The psychological adjustment of vocational high school students: A study of Chinese adolescents.

The research surveyed 500 Chinese vocational school students about their views and opinions concerning the values of receiving a vocational education. The students are preparing for jobs in diverse fields, including computer, finance, business support, kindergarten teaching, and fashion design. Indices of educational engagement, optimism, and perceived social support are created to measure the important aspects of lives for adolescents. Multiple regression and structural equation processes are employed to evaluate the relations among the indices. The analysis aims to examine the relations between educational success and psychological achievement. Most remarkably, there is a very strong association between educational engagement and psychological achievement. Educational engagement predicts optimism, self-esteem and perceived competence. Educational engagement is measured by having educational goals and motivation. Further analysis investigating factors related to educational engagement reveals that educationally successful vocational students tend to perceive a great deal of utilities in their education. In exploring the effects of social support on students, the research discovered that students' perceived support, especially the support from teachers and parents, significantly predict students' perceptions of the utility in their education. Moreover, parental education does not have any effect on vocational students' educational goals or motivation to learn in school. There is a negative effect of academic ability on educational engagement in vocational education. Focusing on the educational experience of vocational students, the research successfully demonstrated effects of education on adolescents' psychological achievement. Vocational education can provide the low-ability adolescents with the tools and environments they need to develop a sense of optimism and self-esteem.PhDDevelopmental psychologyEducationEducational psychologyEthnic studiesPsychologySecondary educationSocial SciencesSocial psychologyVocational educationUniversity of Michigan, Horace H. Rackham School of Graduate Studieshttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/131284/2/9840609.pd