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Parenting styles, academic resilience and academic achievement of polytechnic students
Author
Leong, Peggy Pek Kay
Supervisor
Tay-Koay, Siew Luan
Abstract
This study attempted to understand the relationships among parenting styles, academic resilience and academic achievement of polytechnic students in Singapore. While there are a large body of research on resilience of children and adolescents in the face of life‘s adversity, very few studies have been carried to examine resilience specifically related to academic setbacks and pressures. Polytechnic students were selected for this present study because there were fewer local youth studies which focused on polytechnic students, as youth research were mostly done with samples of secondary school students in early to mid-adolescence. Another reason was that this study also aimed to explore the relationships between parenting styles and academic outcomes of polytechnic students who were mostly in a stage of transition from late adolescence to adulthood. The findings of the study are meant to contribute to existing youth research as well as provide useful data that will enable policy makers to address key issues in the design of parenting and adolescent programmes.
The convenience sample consisted of 686 Year One to Three students (59 males and 627 females) pursuing education (n = 570 or 74%) and humanities diplomas (n=176 or 26%) in a local polytechnic. Participants completed a survey questionnaire and provided demographic information and completed ratings of themselves and their parents. Perceived Parenting styles were measured by the 26-item Parenting Style Index, academic resilience was assessed by the six-item Academic Resilience Scale and academic achievement was indicated by the Grade Point Average score of the most recent semester. Open-ended questions were included in the survey to gather qualitative information.
Findings revealed that there were significant associations among parenting styles, academic resilience and academic achievement. More polytechnic students who were high academic achievers have authoritative parents whilst more of the low academic achievers perceived their parents to be neglectful. Participants with authoritarian parents had a slightly higher mean academic achievement score than those with authoritative parents while students with neglectful parents achieved the lowest mean academic achievement score. Amongst participants who reported high academic resilience, more came from authoritative families. On the other hand, more youths in the low academic resilience group reported having neglectful parents. Polytechnic students with authoritative parents had the highest mean academic resilience score and those with neglectful parents had the lowest mean academic resilience score. While one-quarter of polytechnic students have ever considered giving up their studies in the face of academic setbacks and stress, only 10% of them have ever contemplated hurting / killing self when they could not handle academic setbacks and pressure. Compared to research conducted a decade ago, this current study showed that there were higher proportions of parents in the authoritative and neglectful style categories. Implications and recommendations were also discussed.
The convenience sample consisted of 686 Year One to Three students (59 males and 627 females) pursuing education (n = 570 or 74%) and humanities diplomas (n=176 or 26%) in a local polytechnic. Participants completed a survey questionnaire and provided demographic information and completed ratings of themselves and their parents. Perceived Parenting styles were measured by the 26-item Parenting Style Index, academic resilience was assessed by the six-item Academic Resilience Scale and academic achievement was indicated by the Grade Point Average score of the most recent semester. Open-ended questions were included in the survey to gather qualitative information.
Findings revealed that there were significant associations among parenting styles, academic resilience and academic achievement. More polytechnic students who were high academic achievers have authoritative parents whilst more of the low academic achievers perceived their parents to be neglectful. Participants with authoritarian parents had a slightly higher mean academic achievement score than those with authoritative parents while students with neglectful parents achieved the lowest mean academic achievement score. Amongst participants who reported high academic resilience, more came from authoritative families. On the other hand, more youths in the low academic resilience group reported having neglectful parents. Polytechnic students with authoritative parents had the highest mean academic resilience score and those with neglectful parents had the lowest mean academic resilience score. While one-quarter of polytechnic students have ever considered giving up their studies in the face of academic setbacks and stress, only 10% of them have ever contemplated hurting / killing self when they could not handle academic setbacks and pressure. Compared to research conducted a decade ago, this current study showed that there were higher proportions of parents in the authoritative and neglectful style categories. Implications and recommendations were also discussed.
Date Issued
2010
Call Number
HQ755.8 Leo
Date Submitted
2010