Influence of social anxiety and emotional self‐efficacy on pre‐transition concerns, social threat sensitivity, and social adaptation to secondary school

Abstract

Background Much of the literature on school transfers has centred on academic adjustment and/or achievement, but school transfers also involve social adaption. Children who are socially anxious or lack emotional self‐efficacy are likely to have difficulties with social aspects of the transition. Aim(s) We examined the influence of social anxiety, depressive symptoms, and emotional self‐efficacy on (1) pre‐transition concerns about the move to secondary school and social threat sensitivity relating to that transition experience, and (2) school and peer connectedness after the school transfer. We also examined whether pre‐transition concerns predicted school and peer connectedness after the move. Sample Year 6 children (10–11 years) from 15 primary schools in Northern England. Method Children (N = 266) completed a questionnaire in their primary schools before the move to secondary school. A sub‐group (n = 156) of those children also completed measures immediately after the move to secondary school and then again 4 months later. Results Social anxiety influenced pre‐transition concerns. Higher emotional self‐efficacy was associated with lower social threat sensitivity pre‐transition and with reductions over time. Higher emotional self‐efficacy also influenced greater social adaption 4 months after the school move. Pre‐transition concerns about the move were a good indicator of poorer social adaption later on. Conclusions Based on the findings, interventions should target social anxiety to reduce pre‐transition concerns. Programmes that target emotional self‐efficacy are most likely to impact school and peer connectedness.

Reliability and Validity of the Persian Version Emotional Self-efficacy Scale for Young Adolescents

“…These coefficients indicated the desirable reliability of the adolescents-ESES in an Iranian sample. These results are in agreement with those obtained by other studies [17][18][19]22].…”

“…ESE is a complicated process of initiating, avoiding, inhibiting, maintaining, and fluctuating internal feelings or different factors associated with emotions (biological, cognitive, and behavioral processes). This process acts to realize the adaptability of individuals [17,20]. It is also associated with adolescent aggression [25].…”

“…Emotions play a very important role in interpersonal relationships, and emotion regulation helps individuals adapt to these relationships in most situations. Healthy emotional regulation is the cornerstone of mental health and adaptability, while the unhealthy regulation of emotions plays a key role in many psychological disorders [17]. On the other hand, it has been shown that adolescents' self-regulation is associated with the students' academic achievement [26].…”

“…This research supports the four sub-scales of ESES for adolescents, which are largely independent of cognitive ability. Using this scale in another research, Nowland and Qualter reported that an increase in the adolescents' ESE leads to a better relationship between the adolescent and school and peers [17]. The reliability and validity of the 27item adolescents ESES have been investigated.…”

“…As ESE is a complicated process of initiating, avoiding, inhibiting, maintaining, and fluctuating internal feelings or different factors associated with emotions (biological, cognitive, and behavioral processes), and this process acts to realize the adaptability of individuals; therefore, conducting studies in this area is of paramount importance [17,19,20]. Considering the importance of the translation and adaptation of psychological tests in different cultures and languages that make it possible to more accurately measure psychological constructs and provide the ground for the formation of the basic literature for common concepts and creation of operational definitions [21,22], and because the questionnaires need to be localized and their reliability and validity should be determined in the recruited population, and as so far the adolescent version of this scale has not been assessed psychometrically, the necessity of conducting this research is thus recognized.…”