Year: 2012
Type: article
Study design: Observational Study
Abstract: Contrary to popular belief, children educated \nat home during the early years make better educational \nprogress than children educated at school (Rothermel \n2002). However, even if this is recognised, \nnumerous educationists and Local Government officers \nassert that home educated children are at risk of \ndeveloping psychological problems. This research used \nthe Revised Rutter Scale (RRS) and the Goodman \nStrengths & Difficulties Questionnaire (SDQ) scales to \ninvestigate whether home-educated children experience \npsychological problems over and above what is \nconsidered normal. The research involved 83 homeeducated \nchildren aged between 4 and 11 years old. The \nRevised Rutter Scale (RRS) and the Goodman Strengths \n& Difficulties Questionnaire (SDQ) are both widely accepted \nmeasures of behaviour difficulties. Whilst the \nRRS is the more traditional instrument the SDQ has, by virtue of it being freely available, gained popularity in \nrecent years. Whilst the home educated children were \njudged as psychosocially healthy by the RRS, they were \ndefined by the SDQ as experiencing problems. The research \nconcluded that there were substantial differences \nbetween the design and scoring of the two measures \nand that health professionals using behavioural \nscales with home-educated children should either avoid \ndoing so altogether, or do so with extreme caution, taking \nparticular note of the standardisation sample. Tests \nnormed on school samples, are very likely to identify \nchildren educated out of school as abnormal.
Author: Rothermel, P.J. (Paula Jane)
Language: English
Subfield: Education
Field: Social Sciences
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: green
OpenAlex ID: W157404259