Effortful control and school adjustment: The moderating role of classroom chaos

Abstract

Guided by the person by environment framework, the primary goal of this study was to determine whether classroom chaos moderated the relation between effortful control and kindergarteners’ school adjustment. Classroom observers reported on children’s (N = 301) effortful control in the fall. In the spring, teachers reported on classroom chaos and school adjustment outcomes (teacher-student relationship closeness and conflict, and school liking and avoidance). Cross-level interactions between effortful control and classroom chaos predicting school adjustment outcomes were assessed. A consistent pattern of interactions between effortful control and classroom chaos indicated that the relations between effortful control and the school adjustment outcomes were strongest in high chaos classrooms. Post-hoc analyses indicated that classroom chaos was associated with poor school adjustment when effortful control was low, suggesting that the combination of high chaos and low effortful control was associated with the poorest school outcomes.

Longitudinal relations between executive function and internalizing problems in grade school: The role of peer difficulty and academic performance.

“…Thus, once early relations were controlled, later relations between academic performance and internalizing problems cannot offer extra contribution. Findings are in line with studies showing associations between executive function and academic performance (Ahmed et al, 2019;Morgan et al, 2018), between regulatory capacities and academic performance (Berger et al, 2017; This document is copyrighted by the American Psychological Association or one of its allied publishers.…”

“…Indeed, executive function skills are particularly salient in classroom settings where children are expected to resist distraction, pay attention, follow instructions, and concentrate on various tasks (Diamond, 2013). Children with optimal executive function are more likely to demonstrate adaptive learning-related behaviors (Sánchez-Pérez, Fuentes, Eisenberg, & González-Salinas, 2018), to actively attend to classroom activities (Valiente, Swanson, Lemery-Chalfant, & Berger, 2014), and to form close relationships with teachers (Hernández et al, 2017). The current study extended prior studies by demonstrating that poor academic performance may be a mechanism underlying the relations between executive function and internalizing problems over time.…”

Emotion regulation and well‐being in primary classrooms situated in low‐socioeconomic communities

“…One of the most widely examined and influential explanations for this relationship is that poverty leads to increased levels of stress in the child's environment, which in turn has a negative impact on their social, emotional, and cognitive development (Shaw & Shelleby, 2014). These stressors may be at the community level, such as exposure to violence (Fowler, Tompsett, Braciszewski, Jacques-Tiura, & Baltes, 2009); in the home, such as harsh and inconsistent discipline (Margolin & Gordis, 2004); or at school, such as academically challenging tasks, test taking, and interpersonal conflict (Berger et al, 2017;Pekrun, Goetz, Titz, & Perry, 2002).…”

“…This further highlights the need to examine emotion regulation within a particular social context. Despite the aforementioned benefits of carrying out naturalistic observation studies, and the evidence indicating the importance of the classroom context (Berger et al, 2017;Hernández et al, 2017;McClelland et al, 2017), relatively few studies have examined children's emotion regulation using observational methods in the classroom.…”

Do the school adaptation levels of preschoolers vary according to their relationship with their teachers?

“…In general, school adaptation requires that a child adapts to many variables, such as teachers, classroom settings, school and classroom rules, and peer relationships [2][3][4]. If the child is not supported by these factors within the school and adequate school readiness is not achieved, the child's healthy adaptation to school cannot be ensured [5,6]. School adaptation is an important process that plays a vital role in a child's life [7].…”