, avec les membres de son groupe. À la suite de cette étude permettant de mieux comprendre le sentiment d’appartenance à l’école, le deuxième article visait à examiner la structure factorielle et l'invariance de l’instrument de mesure du sentiment d’appartenance Psychological Sense of School Membership (PSSM) au regard du sexe des élèves. Cette étude a été menée chez un échantillon composé de 766 filles et de 391 garçons de troisième secondaire. Les analyses factorielles confirmatoires ont indiqué une structure à trois facteurs : (1) la qualité des relations entre les élèves; (2) la qualité des relations entre les élèves et l’enseignant; ainsi que (3) le sentiment d’acceptation par le milieu. Les analyses factorielles multigroupes ont indiqué pour leur part que le PSSM est un instrument invariant chez les filles et les garçons de troisième secondaire. Finalement, le troisième article a été mené chez un échantillon de 4166 élèves de niveau secondaire afin d’examiner les processus psychologiques complexes s’opérant entre le sentiment d’appartenance et le rendement scolaire (Anderman & Freeman, 2004; Connell & et al., 1994; Roeser et al., 1996). Afin d’examiner ces processus psychologiques, quatre hypothèses issues du modèle de Freeman-Anderman ont été validées par le biais d’analyses acheminatoires : H1 Les affects positifs médiatisent partiellement et positivement l’effet du sentiment d’appartenance sur l’engagement comportemental; H2 Les affects positifs médiatisent partiellement et positivement l’effet du sentiment d’appartenance sur l’engagement affectif; H3 Les affects positifs médiatisent partiellement et positivement l’effet du sentiment d’appartenance sur l’engagement cognitif; H4 Les engagements affectif, cognitif et comportemental médiatisent partiellement et positivement l’effet du sentiment d’appartenance sur le rendement scolaire. Nos résultats appuient partiellement la première hypothèse de recherche tout en soutenant les hypothèses deux, trois et quatre. Spécifiquement, la relation entre le sentiment d’appartenance et l’engagement émotionnel montre davantage un effet direct qu’un effet indirect (H2). L’étude a produit des résultats similaires pour l’engagement cognitif (H3). Finalement, la relation entre le sentiment d’appartenance et le rendement scolaire indique un effet indirect plus grand qu’un effet direct (H4). À la lumière de ces résultats, des recommandations à l’intention des professionnels de l’éducation sont offertes en guise de conclusion.

Determinants and Implications of Self-perceived Authenticity: Beliefs About Authenticity and Reactions to Behavioral Incongruence

Although many perspectives suggest that authenticity is important for well-being, people do not always have direct access to the psychological processes that produce their behaviors and, thus, are not able to judge whether they are behaving consistently with their personality, attitudes, values, motives, and goals. Even so, people experience subjective feelings of authenticity and inauthenticity, raising the question of factors that influence people’s judgments of whether they are being authentic. The present studies used descriptive, correlational, experimental, and experience sampling designs to examine possible influences on self-judgments of authenticity, including the congruence between people’s behavior and inner dispositions, the positivity of the behavior, their personal beliefs about authenticity, features of the interaction, and trait authenticity. Studies 1A and 1B examined the role of people’s beliefs about authenticity in self-judgments of authenticity. Studies 2A and 2B investigated the criteria that people use to judge their behavior as authentic versus inauthentic and challenged those criteria to see whether self-perceived authenticity was affected. And, Study 3 used an experience sampling design to study people’s experiences of state authenticity in daily life. Together the studies offer insights into the determinants of self-perceived authenticity and show that many factors that influence people’s feelings of authenticity are peripheral, if not irrelevant, to actual authenticity.

Investigating Multiple Roles of Vocal Confidence in Persuasion

Although persuasion often occurs via oral communication, it remains a comparatively understudied area. This research tested the hypothesis that changes in three properties of voice influence perceptions of speaker confidence, which in turn differentially affects attitudes according to different underlying psychological processes that the Elaboration Likelihood Model (ELM, Petty & Cacioppo, 1984), suggests should emerge under different levels of thought. Experiment 1 was a 2 (Elaboration: high vs. low) x 2 (Vocal speed: increased speed vs. decreased speed) x 2 (Vocal intonation: falling intonation vs. rising intonation) between participants factorial design. Vocal speed and vocal intonation influenced perceptions of speaker confidence as predicted. In line with the ELM, under high elaboration, confidence biased thought favorability, which in turn influenced attitudes. Under low elaboration, confidence did not bias thoughts but rather directly influenced attitudes as a peripheral cue. Experiment 2 used a similar design as Experiment 1 but focused on vocal pitch. Results confirmed pitch influenced perceptions of confidence as predicted. Importantly, we also replicated the bias and cue processes found in Experiment 1. Experiment 3 investigated the process by which a broader spectrum of speech rate influenced persuasion under moderate elaboration. In a 2 (Argument quality: strong vs. weak) x 4 (Vocal speed: extremely slow vs. moderately slow vs. moderately fast vs. extremely fast) between participants factorial design, results confirmed the hypothesized non-linear relationship between speech rate and perceptions of confidence. In line with the ELM, speech rate influenced persuasion based on the amount of processing. Experiment 4 investigated the effects of a broader spectrum of vocal intonation on persuasion under moderate elaboration and used a similar design as Experiment 3. Results indicated a partial success of our vocal intonation manipulation. No evidence was found to support the hypothesized mechanism. These studies show that changes in several different properties of voice can influence the extent to which others perceive them as confident. Importantly, evidence suggests different vocal properties influence persuasion by the same bias and cue processes under high and low thought. Evidence also suggests that under moderate thought, speech rate influences persuasion based on the amount of processing.

A Computer Model of Drafting Effects on Collective Behavior in Elite 10,000 m Runners

Purpose Drafting in cycling influences collective behaviour of pelotons. Whilst evidence for collective behaviour in competitive running events exists, it is not clear if this results from energetic savings conferred by drafting. This study modelled the effects of drafting on behavior in elite 10,000 m runners. Methods Using performance data from a men’s elite 10,000 m track running event, computer simulations were constructed using Netlogo 5.1 to test the effects of three different drafting quantities on collective behaviour: no drafting, drafting to 3m behind with up to ~8% energy savings (a realistic running draft); and drafting up to 3m behind with up to 38% energy savings (a realistic cycling draft). Three measures of collective behaviour were analysed in each condition; mean speed, mean group stretch (distance between first and last placed runner), and Runner Convergence Ratio (RCR) which represents the degree of drafting benefit obtained by the follower in a pair of coupled runners. Results Mean speeds were 6.32±0.28m.s-1, 5.57±0.18 m.s-1, and 5.51±0.13 m.s-1 in the cycling draft, runner draft, and no draft conditions respectively (all P<0.001). RCR was lower in the cycling draft condition, but did not differ between the other two. Mean stretch did not differ between conditions. Conclusions Collective behaviours observed in running events cannot be fully explained through energetic savings conferred by realistic drafting benefits. They may therefore result from other, possibly psychological, processes. The benefits or otherwise of engaging in such behavior are, as yet, unclear.

Sketching the temporal landscape : The case of night nursing

We take for granted that we exist in dimensions of time and space. We accept that time passes and that space extends as a matter of course. Just as our personal space is important to us, so is time of our own. The individual is capable of developing a variety of time perspectives or orientations, each applicable to a different aspect of life, for instance, home, leisure, economic, political and organisational. Our temporal perspective influences a wide range of psychological processes, from motivation, emotions and spontaneity to risk-taking creativity and problem-solving. Our temporal landscapes are made up of recognisable domains, with permeable borders – private time and public time, home time and work time, past, present and future time, cyclical time. Just as a geography of space contains recognisable natural features – rivers, deserts, mountains – and features created by human beings – canals, roads, skyscrapers – so our temporal landscape contains natural features – day and night, the seasons – and features created by us – the ordering of social, economic, legal, and organisational time into, among others, the practices of family life, financial periods, prison sentences and workloads. This paper views the temporal landscapes of night nurses, and is based on longitudinal ethnographic research. It highlights areas such as shift work, workload, and the temporal aspects of caring. The result is the production of a map, albeit a rough one, of the temporal landscape inhabited by night nurses as they go about their working lives.

Retiro de meditação budista: estudo exploratório à luz do método fenomenológico

Dissertação de Mestrado apresentada ao Instituto Superior de Psicologia Aplicada para obtenção de grau de Mestre na especialidade de Psicologia Clínica.

Feasibility of resting-state microstates neurofeedback

Despite major progress, currently available treatment options for patients suffering from schizophrenia remain suboptimal. Antipsychotic medication is one such option, and is helpful in acute phases of the disease. However, antipsychotics cause significant side-effects that often require additional medication, and can even trigger the discontinuation of treatment. Taken together, along with the fact that 20-30% of patients are medication-resistant, it is clear that new medical care options should be developed for patients with schizophrenia. Besides medication, an emerging option to treat psychiatric symptoms is through the use of neurofeedback. This technique has proven efficacy for other disorders and, more importantly, has also proven to be feasible in patients with schizophrenia. One of the major advantages of this approach is that it allows for the influence of brain states that otherwise would be inaccessible; i.e. the physiological markers underlying psychotic symptoms. EEG resting-state microstates are a very interesting electrophysiological marker of schizophrenia symptoms. Precisely, a specific class of resting-state microstates, namely microstate class D, has consistently been found to show a temporal shortening in patients with schizophrenia compared to controls, and this shortening is correlated with the presence positive psychotic symptoms. Under the scope of biological psychiatry, appropriate treatment of psychotic symptoms can be expected to modify the underlying physiological markers accompanying behavioral manifestations of a disease. We reason that if abnormal temporal parameters of resting-state microstates seem to be related to positive symptoms in schizophrenia, regulating this EEG feature might be helpful as a treatment for patients. The goal of this thesis was to prove the feasibility of microstate class D contribution self-regulation via neurofeedback. Given that no other study has attempted to regulate microstates via neurofeedback, we first tested its feasibility in a population of healthy subjects. In the first paper we describe the methodological characteristics of the neurofeedback protocol and its implementation. Neurofeedback performance was assessed by means of linear mixed effects modeling, which provided a complete profile of the neurofeedback’s training response within and between-subjects. The protocol included 20 training sessions, and each session contained three conditions: baseline (resting-state) and two active conditions: training (auditory feedback upon self-regulation performance) and transfer (self-regulation with no feedback). With linear modeling we obtained performance indices for each of them as follows: baseline carryover (baseline increments time-dependent) and learning and aptitude for each of the active conditions. Learning refers to the increase/decrease of the microstate class D contribution, time-dependent during each active condition, and aptitude refers to the constant difference of the microstate class D contribution between each active condition and baseline independent of time. The indices provided are discussed in terms of tailoring neurofeedback treatment to individual profiles so that it can be applied in future studies or clinical practice. In our sample of participants, neurofeedback proved feasible, as all participants at least showed positive results in one of the aforementioned learning indices. Furthermore, between-subjects we observed that the contribution of microstate class D across-sessions increased by 0.42% during baseline, 1.93% during training trials, and 1.83% during transfer. This range is expected to be effective in treating psychotic symptoms in patients. In the second paper presented in this thesis, we explored the possible predictors of neurofeedback success among psychological variables measured with questionnaires. An interesting finding was the negative correlation between “motivational incongruence” and some of the neurofeedback performance indices. Even though this finding requires replication, we discuss it in terms of the interfering effects of incompatible psychological processes with neurofeedback training requirements. In the third paper, we present a meta-analysis on all available studies that have related resting-state microstate abnormalities and schizophrenia. We obtained medium effect sizes for two microstate classes, namely C and D. Combining the meta-analysis results with the fact that microstate class D abnormalities are correlated with the presence of positive symptoms in patients with schizophrenia, these results add further support for the training of this precise microstate. Overall, the results obtained in this study encourage the implementation of this protocol in a population of patients with schizophrenia. However, future studies will have to show whether patients will be able to successfully self-regulate the contribution of microstate class D and, if so, whether this regulation will have an impact on symptomatology.

Resiliência e auto-conhecimento

Dissertação de mest. em Psicologia da EducaçãoEspecialização em Ensino Básico, Faculdade de Ciências Humanas e Sociais, Escola Superior de Educação, Univ. do Algarve 2003

Co-creation of tourism experience: attention, involvement and memorability

Tese de Doutoramento, Turismo, Faculdade de Economia, Universidade do Algarve, 2016

How can personal role engagement lead to increased engagement? The roles of meaningfulness and perceived line manager relations

There is an increasing need to understand the psychological processes that link personal development with employee engagement, particularly the boundary conditions at which these occur. The current study sought to meet this need by testing whether perceived opportunities for development are positively associated with job engagement indirectly through the experience of meaningfulness, and whether this indirect relationship is conditional on the level of perceived line manager relations. Questionnaire data was collected from 152 UK workers from a range of occupations and organizations. The results found support for all the hypotheses. In particular, the positive effects of perceived opportunities for development on job engagement (measured one month later) via meaningfulness were only significant for those who perceived that they had a good relationship with their line manager. Thus, there is a need for line managers to develop high quality relationships with their direct reports in order for development practices to translate into positive psychological outcomes. Engagement theory could be advanced by further understanding broaden-and-build and social exchange processes.

Negotiating meaning: Effects of group dynamics on information system development.

The research explored the impacts that the psychological processes within and between work groups had on software development and IS project failure. It has identified and demonstrated ways to moderate such group dynamics and their causes; in turn providing an approach to reduce IS project failure.

The effect of physical activity and sedentary behaviour on mental health amongst young adults.

Through a systematic review, cross-sectional and longitudinal studies, the current thesis found that physical activity was associated with reduced mental health symptoms; however, this effect was not maintained after multivariate control for young adult psychosocial characteristics. Further, engagement in long periods of sedentary behaviour (sitting time) was associated with higher psychological distress in the cross-sectional study, but not related in the longitudinal study. A significant contribution of the thesis was the finding of a threshold at which sitting time may be related to mental health.

Clase Invertida

En este segundo número de reflexiones pedagógicas se presenta una revisión de la denominada clase invertida (flipped classroom). Este texto presentan los componentes que caracterizan esta estrategia. Se comparan igualmente los elementos que la diferencian de la clase tradicional y se destacan los pasos para adelantar esta innovación y su forma de funcionamiento. De igual manera se muestran algunos indicadores que pueden llevar a una reflexión de la pacífica pedagógica y se concluye con estudios que muestran sus aportes e investigaciones que la soportan.

Cognitive Assessment System (CAS): Psychometric studies with Portuguese children from 7 to 15 years.

The Cognitive Assessment System (CAS) is a new measure of cognitive abilities based on the Planning, Attention, Simultaneous and Successive (PASS) Theory. This theory is derived from research in neuropsychological and cognitive Psychology with particular emphasis on the work of Luria (1973). According to Naglieri (1999) and Naglieri and Das (1997), the PASS cognitive processes are the basic building blocks of human intellectual functioning. Planning processes provide cognitive control, utilization of processes and knowledge, intentionality, and self-regulation to achieve a desired goal; Attention processes provide focused, selective cognitive activity and resistance to distraction; and, Simultaneous and Successive processes are the two forms of operating on information. The PASS theory has had a strong empirical base prior to the publication of the CAS (see Das, Naglieri & Kirby, 1994), and its research foundation remains strong (see Naglieri, 1999; Naglieri & Das, 1997). The four basic psychological processes can be used to (1) gain an understanding of how well a child thinks; (2) discover the child’s strengths and needs, which can then be used for effective differential diagnosis; (3) conduct fair assessment; and (4) select or design appropriate interventions. Compared to the traditional intelligence tests, including IQ tests, the Cognitive Assessment System (CAS) has the great advantage of relying on a modern theory of cognitive functioning, linking theory with practice.

Interactive processes link the multiple symptoms of fatigue in sport competition

Muscle physiologists often describe fatigue simply as a decline of muscle force and infer this causes an athlete to slow down. In contrast, exercise scientists describe fatigue during sport competition more holistically as an exercise-induced impairment of performance. The aim of this review is to reconcile the different views by evaluating the many performance symptoms/measures and mechanisms of fatigue. We describe how fatigue is assessed with muscle, exercise or competition performance measures. Muscle performance (single muscle test measures) declines due to peripheral fatigue (reduced muscle cell force) and/or central fatigue (reduced motor drive from the CNS). Peak muscle force seldom falls by >30% during sport but is often exacerbated during electrical stimulation and laboratory exercise tasks. Exercise performance (whole-body exercise test measures) reveals impaired physical/technical abilities and subjective fatigue sensations. Exercise intensity is initially sustained by recruitment of new motor units and help from synergistic muscles before it declines. Technique/motor skill execution deviates as exercise proceeds to maintain outcomes before they deteriorate, e.g. reduced accuracy or velocity. The sensation of fatigue incorporates an elevated rating of perceived exertion (RPE) during submaximal tasks, due to a combination of peripheral and higher CNS inputs. Competition performance (sport symptoms) is affected more by decision-making and psychological aspects, since there are opponents and a greater importance on the result. Laboratory based decision making is generally faster or unimpaired. Motivation, self-efficacy and anxiety can change during exercise to modify RPE and, hence, alter physical performance. Symptoms of fatigue during racing, team-game or racquet sports are largely anecdotal, but sometimes assessed with time-motion analysis. Fatigue during brief all-out racing is described biomechanically as a decline of peak velocity, along with altered kinematic components. Longer sport events involve pacing strategies, central and peripheral fatigue contributions and elevated RPE. During match play, the work rate can decline late in a match (or tournament) and/or transiently after intense exercise bursts. Repeated sprint ability, agility and leg strength become slightly impaired. Technique outcomes, such as velocity and accuracy for throwing, passing, hitting and kicking, can deteriorate. Physical and subjective changes are both less severe in real rather than simulated sport activities. Little objective evidence exists to support exercise-induced mental lapses during sport. A model depicting mind-body interactions during sport competition shows that the RPE centre-motor cortex-working muscle sequence drives overall performance levels and, hence, fatigue symptoms. The sporting outputs from this sequence can be modulated by interactions with muscle afferent and circulatory feedback, psychological and decision-making inputs. Importantly, compensatory processes exist at many levels to protect against performance decrements. Small changes of putative fatigue factors can also be protective. We show that individual fatigue factors including diminished carbohydrate availability, elevated serotonin, hypoxia, acidosis, hyperkalaemia, hyperthermia, dehydration and reactive oxygen species, each contribute to several fatigue symptoms. Thus, multiple symptoms of fatigue can occur simultaneously and the underlying mechanisms overlap and interact. Based on this understanding, we reinforce the proposal that fatigue is best described globally as an exercise-induced decline of performance as this is inclusive of all viewpoints.