2024-03-26, Neuenschwander, Markus, Garrote, Ariana, Huttasch, Michelle

Social stereotypes influence people’s perceptions of nationalities. To categorize the stereotypes about existing nationalities in Switzerland, the stereotype content model can be used. People with nationalities that are associated with low warmth and competence are at risk of being perceived as outgroup members and of being discriminated against, whereas people with nationalities that are rated as high in warmth and competence are more likely to be perceived as ingroup members and are therefore better accepted. Warmth is negatively associated with competition while competence is positively associated with status. Students (N = 101) from various universities in the German-speaking part of Switzerland rated 70 nationalities along the dimensions of warmth, competence, competition, and status. The cluster analyses revealed four groups of nationalities along the dimensions warmth and competence. Levels in status and competition differed between those four clusters. In line with prior research, a negative relationship was found between competition and warmth and a positive relationship between status and competence. These findings allow to understand social stereotypes of nationalities based on empirical evidence. More importantly, the clusters can be used in future studies to compare groups of people with different nationalities who have specific stereotyping experiences.

2023-06-10, Garrote, Ariana, Zurbriggen, Carmen L. A., Schwab, Susanne

Friendships with classmates play a significant role in student’s development. However, only some friendships are maintained for longer than a school year and their formation depend on many factors. One important factor is gender because gender homophily is consistently found in friendship networks. In addition, there is evidence that same-gender friendships are more stable. In the context of inclusive education, friendship can be considered as one of four key dimensions of social inclusion. While three of these dimensions are assessed from others’ perspective, self-perception of social inclusion focuses solely on the individual students’ view. However, hardly any studies investigated how students’ self-perception of social inclusion is related to friendships, and more specifically, whether and how self-perceived social inclusion is related to changes in friendship networks in the classroom. To contribute to this research gap, friendship networks of 280 students aged 9–11 years (49% girls) in 15 classes of Grade 4 were examined at the beginning and at the end of one school year. Network changes were analyzed with longitudinal social network analyses. Students’ gender and self-perception of inclusion were added as predictors of changes in the friendship networks. The results confirmed gender homophily for formation and stability. The analyses also showed that students who perceived themselves as socially included nominated more best friends at the end of the school year but were not necessarily perceived as best friends by their peers. This highlights the importance of considering different perspectives to better understand social inclusion in classrooms.

2021-12-02, Ertanir, Beyhan, Kassis, Wassilis, Garrote, Ariana

This study aimed to explore changes in mental health outcomes (depression, anxiety, home, and school stress) from before the first COVID-19 wave (autumn 2019) to the later stages of the same wave (autumn 2020) in a sample of N = 377 Swiss adolescents (Mage = 12.67; 47% female. The results showed that the expected impact of the pandemic on mental health was not noticeable in the later stages of the first COVID-19 wave. Only two effects were demonstrated in terms of intra-individual changes, namely, an effect of gender on depression and anxiety symptoms and an effect of reported COVID-19 burden on school stress symptoms. Moreover, few associations were found for selected predictors and students’ mean level scores, averaged across both time points.

2021-04-26, Moser Opitz, Elisabeth, Maag Merki, Katharina, Pfaffhauser, Rico, Stöckli, Meret, Garrote, Ariana

2024, Favre, Céline Anne, Garrote, Ariana, Kassis, Wassilis, Bacher, Janine, Wullschleger, Andrea, Aksoy, Dilan

Previous research on adolescent peer networks has mainly focused on friendship networks and their association with violence, but very limited research is available on peer rejection networks. This lack of knowledge hinders the effectiveness of preventing peer rejection and its negative effects. Based on the theory of the cycle of violence, the present study examines the extent to which parental physical abuse experiences, aggressive behavior toward peers and acceptance of violence are related to peer rejection networks at school. Social network analysis with a stochastic actor-oriented model of longitudinal data collected from high school students (Wave 1, n = 620; Wave 2, n = 590) confirms that adolescents who frequently use aggression toward their peers are more likely to be rejected, especially if those adolescents have experienced abuse. Similarly, peers are more likely to reject adolescents with high levels of accepting violence. The results also show that aggression toward peers generally tends to decrease over time but not for adolescents who reject a larger number of students. For students who reject many peers, aggression frequency increases. From the perspective of resilience theory, peer rejection, when combined with aggression toward peers and acceptance of violence, particularly in female adolescents, creates a significant risk factor for socio-emotional development. Therefore, tackling violence attitudes, experiences and behavior in the school environment and at home is crucial in overcoming the cycle of violence.

2022-07-04, Neuenschwander, Markus, Niederbacher, Edith, Garrote, Ariana

Die COVID-19 Pandemie führte im Frühling 2020 zu einer unerwarteten flächendeckenden Unterbrechung des Präsenzunterrichts in allen Schulen der Schweiz und zur Einführung von Fernunterricht. Durch die Verlagerung des Unterrichts in die Familie könnten die ungleichen familiären Ressourcen zu einer Verstärkung der Herkunftseffekte auf den Lernzuwachs der Schüler*innen führen. Wie sehr hatten der sozioökonomische Status und die Familiensprache von Schüler*innen einen Effekt auf den Lernzuwachs während des Fernunterrichts? Diese Frage wurde mit einer Stichprobe von 1321 Schüler*innen, 851 Erziehungsberechtigten und 108 Klassenlehrpersonen aus der Nordwestschweiz, die im Juni/Juli 2020 einen Online-Fragebogen ausfüllten, bearbeitet. Ein Pfadmodell mit Berücksichtigung der Mehrebenenstruktur der Daten zeigte vergleichbare Ergebnisse für die Primarstufe und die Sekundarstufe I sowie für Mädchen und Jungen. Der sozioökonomische Status erklärte den Lernzuwachs im Lehrpersonenurteil vermittelt über das Leistungsniveau der Schüler*innen (Lehrpersonenurteil). Die Familiensprache hat einen indirekten Effekt über das Leistungsniveau der Schüler*innen auf den Lernzuwachs. Das Leistungsniveau der Schüler*innen, die Selbstwirksamkeitserwartung der Eltern und die Verfügbarkeit eines ruhigen Lernortes im Schülerurteil erklären, vermittelt über das Lernverhalten im Elternurteil, den Lernzuwachs der Schüler*innen. Das Modell liefert eine Erklärung zu Bildungsungleichheit während des Fernunterrichts. Allerdings sind in den vorliegenden Daten die Effekte des sozioökonomischen Status und der Fremdsprachigkeit auf den Lernzuwachs nicht stärker als in vergleichbaren Studien zur Situation vor der Pandemie. Die wenigen Wochen Fernunterricht haben daher möglicherweise weniger zu einer Verstärkung der Bildungsungleichheit beigetragen als befürchtet.

2021-09-29, Tulowitzki, Pierre, Garrote, Ariana

Das Amt für gemeindliche Schulen des Kantons Zug lancierte ein Projekt zur Entwicklung von zyklusspezifischen Indikatoren, die Lehrpersonen bei der Förderung und Beurteilung von überfachlichen Kompetenzen unterstützen sollen. Für die überfachlichen Kompetenzen wurden insgesamt 1042 evidenz- und erfahrungsbasierte Indikatoren formuliert. Diese wurden von der Firma Menon Skills AG in ein Plattform-übergreifendes Web-Tool eingepflegt. Forschende der Pädagogischen Hochschule FHNW wurden damit beauftragt, in einer Begleitstudie die Akzeptanz der Indikatoren zu überfachlichen Kompetenzen durch die beteiligten Lehrpersonen zu untersuchen. Hierzu wurden die in der Web-Plattform erhobenen Daten ausgewertet. In diesem Bericht werden zunächst die verwendeten Daten sowie das methodische Vorgehen kurz erläutert. Anschliessend werden die Ergebnisse präsentiert und einige Schlussfolgerungen auf Basis der Ergebnisse gezogen.

2024, Garrote, Ariana, Diener, Marion, Hepberger, Brigitte, Kuratli Geeler, Susanne, Nesme, Celina, Moser Opitz, Elisabeth

2022-04-22, Favre, Céline Anne, Aksoy, Dilan, Garrote, Ariana, Janousch, Clarissa

Research has well established that parental physical abuse experiences can lead to devastating consequences for adolescents, with peer relationships acting as both protective and risk factors. With the person-centered latent profile analysis (LPA), we analyzed questionnaire data from a cross-sectional study in 2020 composed of a sample of 1959 seventh-grade high school students from Switzerland. This study investigated and compared peer-status profiles combining peer acceptance and peer popularity for adolescents with and without parental physical abuse experiences. We conducted a multinomial logistic regression analysis to investigate further depression, anxiety, and dissociation as predictors of profile membership. With LPA, we identified three distinct profiles for adolescents within the subgroup with experiences of parental physical abuse (n = 344), namely liked, liked-popular, and rejected-unpopular. Within the subgroup of adolescents without parental physical abuse experiences (n = 1565), LPA revealed four profiles, namely liked, liked-popular, rejected-unpopular, and average. For adolescents with parental physical abuse experiences, higher levels of dissociation significantly indicated they were more likely to belong to the rejected-unpopular group than belong to the liked group. Anxious students without experiences of parental physical abuse were more likely to belong to the rejected-unpopular and liked profiles than belong to the liked-popular and average profiles. These findings clearly argue for a deeper understanding of the role of parental physical abuse when analyzing the relationship between dissociation and anxiety and peer status. Operationalizing peer status with the four individual dimensions of likeability, rejection, popularity, and unpopularity was valuable in that the role of peer rejection with respect to different internalizing symptoms became apparent.

2021-09-17, Garrote, Ariana, Niederbacher, Edith, Hofmann, Jan, Rösti, Ilona, Neuenschwander, Markus

School closures in spring 2020 caused by the COVID-19 pandemic were an unprecedented and drastic event for students, parents, and teachers. The unplanned adaptation of classroom instruction to emergency distance learning was necessary to ensure continued education. In this new learning environment, teachers formed expectations for student academic achievement gains, which in turn affected the opportunities for students to learn. Parents faced new challenges in supporting their children’s learning. According to parenting stress models, such drastic events can be a stress factor for parents, which in turn affects their children’s adjustment. This study analyzed the extent to which parents and teachers affected the perceptions of students in compulsory school toward distance learning through processes at home (individual level) and at the class level with data from multiple informants. On an individual level, the relationship between parents’ perceived threat of COVID-19 and their stress due to distance learning and students’ perceived threat of COVID-19 and their perception of distance learning were examined. Students’ learning behavior was accounted for as a variable related to their perception of distance learning. At the class level, the explanatory character of teacher expectations and class-aggregated achievement gains were examined. Data on students in grades 4 to 8, parents, and teachers in Switzerland were collected with standardized online questionnaires after the period of school closures. A subsample of 539 students, 539 parents, and 83 teachers was analyzed. The results of multilevel structural equation modeling suggested that students had a more positive perception of distance learning if they were able to learn more autonomously (i.e., more motivated and concentrated than in regular classroom instruction) and if their parents felt less stressed in the distance learning setting. Parents were more stressed if they perceived COVID-19 as a threat. Students’ perception of the COVID-19 threat was related to their parents’ perception but did not explain students’ learning behavior. At the class level, if teachers expected high academic achievement gains in distance learning, the average academic achievement gains of a class were greater. The greater the achievement gains were, the more positive the collective student perception of distance learning was.