Tėvų ir pedagogų požiūris į vaikų, turinčių mokymosi negalių, psichologinį prisitaikymą

LTStraipsnyje analizuojama turinčių mokymosi negalių vaikų psichologinio prisitaikymo sunkumai ir pateikiami empirinio tyrimo rezultatai. Tyrime naudoti Achenbach vaikų elgesio vertinimo klausimynai ne tik leidžia atskleisti įvairius prisitaikymo sunkumus, bet ir analizuoti juos tėvų ir pedagogų požiūriu. Tyrime siekta palyginti jaunesnio mokyklinio amžiaus vaikų turinčių mokymosi negalių ir jų bendraamžių psichologinio prisitaikymo sunkumus, nustatyti, kaip mokymosi negalės pobūdis susijęs su psichologinio prisitaikymo sunkumų specifika.

ENIn Lithuania, for about ten years children with learning disabilities have been treated as a discrete and one of the largest groups of children with special needs. However, it has been little studied, especially from the mental health point of view. On the contrary, psychological adjustment of children with learning disabilities has been the area of intensive investigations in the last decade in countries with long lasting traditions in special education. Empirical evidence indicates that children with learning disabilities as a group exhibit a higher rate of psychosocial adjustment problems than do their non learrung-impaired peers. Studies in order to find out a more complete view of social emotional functioning of children with learning disabilities have revealed that about half of the children with learning disabilities exhibit maladaptive behavior patterns. This implies that learning disabled children are heterogeneous in their psychosocial functioning and this must be considered in empirical studies. In addition, in order to gain more valid results, the most important contexts for psychological adjustment - home and school - have to be analyzed. This study deals with the psychological adjustment problems of children with learning disabilities in primary school. The experimental group consisted of 102 children with learning disabilities (average age being 9.2). This group in tum was subdivided in 2 subgroups according to the severity of learning disability: 63 children with mixed learning disabilities (their learning problems encompass reading, writing and mathematics) and 39 children with specific learning disabilities (learning problems cover reading and writing). The control group consisted of 102 children (average age being 9.3).Two kinds of comparisons were made: between-groups comparisons (children with learning disabilities and average achievers) and within-group comparisons (children with specific learning disabilities and mixed learning disabilities). In order to collect data on children's behavioral and emotional problems two instruments were used: the Child Behavior Checklist (CBCL 4/18; Achenbach, 1991) and the Teacher Report Form (TRF 5/18; Achenbach, 1991). Comparative analysis of behavioral-emotional problems of children with learning disabilities (LD) and average achievers (NLD) revealed that children with learning disabilities scored higher on problem behavior scores on CBCL 4/18 as well as on TRF 5/18: significant differences were obtained on all scales except the few ones: aggressive behavior, delinquent behavior. The analysis of broadband scales' - Internalizing and Externalizing problems - showed significant differences on Internalizing problems (p < 0.01 for CBCL 4/18; p < 0.0001 for TRF 5/18). A total problem score was also higher in experimental group according to two sources of information - CBCL 4/18 and TRF 5/18. In the subgroups of experimental group the significant differences were obtained on CBCL 4/18 but not on TRF 5/18. Mothers rated children with mixed learning disabilities higher than children with specific learning disabilities on social problems (p<0.05), attention problems (p<0.05), delinquent behavior (p<0.01), aggressive behavior (p < 0.05) and externalizing problems (p < 0.05). No significant subgroup (severity of learning disability) effect was found on Internalizing problems on CBCL 4/18. Children with specific learning disability seamed to be more similar to average achievers on the profile of psychological adjustment problems when those were obtained by CBCL 4/18 (rated by mothers).Contrary to mothers' rating, teachers rated children with specific learning disability as displaying more behavioral-emotional problems than do their average peers. The significant differences were obtained on the scales of withdrawn behavior (p< 0.001), somatic complaints (p < 0.01), anxious/depressed behavior (p < 0.01), social problems (p < 0.001), attention problems (p < 0.001). The same tendency has been seen for the subgroup of children with mixed learning disabilities when it has been compared to average children on TRF 5/18 scores. The research results are in line with the results of many other empirical studies in other countries. This implies that children with learning disabilities are more vulnerable for psychological adjustment difficulties despite cultural differences. The question under discussion is what specific psychosocial difficulties are the most typical for these children. This study revealed attention, social and internalizing problems to be the most characteristic ones in children with learning disabilities. This study proved that children with learning disabilities did not exhibit higher levels of aggressive and delinquent behavior than their peers. It was the case for mothers' as well as teachers' ratings. One of the important findings of this study relates to the heterogeneity of learning disabilities. Children with specific and mixed learning disabilities also tended to differ in terms of their behavioral and emotional problems. These results can be interpreted in terms of eco-cultural theories maintaining that child's adjustment is likely to differ across settings. Moreover, parents and teachers, who see children in different settings, can create different constructions of their behavior. This study shows that severity of learning disability as well as cross-setting information should be given attention when taking into account psychological adjustment of children with learning disabilities.