Projects / Programmes
Vloga osebnosti v razvoju psihosocialnega prilagajanja (Slovene)
| Code |
Science |
Field |
Subfield |
| 5.09.00 |
Social sciences |
Psychology |
|
| Code |
Science |
Field |
| 5.01 |
Social Sciences |
Psychology and cognitive sciences |
Researchers (9)
Organisations (2)
Significance for science
Investigating the development of personality in early/middle childhood, their role in psychosocial adjustment to pre-school, school entry, and early academic achievement, our analyses of normative developmental trajectories of adjustment add to the psychological knowledge on developmental change. The contribution of child personality traits to adjustment was studied across series of longitudinal predictive analyses, along with an account for family environment, attendance of pre-school, and reliance on multiple informants and methods of assessment. We were among first to demonstrate that the developmental change in social competence is related mainly to the change in extraversion, the trajectories of neuroticism and internalizing behavior show concomitant change, and the change in developmental course of disagreeableness is associated with the course of externalizing behavior; the contributions of family characteristics and preschool experiences to the trajectories of adjustment are relatively small as compared to the effects of children’s dispositional tendencies (personality). Our studies on person-environment transactions over childhood further extend the knowledge on differential directions of influence between personality and environment. The results of predictive analyses on adjustment to school, on-entry basic skills, cognitive ability and early academic attainments based on child robust and specific traits also present a new contribution to psychological science. The findings (also obtained with adolescents) partly explain which of the specific traits account for consistently significant links between the students’ robust traits and their academic success. Our empirically supported mediational model of individual and social factors predicting adolescent academic achievements received a special attention by the international research community.
The research on the role of personality in psychosocial adjustment of specific groups of adolescents provided unique findings and highlighted the importance of knowledge of adolescents’ personality in specific contexts of their functioning: (a) adherence to medical regimen in treatments of adolescents with a chronic asymptomatic illness, and (b) coaching young talented athletes; the study contributed a new interactional approach in exploring the role of coach-perceived personality traits of athletes, which was demonstrated a significant risk factor of premature termination of a successful sports career. The findings of both studies also have an important practical value in creating research-based prevention models of treatment of adolescents in specific developmental contexts.
The Individuation Test for Emerging Adults (ITEA) was (among others) constructed during the project and presents a valuable supplement to the pool of psychological instruments to measure various aspects of individuation in relation to parents. The ITEA is the only available questionnaire providing a highly reliable and valid measurement of individuation over emerging adulthood. We supported the dimensional invariance in measuring the aspects of individuation among individuals within Central Europe. Based on the interest of international research community to use the ITEA, we translated, adapted (according to international standards and norms) and adjusted the e-application of the Slovene version into English, German, French, Norwegian, Russian, and Croatian. We created a dimensional model of individuation and showed a differential role of personality traits in the process of individuation and achievement of criteria for adulthood among emerging adults, which presents an original contribution to science.
We also obtained new relevant knowledge about the differential role of personality traits in various aspects of subjective well-being and use of effective life-management strategies over adulthood (especially in elderly) by testing several hypotheses empirically.
Significance for the country
The research conducted will contribute to professional work with children, adolescents, emerging adults, and elderly, especially those who are at personality risk for unfavorable developmental outcomes (e.g., emotional, conduct problems in children, interpersonal difficulties in adolescents) and under-achievements in important domains of their life (e.g., poor academic achievement, premature termination of sports career, prolonged psychological dependence on parents, productivity and quality of life in the elderly). Identification of specific personality factors of psychosocial adjustment and academic achievement, for example, enables teachers and experts in Slovene (pre)schools to differentiate in individualize their classroom work, which was shown to significantly improve the students’ academic attainments.
The effects of the construction, validation, and standardization of the ITEA(and its e-application for administration) are especially important; these are displayed through (a) the current use of the questionnaire and its e-application in graduate research projects of the students at the Department of Psychology (Faculty of Arts, University of Ljubljana) and at the Faculty of Psychology (University of Vienna), and in further Slovene as well as international research; (b) the adaptation of the ITEA for use in other language communities which has certainly increased the reputation and excellence of the Slovene psychological research within the international research community. The results of the research (including the construction of new assessment tools) about the coaches’ influence on the course and termination of young athletes’ sports career will contribute to more effective training and improvement of the quality of work with young talented athletes. Specifically, the coaches often create a negative motivational climate affecting the process of decision-making about pursuing or terminating the sports career due to their poor knowledge of the athletes’ personality as shown by our studies.
The research findings of the project are of a general significance for the promotion of Slovenia international-wise (presentations at international research conferences, publications in international research journals, invited lectures), development of university education (continuous integration of research findings in education at the graduate, master’s, and doctoral levels at the three Slovene public universities) , in-service training of professional staff (e.g., psychologists, (pre)school teachers, sports coaches, social workers, medical staff), education of the elderly (universities for the third life period, centers of daily activities for the elderly), and education of professionals working with the elderly (e.g., in homes for the elderly). The findings provide a research-based support to use the new knowledge at work with individuals of different ages, to improve the quality of professional services in the fields of developmental assessment, psychological counseling, health psychology, sports psychology and gerontological psychology. Based on the project conducted we have thus, already contributed to an improvement of extant psychological services (e.g., assessment and counseling in schools, health centers, sport organizations, university student counseling), we have elaborated the guidelines of treatment in the field of psychological prevention services, constructed psychometrically sound psychological instruments and procedures applicable in Slovenia for research purposes and developmental assessment. Our research findings further serve as guidelines of effective enhancement of autonomy in emerging adults, development of strategies to decrease intolerance toward an increasing portion of elderly in Slovenia, and to provide them opportunities to develop psychological potentials fully.
Most important scientific results
Annual report
2009,
2010,
2011,
final report,
complete report on dLib.si
Most important socioeconomically and culturally relevant results
Annual report
2009,
2010,
2011,
final report,
complete report on dLib.si
