Well-being, confidence and social competences

Study D concerns the effects of the programmes on the well-being, confidence and social competences of the participating pupils. We will ask students in a stratified sample of secondary schools to complete an online questionnaire (aim: 100 schools, including the schools from studies B and C).

The online questionnaire will be filled in prior to and on completion of the programme. The schools will be sent a link to the questionnaire, which they can forward to the parents. The parents will then send this link to their children, who will fill in the questionnaire. The questionnaire measures intrinsic motivation (IMI; Deci & Ryan, 2000), academic self-concept (Self-Description Questionnaire II; Marsh et al., 2005), well-being at school (school questionnaire; Smits & Voorst, 2006) and social acceptance (PRIMA; Vandenberghe et al., 2005).

The students fill in the questionnaire twice: once at the start and once at the end of the programme. Students who do not participate in the programme will also be asked to fill in the questionnaire. In this way, we can determine whether the programme has an effect on the well-being, confidence and social competences of the participating students by examining whether these variables change significantly for participants relative to the control group. We will also measure the effect of the intervention on well-being, confidence and social competences at the school level. As in study B, we will correlate this with the information on effective elements of the programme in the school, as identified in study A. This will enable us to determine which aspects of the programmes are correlated with effects on well-being, confidence and social competences.

Participating schools will receive a summary of the results for their school. We expect schools to be eager to take part, given the interest that they have in pupils’ well-being, confidence and social competences.