Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Abstract: The current study examined processes relating problem-solving skills training to the performance of adolescent educationally at-risk students. This study began with a model based on the belief that both educational-risk level and problem solving skills training would influence behavioral efficacy and attempted to investigate processes related to locus of control and self-efficacy that underlie this influence. A quasi experiment first varied the problem solving skills training (trained, not trained) at different levels of student educationally at-risk students (at-risk, non-risk) and then measured problem-solving cognitive skill, locus of control, self-efficacy, and behavioral outcome efficacy on a sample of 88 students. Separate models for at-risk and non-risk students evolved. Models for both groups represent a process in which problem solving skills training influences locus of control (positively for at-risk but not positively for non-risk students) which then increases self-efficacy and subsequent behavioral outcome efficacy.