Acceptance and Commitment Therapy: Applications for Educational Psychologists within Schools

Guidance for schools regarding the promotion and enhancement of psychological wellbeing represents an invitation to intervene to promote effective, evidence-informed, whole-school approaches for school staff, students and parents. With its transdiagnostic approach and evidence from empirical literature, Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) is asserted as a coherent psychological model that has potential to support schools in developing effective and sustainable practices to promote psychological wellbeing. Three ways of applying ACT within educational contexts are discussed, demonstrating potential utility of the model: supporting school staff wellbeing; targeted interventions for children and young people; and a potential universal application, through the development of an ACT-based emotional health and wellbeing curriculum.     

The influence of match location, quality of opposition, and match status on technical performance in professional association football

The aim of this study was to examine the effects of match location, quality of opposition, and match status on the technical aspects of performance within a single professional British football team. Forty matches from the 2002--2003 and 2003--2004 domestic league seasons were notated post-event using a computerized notational analysis system with 13 on-the-ball behaviours and corresponding outcomes (successful or unsuccessful) assessed. Log-linear modelling procedures indicated that the incidences of all on-the-ball technical behaviours, with the exception of "set-pieces", were influenced by at least one of the three situation variables, with both independent and interactive effects found. In contrast, logit modelling suggested that there was no general influence of the situation variables on the outcomes of the on-the-ball behaviours. The findings emphasize the need for notational analysts and coaches to consider the potential independent and interactive effects of match location, quality of opposition, and match status when assessing the technical components of football performance, particularly those relating to behaviour occurrence. Future research should consider the effects of additional situation variables purported to influence the mental, physical, technical, and tactical components of football performance.     

The derived generalization of thought suppression

Thought suppression appears to be a relatively ineffective and even counterproductive strategy for dealing with unwanted thoughts. However, the psychological processes responsible for unsuccessful suppression are still underspecified. One process that may be implicated is derived stimulus relations, which may underlie the formation of unintentional relations that act to hamper suppression attempts. To test this prediction, participants were trained and tested for the formation of three derived equivalence relations using a match-to-sample procedure. Subsequently, they were instructed to suppress all thoughts of a particular target word that was a member of one of the three relations and were also allowed to selectively remove words that appeared on a computer screen in front of them by pressing the space bar. Results showed, as predicted, that participants not only removed the to-be-suppressed stimulus, but also removed words in derived relations with that stimulus, thus showing transformation of suppression/interference functions via derived equivalence. The theoretical implications of this demonstration, including its potential as a model for a key psychological process involved in unsuccessful thought suppression, are discussed.     

Health literacy in schools: prioritising health and well-being issues through the curriculum

Health literacy (HL) is a relatively new concept in health promotion and is concerned with empowering people through enhancing their knowledge of health issues and improving their ability to make choices about their health and well-being. Schools are seen increasingly as key settings for the dissemination of health messages through curricula and other on-site provision. However, such opportunities are amongst many demands being placed on educational providers and finding space in the school day to support the health agenda is a challenge. This practice-based, qualitative study examines the current practices in three schools in the UK. In total 34 pupils (n=16 from Year 9 and n = 18 from Year 11) were interviewed in six focus groups (3 in each school), with up to 6 pupils in each focus group. School staff (n = 8) were also interviewed individually. Findings suggest that pupils and staff have an understanding of health and a capacity for HL, though health education (via taught subjects) is not statutory across the four Key Stages of the National Curriculum. In order to engender health literate young people, with a view to reducing health inequalities, it is recommended that key health messages are delivered through an agenda that integrates current provision for health via the curriculum and other school-based practices, such as the Healthy Schools Programme.     

Editorial

This study examined the benefits of all-girls adventure programmes from the perspective of adolescent girls. Participants included 361 girls aged 10–17 years from diverse ethnic and socio-economic backgrounds who completed a variety of adventure programmes. Adventure activities included rock climbing, sea kayaking, mountaineering, backpacking, canyoneering and mountain biking. The programme philosophies of each organization are rooted in a strength-based approach for programme planning and implementation which focus on supporting positive physical, social and emotional growth of girls. Using an open-ended survey and qualitative methods of coding, three themes emerged illustrating the benefits of these all-girls programmes from the girls' point of view: feelings of safety and comfort, increased connection to others, and freedom from stereotypes. The girls also considered how their experience may have differed if the setting had been co-educational (co-ed).     

Poverty & privilege: Primary school inequality in South Africa

The strong legacy of apartheid and the consequent correlation between education and wealth have meant that, generally speaking, poorer South African students perform worse academically. Although racial segregation has been abolished for 18 years now, schools which served predominantly White students under apartheid remain functional, while those which served Black students remain dysfunctional and unable to impart the necessary numeracy and literacy skills students should be acquiring by this level. The present study provides an overview of this dualistic nature of the primary education system in South Africa, with special attention paid to the bimodality of student performance. It argues that there are in fact two different education systems in South Africa and thus two different data-generating processes. These two sub-systems can be seen when splitting student performance by former-department, language, or socioeconomic status. The implications of such a dualistic schooling system are also elucidated, with special emphasis on government reporting and econometric modeling. The recently released SACMEQ III dataset is used for the econometric modeling. The study finds that when modeling student performance separately for the wealthiest 25% of schools on the one hand, and the poorest 75% of schools on the other, there are stark differences in the factors influencing student performance. Only five of the 27 factors are shared between the two models for mathematics, and 11 of the 30 factors for reading. This suggests a bifurcated system where the process which converts inputs into outputs is fundamentally different for each sub-system. Ultimately the paper has two logical conclusions: 1) Observing averages in South African education is uniquely misleading and overestimates the educational achievement of the majority of students, and 2) Modeling a single schooling system when there are in fact two school systems can lead to spurious results and misleading policy conclusions.     

The development of position-specific performance indicators in professional rugby union

The aim of this study was to construct a valid and reliable methodology for the analysis of performance profiles of individual playing positions within rugby union. Twenty-two matches were sampled from the domestic season of a professional male rugby union team. Key performance indicators for individual positions were developed and notated using a computerized behavioural analysis system. Performance profiles of playing positions containing data from one or more individuals were then constructed to compare intra-positional differences. Significant differences (chi-square) were observed between individuals within all the tested playing positions for the principal performance indicators (passing, carrying and tackling for the forward positions, and passing, carrying, tackling and kicking for the backs). For example, the difference between the two outside-halves in the study (P?<?0.001) was illustrated by one of the players having a median of 6 successful carries for the season (95% confidence limits of 13 and 3), whereas the other had a median of 2 successful carries (95% confidence limits of 5 and 1). The findings suggest that while general positional performance profiles appear to exist, intra-positional differences may occur due to variations in an individual's style of play, the decision-making demands of the position and the effects of potential confounding variables. Multiple profiles may therefore be necessary for some playing positions to account for variation in factors such as playing conditions and the strength of the opposition.     

The development of position-specific performance indicators in professional rugby union

The aim of this study was to construct a valid and reliable methodology for the analysis of performance profiles of individual playing positions within rugby union. Twenty-two matches were sampled from the domestic season of a professional male rugby union team. Key performance indicators for individual positions were developed and notated using a computerized behavioural analysis system. Performance profiles of playing positions containing data from one or more individuals were then constructed to compare intra-positional differences. Significant differences (chi-square) were observed between individuals within all the tested playing positions for the principal performance indicators (passing, carrying and tackling for the forward positions, and passing, carrying, tackling and kicking for the backs). For example, the difference between the two outside-halves in the study (P < 0.001) was illustrated by one of the players having a median of 6 successful carries for the season (95% confidence limits of 13 and 3), whereas the other had a median of 2 successful carries (95% confidence limits of 5 and 1). The findings suggest that while general positional performance profiles appear to exist, intra-positional differences may occur due to variations in an individual's style of play, the decision-making demands of the position and the effects of potential confounding variables. Multiple profiles may therefore be necessary for some playing positions to account for variation in factors such as playing conditions and the strength of the opposition.