A thesis abstract of Mathilde Lamour
Key words
Quality of life, school satisfaction, social satisfaction, disability, Accompanying Person for Students with Disabilities, teachers.
Abstract
Improving the quality of life of children, whether in material, cognitive or emotional terms, is a widely shared motivation for policies implemented in developed countries. There are several international surveys that have made an important contribution to the study of the quality of life of children and adolescents since the 1980s. In particular, the international Children’s Worlds survey, which is the subject of my Master’s thesis in Psychology. Children’s Worlds aims to collect robust and representative data on the lives and daily activities of 10 year olds in France. The questionnaire used in this study is derived from the Children’s Worlds questionnaire. It is a self-administered questionnaire consisting of 59 questions (46 of which are common to all countries), and 146 items. The questionnaire focuses on evaluations and aspirations related to what makes up children’s daily lives, covering 11 domains: socio-demographic information, living environments, family, school, friends, leisure activities, how children feel about their lives in general, money and possessions, use of time, children’s rights and life in France. To complete this common questionnaire, three areas were added to the French version: supervised leisure, bilingualism, and possible disability.
Students’ academic and social satisfaction plays a critical role in their overall life satisfaction for both mainstream and disabled children, as the dimensions that contribute to the HRQOL of these two populations are identical (Magerotte, 2014). Studies show that students who are satisfied with what they experience at school are more likely to increase their personal resources, develop social and emotional adaptive strategies, and academic skills (Huebner, 1991; Kong, 2008). However, several research studies also indicate that students with disabilities have lower levels of school satisfaction compared to other children (Godeau et al., 2012). It should be noted, however, that these results relate more to middle school students than to elementary school students and that they are derived from cross-sectional studies, providing limited results compared to longitudinal studies, since they do not allow for the study of stability or change in school satisfaction for the same group of children. Finally, it should be noted that in France, research on well-being at school is rare. Consequently, we decided to investigate the following question in greater depth: The impact of inclusive education on the academic and social satisfaction of children with disabilities.
Thus, we chose to study the satisfaction with school life and social relationships of 10 year old children with disabilities in France, using data from Children’s World. It is also a question of knowing which dimensions of inclusion contribute or not to their satisfaction at school and to their good relations with other pupils. Thus, the second objective of this study will be to explain the impact of these inclusion arrangements, i.e. a satisfactory relationship with the teacher and the presence of an AESH on the school and social satisfaction of children with disabilities.
First, statistical analyses allowed us to confirm that children with disabilities generally have lower school satisfaction than their non-disabled peers. The first results also show significant links between a satisfactory relationship with the teacher and the school satisfaction of children with disabilities, we did not find a significant link between the follow-up by an Accompanying Person for Students with Disabilities and the school life satisfaction of children with disabilities. As for satisfaction with social relations, the relationship with the teacher and the presence of an AESH did not seem to have an influence on satisfaction with peer relations.