The effectiveness of the psychological immunization program on the writing style of students with dyslexia

Master's Thesis

Department of Psychology and Education of Exceptional Children

Abstract

The aim of the present study was to determine the effectiveness of the psychological immunization program on the writing style of dyslexic students. The current study was a pilot study with a pre-test-post-test design with a control group. The research sample consisted of 60 dyslexic boys and girls aged 7-9 years old, who were selected from the learning disability centers of districts 2 and 4 of Isfahan city in the academic year 2013-2013 and were randomly replaced in two experimental groups and two control groups (separated by gender, 15 people in each group). Two experimental groups received the psychological immunization program during 10 sessions (two sessions per week and 60 minutes each session), while the control group only benefited from regular training in learning disabilities centers. Before and after the intervention, Children's Documenting Style Questionnaire (CASQ) was completed by the control and experimental groups and the data were analyzed using covariance analysis. Six weeks after the end of the intervention, the experimental group completed the children's documentation style questionnaire again, and at the end, the resulting data were analyzed using the repeated measurement method. The results showed that the training of the psychological immunization program led to a change in the pessimistic to optimistic writing style in dyslexic students (p<0.001), but there was no significant difference between the writing style of girls and boys in the experimental group. Therefore, it is expected that the psychological immunization program will improve the writing style of dyslexic students and it can be used to create positive and optimistic documents that lead to greater adaptation and through it prevent the occurrence of many academic problems that result from pessimistic documents.

Keywords: dyslexia, document style, psychological immunization

Introduction

Dyslexia [1] (dyslexia) is a condition in which reading progress is lower than what can be expected from a child based on his age, education and intelligence. This disorder greatly hinders academic success or daily activities that require reading, and if there is a neurological or sensory disorder, the degree of reading disability is higher than that usually associated with other disorders (Porafkari, 2007/1386). Dyslexia is one of the types of reading problems that fall under the general category of learning disabilities. Due to having pessimistic and negative attribution style, compared to their normal peers, students with learning disabilities attribute successes and failures to luck or external factors, uncontrollable and unstable, and less likely to ability and internal factors, controllable and stable (Tarnoski[2] and Ney[3], 1989). They attribute their successive failures to a lack of ability rather than a lack of effort (Miranda[4], Vilascoza[5] and Vidal Aparca[6], 2000; Peterson[7], Mayer[8] and Seligman[9], 2001), are less likely to start new activities, feel that they have no control over their environment, and experience intermittent bad luck (Zieland[10], 2004). The emphasis of students with learning disabilities on attributing academic failures and failures to external, uncontrollable and unstable factors gradually leads to the formation of a weaker academic self-concept [11] in them (Banks [12], 2006), which gradually creates a sense of learned helplessness [13] in them (Pierle [14], Brian [15] and Donahe [16], 1980; Seligman, 2001; Bloom [17], 1982, quoted by Zeeland, 2004; Neki [18], 1996). The feeling of helplessness in learning basic skills such as reading, writing and math calculations puts the child in a situation where he feels incompetent and incompetent despite having normal intelligence. Students with learning disabilities compared to normal students, in terms of achievement motivation (Dunn[19] and Shapiro[20], 2000; Oliver[21] and Steenkamp[22], 2004; Pintrich[23], Anderman[24] and Klobkar[25], 1994; Alaei Khoraim, Narimani and Alaei Khoraim, 2011), depression (Dunn and Shapiro, 2000) self-esteem (Riddick[26], Starling[27], Farmer[28], and Morgan[29], 1999), loneliness[30], helplessness (Wallace[31], 2001) and self-regulation (Folk[32], Brigham[33] and Lohmann[34], 1998) have significant differences. In addition, these students often face negative social attitudes that include disrespect, humiliation, and labeling (Sideridis[35], 2007).

Statement of the problem

Dyslexia refers to any inability to read due to which the child lags behind the basic level of his class, and there is no objective evidence of disability and cognitive impairment, major brain damage, emotional-cultural and spoken language problems in the child (Sideris, 2007). Almost 80% of children with learning disabilities are dyslexic (Naki, 1996). In America, about 4% of school-age children are dyslexic (Porafkari, 2007/1386). The prevalence rate of learning disabilities in Iran has been declared to be 11%, of which at least 9% is dyslexic population, and despite the presence of this disorder in both genders, its frequency is 3 to 4 times higher in boys than in girls (Seif Naraghi and Naderi, 2008). Students with learning disabilities, as a result of successive failures in education, come to the conclusion that regardless of the amount of effort they show, they fail again, lose their motivation and finally stop trying, and because of this, negative emotions and depression increase in them. Children with learning disabilities, because they lack the skills to understand social relationships, receive negative reactions from others and estimate their successes and capabilities less than normal (Pierle, Brian and Donahe, 1980). About twenty years ago, Martin Seligman accidentally discovered the phenomenon of learned helplessness while conducting experiments on animal conditioning. In the preliminary investigations of this psychologist, it was found that when a living being is faced with uncontrollable events (including electric shock) and fails, it generalizes this uncontrollability to other situations in life, and when faced with controllable situations, it acts inactive and powerless (Prosecutor, 2009). Along with experiencing uncontrollable situations, the organism does not learn that its response can also be fruitful. In Seligman's experiments, it was also found that animals that had previously received controllable shocks or had not been shocked at all learned that reaction and continued to do it as soon as their reaction became effective in the situation they were in. After the successful implementation of learned helplessness in animals, research on humans was also noticed by researchers, and the results showed that humans also learn during uncontrollable events that responding to situations is futile. A helpless being considers the events beyond his control and the belief that the events are beyond his control leads to the formation of physical, emotional, motivational and cognitive reactions in him. In 1978, Abramson and Seligman reformulated the learned helplessness theory by integrating the attributional theory. According to the new theory, in addition to experiencing uncontrollable events, how a person interprets events and explains them is of considerable importance. Because the way a person interprets events may be more important than what actually happens. Based on this model, the question that sticks in one's mind is, what is the reason for my failure now? Does this failure happen in other situations as well? Is it short-term and temporary? The answers to the above questions can be discussed and investigated in the framework of people's documentary styles. According to the revised theory of learned helplessness, the document style classifies the cause of failure and lack of control in three areas: internal-external (whether the cause of failure is related to factors inside or outside the person), comprehensive-specific (whether the cause of failure is present in all situations or only specific to the current situation) and stable-unstable (whether the cause of failure is temporary or permanent). According to these dimensions, two main dimensions resulting from the attribution style can also be identified in people: the optimistic attribution style, which is specific to people who attribute the cause of their failures to unstable, specific, and external factors, and the pessimistic attribution style, which is specific to people who attribute their failures to stable, comprehensive, and internal factors. Attributing failure to stable, pervasive, and internal factors and attributing success to specific, unstable, and external factors (both of which result from pessimistic and negative attributional styles) predisposes a person to depression and helplessness (Seligman, 2005). Pessimistic attribution style is predictive of decreased physical health, increased depression, and decreased career and academic progress.