An analysis of behavioral differences of emotionally disturbed children assessed high on creativity

One hundred and seventy-two emotionally disturbed children ages 7 to 12 in self-contained classrooms were nominated by their teachers as potentially highly creativein either verbal or performance creativity. Eighty-three of the 172 were found to be highly creative as assessed by the Torrance Test of Creative Thinking. The discussion focuses on the behavioral differences among groups of highly emotionally disturbed children as revealed through factor analysis.     

WISC-R subtest patterns of severely emotionally disturbed students

The diagnostic category of “emotionally disturbed” is extremely difficult to define. This study attempts to use a subtest grouping approach to analyze the WISC-R performance of a representative sample of severely emotionally disturbed children. A pattern of performance on the WISC-R would aid greatly in diagnosis. A similar approach has obtained significant results for other specific diagnostic groups.     

Play for young handicapped children in an integrated setting,part 1

This is the first of two articles on the importance of play for young handicapped children. Part 1 explores activities for mentally retarded and emotionally disturbed children.     

Do parents,teachers, and psychoeducational evaluators agree in their perceptions of the problems of black and white emotionally disturbed children?

The aim was to examine the agreement among parents, teachers, psychologists, and educational diagnosticians in their perceptions of the problem behaviors of emotionally disturbed children. The sample of 194 emotionally disturbed boys and girls included 129 whites and 65 blacks. The use of measures of relationship showed that there was significantly greater consensus among the raters in perceptions of white than of black children; agreement was particularly poor between parents and teachers of black youngsters. The implications of these findings are discussed.     

Emotionally disturbed children's beliefs about punishment

Beliefs about discipline were examined in 58 emotionally disturbed, residentially placed children. Sixty-one percent had been physically or sexually abused prior to placement. Subjects were presented with vignettes depicting child misbehaviors and interpersonal problem situations. Very few children recommended physical punishment, including those from abusive families. However, emotionally disturbed children were somewhat more likely to endorse physical punishment than previously studied children from a normal sample. Neither gender nor ethnic differences were found. Children who endorsed physical punishment were also more likely to recommend aggressive problem solutions.     

The semantic differential technique in the examination of teacher attitudes to handicapped children

The study investigated the relationship between the attitudes of educators to exceptional children and the amount of contact with such children, knowledge about them, and the demographic variables: sex; age; and teaching experience of the respondents. A Semantic Differential technique was used and ten scales were rated over four concepts: physically handicapped children; emotionally disturbed children; mentally retarded children; speech impaired children. Attitude, represented by factor scores on a ‘social acceptability’ dimension, was correlated with the independent variables and produced low (r<.30) and inconsistent coefficients. An analysis of variance of the means of the ten scales over the four concepts indicated a more negative evaluation of the concept representing emotionally disturbed children than of the other three concepts. The evaluations were made in response to disability labels, and the results point to the need for further empirical research into the effects of labelling children on the attitudes of educators.     

Differentiating emotionally impaired from socially maladjusted students

This paper addresses the issue of whether serious emotional disturbance in children can be distinguished reliably from social maladjustment. Educational authorities at the local, state, and federal levels have expressed concern over the inclusion of socially maladjusted youths in special education programs for the seriously emotionally disturbed. For multidisciplinary teams to enforce the exclusionary clause of PL 94–142, which denies socially maladjusted students services for the seriously emotionally impaired unless it is determined that they are seriously emotionally disturbed, practitioners must be able to distinguish between these two conditions. The literature on taxonomies of childhood psychopathology was reviewed and a set of items based on research and clinical experience was developed to differentiate between these two groups. These items were submitted to eight school psychologists. Eleven items met the criterion of agreement by at least six of the eight psychologists. Implications for school psychologists are discussed.     

First Years at Warleigh School

Developing an environment in which to teach emotionally disturbed children is the theme of John Dwyfor Davies, headteacher at Warleigh School, an independent school for maladjusted boys, near Bath     

Behavioural Interactions within Chinese Families with Children Exhibiting Emotional Difficulties in Adlerian Family Play Therapy: Implications for Counselling Professionals

This study explores behavioural interactions between Chinese parents and emotionally disturbed children in Taiwan by conducting behavioural interaction analysis of five sessions each of Adlerian family play therapy involving two families. Emerging themes included behavioural displays of discouragement, control, aggression, intimacy, and conflicts. Implications are drawn and recommendations made on how counselling professionals may use behavioural interaction assessment through family play therapy as an intervention tool.     

Behavior ratings of emotionally disturbed children by teachers,parents, and school psychologists

Emotional disturbance was rated by teachers, parents, and the school psychologist for a group of 104 children diagnosed as severely emotionally disturbed. Teachers were found significantly more severe in their judgments than the school psychologist on the Behavior and Socialization scales of the Referral Checklist, but not on Communication. The teacher rating profile was also found to deviate from parallelness from the other raters with increased severity in the Behavior scale. None of the nine correlations between judges on the same scales was significant. Interpretations and possible implications are offered.     

Teachers' instruction of noncategorically grouped handicapped children

Abstract

The sample for this study consisted of 46 noncategorically identified handicapped students who had been assigned to functionally grouped self‐contained classes. For purposes of this research, only a child study team reevaluated the students and supplied a label, learning disabled or emotionally disturbed. We observed all students on at least nine occasions on three behaviors: teachers' academic questions directed toward them, extended feedback from teachers, and dyadic work interactions. Although the special education classroom teachers did not know the labeled identity of any student in the class, they instructed the two groups differently. They instructed the emotionally disturbed children with fewer instances of academic questioning, less extended feedback for their responses, and fewer dyadic work interactions.     

Healing trauma and spiritual growth: the relevance of religious education to emotionally and behaviourally disturbed children looked after by local authorities

In this article, Maria Poyser looks at the relevance of religious education (RE) to looked‐after young people who have been labelled emotionally and behaviourally disturbed (EBD). She begins by painting an overall picture of the education of looked‐after young people and examines the concept of what being ‘looked after’ means. The article highlights the problem of a disproportionate number of looked‐after young people ending up in special schools catering for EBD children and challenges schools to look at ways of preventing this. It poses the question: are these children emotionally and behaviourally disturbed or in fact the victims of post‐traumatic stress disorder (PSTD)? The writer goes on to examine the fact that trauma does not have to be a life sentence. It has the potential to be one of the most significant forces for psychological, social and spiritual awakening and evolution.     

Expectancy and halo effects as a result of artificially induced teacher bias

This investigation examined the effects of deviancy labels on teachers' expectations of child behavior and their ability to evaluate child behavior objectively. One hundred elementary school teachers were randomly assigned to one of four label groups. Each group dealt with one label (emotionally disturbed, learning disabled, mentally retarded, normal), and each group participated in two separate treatment phases. During Phase I teachers identified behaviors they expected to be displayed by hypothetical children characteristic of the label condition. They were asked to complete a referral form for either a hypothetical normal, mentally retarded, learning disabled, or emotionally disturbed child. During Phase II, each group saw the same videotape of a normal fourth grade boy and completed a second referral form based on the behaviors displayed during this presentation. Experimental procedures were identical for the four groups, except each group was told the child was a member of a different category.Results indicated that teachers hold negative expectancies toward children categorized with a deviancy label and maintain expectancies even when confronted with normal behavior, behavior inconsistent with the stated label. Maintenance of this bias is sufficient to cause teachers to misinterpret actual child behavior, resulting in a halo effect. Results further indicated that the label of educable mentally retarded generated a greater degree of negative bias than did the labels learning disabled or emotionally disturbed, although all three deviancy labels produced negative expectancies and halo effects significantly different from those found under control conditions.     

Mainstreaming: Parental perceptions

Parents of learning disabled, mentally retarded, and emotionally disturbed children were surveyed regarding their reactions to mainstreaming handicapped children. Results indicated that parents of learning disabled children were significantly more supportive of this educational procedure than were the other two groups of parents. Possible reasons for this difference are discussed.     

Personality variables of children nominated as emotionally handicapped by classroom teachers

Ninety-nine children in grades one through three in a rural Maine school were administered the Early School Personality Questionnaire (ESPQ). The teachers of these children were asked to list the children in their classroom who, in their judgement, demonstrated emotionally handicapping conditions which interfered with achievement and/or adjustment. The teachers had been involved, prior to the nomination task, in an in-service training session on the characteristics of emotionally disturbed children suggested by Bower (1961). “T” tests were used to compare the differences in the ESPQ factors between children selected as emotionally handicapped by their teachers, and those not selected. Differences were found on three factors: B (Dull vs. Bright), H (Shy vs. Venturesome) and O (Placid vs. Apprehensive). Implications of this study were for in-service education of teachers and future research on screening processes.     

Dimensions of problem behaviors of emotionally disturbed children as seen by their parents and teachers

Compared the factor structure of parents' and teachers' ratings of children's behavior problems. Data were analyzed for a heterogeneous group of 194 emotionally disturbed boys and girls aged 3–13 years. Three factors emerged based on parents' ratings, and highly similar factors were obtained from teachers' ratings. The factors closely resemble the dimensions isolated in numerous previous studies, such as Quay's Conduct Problem, Inadequacy-Immaturity, and Personality Problem factors. The importance of the findings is discussed, especially pertaining to the analysis of parents' ratings.     

Recognition of emotions in facial expressions by emotionally disturbed and nondisturbed children

Groups of emotionally disturbed and nondisturbed elementary and junior high subjects were tested for ability to recognize primary emotions in facial expressions. Emotionally disturbed groups were found to be significantly less proficient both for overall emotion recognition ability and for several individual emotions. On the whole, the junior high groups were found to be better identifiers of emotion than the younger groups, but precise relationships between emotion recognition ability and age and also intelligence were unclear. Several possible interpretations of these findings and their implications for educational planning are discussed, and suggestions for additional research are presented.     

Intelligence and academic achievement in a clinical adolescent population

Three canonical variate analyses were carried out on the CAT, WRAT, and WISC/WAIS scores obtained from a sample of 182 emotionally disturbed adolescents. A large general variate emerged in all three analyses. Two additional variates tentatively identified as attentional and symbolization factors also appeared in the analyses of the WRAT-WISC/WAIS and the WRAT-CAT.     

High-School Subjects as Conditioners of College Success

Abstract

This study examines the utility of the Ban- natyne recategorization system in discriminating among three groups of handicapped students. A stepwise discriminant functions analysis was performed on the subtest scaled scores from the WISC-R for 294 learning disabled (LD), 36 educably mentally retarded (EMR), and 71 emotionally disturbed (ED) students. The results of this analysis revealed that 100 percent of the EMR and ED students were predicted to be labeled LD on the basis of this recategorization, while 99.7 percent of the LD students were predicted to be LD. These findings are examined in relation to the use of alternative statistical methods and different diagnostic procedures to identify and classify students.