Peer Aggression and Sexual Harassment among Young Adolescents in a School Context: A Comparative Study between Finland and Turkey

The study investigates peer aggression and sexual harassment among young adolescents in Finland and Turkey. Sex differences and the interaction effect between country of residence and sex are also examined. A questionnaire was completed by 1,747 adolescents (1, 268 from Finland, 479 from Turkey, Mage = 14.1). Six different forms of aggression (physical, verbal, indirect, cyber, verbal sexual harassment, physical sexual harassment) were examined. More adolescents from Turkey, and more boys, were found to be involved in aggression as both victims and perpetrators compared to adolescents from Finland and girls. The interaction effect was significant between country of residence and sex with being a boy from Turkey was related to having the highest involvement in cyber aggression, verbal sexual harassment, and physical sexual harassment, as both victim and perpetrator. Regarding victimization from indirect aggression, girls from Finland scored higher than Turkish girls, while boys from Turkey scored higher than Finnish boys.

Genetic Determinism on Teachers’ Perceptions about Etiology of Mental Disorders

Mental disorders are disorders of the cognitive, emotional or behavioral condition of an individual. They can have several origins and are usually associated with expressive anguish and difficulty in various aspects of life, including school education. Mental disorders are accompanied by social stigmas which may be linked to the belief in genetic determinism, i.e., in the perception that mental disorders are unchanging. The objective of the present study was to understand the perception of Brazilian teachers of all levels about the etiology of mental disorders. The results showed that most of the teachers studied believe in the predominance or exclusivity of genes in mental disorders, and do not consider the environment as a potential influencer of their occurrence or mitigation. This perception approaches the belief in genetic determinism and can justify the labeling of students with mental disorders and the consequent perpetuation of social stigmas. It is therefore recommended to promote knowledge in this area, including knowledge of the dynamics of interaction between genes and the environment, helping educators to prepare and to be able to act according to the reality of each student without creating inappropriate stereotypes.

Does Use of Books and Electronic Media Associate to Joint Attention Skills and Temperament during the First Year of Life?

Several researchers have found that media exposure through books or electronic media contribute to preschoolers’ development. However, research with behavioral measures and during the first years of life have not been carried out in Latin American contexts. The aim of the following research was to evaluate the relations between media exposure through electronic media and books with joint attention skills and temperament (i.e., effortful control, surgency and negative affect) during the first year of life. A free play session was carried out, where the number of mother-infant interaction behaviors were assessed. Findings state that only the amount and the frequency of the use of books at home between caregivers and infants were positively associated with the behaviors of joint attention and surgency. Conclusion denotes that books would probably be associated with more infant interactions and higher SES, mediating in the promotion of cognitive development from the first months of life.

Productive Failures: From Class Requirement to Fostering a Support Group

Mistakes occur frequently in mathematics. Reframing mistakes into positive moments can be psychologically important in a student’s educational journey. We investigated two tertiary math classes that explicitly valued mistakes through a pedagogical requirement called “productive failure”. For a percentage of their grade, students demonstrated how they made mistakes in their problem solving and, most importantly, how they overcame those mistakes. Through interviews, video-stimulated recalls, and evaluations of the course all from students, we initially looked for affectual responses to the pedagogical allowance and student-led demonstration. Many of the responses, both benefits and drawbacks of the productive failure, were interpreted by the research group to resemble the psychology literature on peer-led support groups. Descriptions of both productive failure and support groups, as well as quotes from the students, aim to shed light on psychological benefits of valuing mistakes. Finally, we believe that productive failures benefitted many students because it made the human aspect of mathematics more explicit.

The Importance of Personality and Self-efficacy for Stress Management in Higher Education

The psychological implications of stress have become an issue of concern for university students around the world over the past decade. It is thought that the perception of stress varies depending on students' personality traits and their beliefs about being able to manage their academic life. To investigate this further, a study was conducted with a sample of 200 university students. The main findings of this study were: (1) All of the Big Five Model of personality traits significantly contribute to developing positive academic self-efficacy, with some of these being moderated by gender. Self-efficacy is characterised by agreeableness, conscientiousness, extraversion, emotionally stability and openness to experience. (2) People with high academic self-efficacy are able to take advantage of eustress and manage distress better than people with low academic self-efficacy. (3) There are some personality traits that contribute to distress and eustress. Specifically, people who are introverted and have low emotional stability and low openness to experience tend to suffer from distress more than people who do not have these traits. In contrast, conscientious people tend to experience eustress more than people without these characteristics. All these traits were mediated by self-efficacy, and in some cases were moderated by gender.

Why Some Adolescents Engage in Risk-Taking Behavior

This study explored adolescents’ reasons for involving themselves, or not, in risk-taking behavior, in two vulnerable areas of North Jakarta. The sample was purposively selected among households with adolescents ranging from 12 to 18 years old living in the two areas. The study involved 401 parents (8% female; 92% male; mean age 45.3 years) and 414 adolescents (57.49% female; 42.51% male; mean age 14.9 years). Parents’ demographic data included educational level, employment status, family income, and expenditure. Adolescents were asked about their perceptions of their relationships with their parents, whether they had been involved in eight risky behaviors (smoking, consuming alcohol, substance use, brawling, crime, physical fighting, heavy petting, and premarital sex), and reasons for engaging in risky behaviors or not. The comparison of proportions of eight risky behavior was tested by different test procedures, namely Z test, Chi-Square and Marascuillo multiple comparison. Results revealed that older adolescents were more likely to be involved in risk-taking, and boys were more likely to engage in risky behaviors than girls. The study also indicated that curiosity and peer pressure were the main reasons adolescents engaged in risky behaviors. Advice from family members, fear of God, and fear of being sinful were reasons adolescents did not engage in risky behaviors.

Investigation of the Statistical Anxiety Rating Scale Psychometric Properties with a Sample of Greek Students

The purpose of this study was to adapt the Statistics Anxiety Rating Scale (STARS) for a Greek student population. The STARS was administered to 890 Tertiary Education students in two Greek universities. It was performed a cross-validation study to examine the factorial structure and the psychometric properties with a series of confirmatory factor analyses. Results revealed a correlated six first-order factor model which provided the best fit to the data compared to a six-factor model with one superordinate factor. All six factors of the Greek version of the STARS presented convergent and discriminant validity and were internally consistent. Implications and limitations are discussed.

Two Interventions to Improve Knowledge of Scientific and Dissemination Articles in First-Year University Students

The representations of science in mass media have shown a significant increase in the last years. However, mass media dissemination activities can extend to pseudoscience due to the fact that not all scientific news are published with the same rigour. Thus, we aimed to develop two theoretical-practical interventions among first-year university students with the purpose of improving their knowledge about scientific studies and original scientific sources, as well as to critically analyze dissemination of scientific research in media. The interventions had a positive impact on knowledge about scientific information sources, particularly Pubmed, in addition to reducing the number of incorrect features linked to both scientific and dissemination articles, suggesting the importance of interventions focused on misconceptions. However, students showed knowledge of correct features of scientific articles, independently of our intervention, and they made more mistakes when attributing incorrect features to scientific articles when compared to dissemination ones.

Finnish Primary School Teachers' Emotional Coping in Student-related Stressful Situations

The current study aimed to explore primary schoolteacher’s emotional stress-coping strategy and to examine its possible relationships with stressful situations caused by pupils’ misbehaviours in Finland context. A total of 12 items in four subscales with second-order model was the most appropriate structure to understand teachers’ emotional coping strategy. In the student-related stressful situations, the most relevant emotional coping strategies were religion/mindfulness,social support from family members, and self-blame. In addition, when teachers use self-blame to acknowledge their stressful emotions, they use another emotional strategy simultaneously, and vice versa. Those results showed significance of future studies on understanding more effective emotional strategies for student-related stress and investigating how teachers use several types of emotional coping strategies coincidently.