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School connectedness and child anxiety

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  03 March 2020

Paige J. Pikulski ,
Jeffrey E. Pella Open the ORCID record for Jeffrey E. Pella [Opens in a new window] ,
Elizabeth P. Casline ,
Amy E. Hale ,
Kelly Drake  and
Golda S. Ginsburg
Paige J. Pikulski
Affiliation:
Department of Psychiatry, University of Connecticut School of Medicine, West Hartford, Connecticut, USA
Jeffrey E. Pella*
Affiliation:
Department of Psychiatry, University of Connecticut School of Medicine, West Hartford, Connecticut, USA
Elizabeth P. Casline
Affiliation:
Department of Psychology, University of Miami, Coral Gables, Florida, USA
Amy E. Hale
Affiliation:
Department of Psychiatry, Boston Children’s Hospital, and Harvard Medical School, Boston, Massachusetts, USA
Kelly Drake
Affiliation:
Department of Psychiatry, The Johns Hopkins University, and Anxiety Treatment Center of Maryland, Maryland, USA
Golda S. Ginsburg
Affiliation:
Department of Psychiatry, University of Connecticut School of Medicine, West Hartford, Connecticut, USA
*
*Corresponding author. Email: Pella@uchc.edu
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Abstract

Poor school connectedness (SC), defined as students’ feelings of belonging, safety, and fairness at school, is a risk factor for negative psychosocial outcomes. Few studies have examined the specific relationship between SC and anxiety. This study examined the relation between SC and anxiety within a group of 114 clinically anxious youth (mean age = 10.82; SD = 2.93; 48.2% female; 70.2% White, non-Hispanic); age differences were also examined. Results indicated that SC was significantly negatively associated with age but unrelated to gender, race/ethnicity, socio-economic status, parent education, or presence of a comorbid disorder. Findings generally revealed that low SC was associated with greater total and domain specific anxiety. SC may play a unique role in the maintenance of global and domain specific anxiety symptoms.

Keywords

school-connectednesschild anxiety
Type
Articles
Information
Journal of Psychologists and Counsellors in Schools , Volume 30 , Issue 1 , June 2020 , pp. 13 - 24
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Copyright
© The Author(s) 2020. Published by Cambridge University Press

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