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- Student’s access and performance in the Portuguese Higher EducationPublication . Ferrão, Maria Eugénia; Almeida, Leandro S.The purpose of this article is to characterize and contribute to the debate on the democratization of Portuguese higher education, both in terms of access and the performance of students enrolled in a public university. The analyses concern the sociodemographic characteristics and schooling trajectory of the 2,697 students enrolled for the first time in the University of Minho in the academic year 2015/16. The relationships between such characteristics and the choice of program, expectations regarding higher education, the criteria of admission, and the association with their permanence and performance in the first year of studies are explored as well. Several statistical tests were applied, such as those based on multivariate analysis of variance, chi-squared test for the independence between variables, or the tStudent test for the comparison of means of two independent samples. Results suggest that student’s gender, socio-cultural background and schooling trajectory are related to the choice of the programe, university entrance score and the entrance option. The multivariate analysis of variance of student’s grade point average at the end of the first year suggests the influence of the interaction between the fixed term of scientific-disciplinary area of the program attended and the program option of access to higher education. We did not find any statistically significant association between socio-cultural background and permanence in higher education; i.e, the socio-cultural origin of the students does not seem to influence the decision to abandon, suspend or transfer program, at least during their first year of studies. Our findings suggest student’s resilience and/or institutional action meaning a step further on the path for social equity in the Portuguese higher education.
- Multilevel modeling of persistence in higher educationPublication . Ferrão, Maria Eugénia; Almeida, Leandro S.The dropout or evasion rates in higher education are now a social and institutional concern, justifying the implementation of public policies to prevent this phenomenon. These policies need studies on the most determinant variables of the risk of dropout. The main objective of this study is to analyze the student’s persistence in undergraduate courses, and the relationship with the student’s previous school trajectory and with the conditions of entrance into higher education, controlling for students’ sociodemographic characteristics, such as gender and age. We applied multilevel logistic regression models to data of 2.697 freshmen enrolled in a Portuguese public university in the academic year 2015/16. The results suggest that failure in basic education (ISCED 2) has a long-term effect. According to the estimates obtained, students who declare not having failed in basic education have odds ratio of persistence 2.7 times higher than students who declare having failed in basic education. The conditions of student’s admission to the course he/she attends are relevant variables to persistence in Higher Education, for example, whether s/he was admitted to her/his first option course and the student’s university entrance score. The results also show that older and male students have lower probability of persistence.
- Funcionamento psicológico positivo numa amostra portuguesa de estudantesPublication . Oliveira, Ema; Merino, María Dolores; Privado, Jesus; Almeida, Leandro S.Este estudo explora diferentes recursos pessoais associados ao bem-estar e funcionamento psicológico positivo de estudantes universitários portugueses, tomando na sua análise as variáveis área de curso e género. Foi aplicada a Escala de Funcionamento Psicológico Positivo (EFPP) a 1070 estudantes de diferentes cursos. Observa-se um efeito da interação do género e área científica em 5 dimensões da EFPP. O género diferencia Autonomia, Autoestima e Otimismo (pontuações mais favoráveis nos homens), enquanto a área científica diferencia Resiliência, Autoestima, Propósito na Vida, Desfrute e Otimismo (pontuações superiores nos estudantes de Saúde). Discutem-se implicações para a intervenção no contexto do Ensino Superior.
- Differential effect of university entrance score on first-year students’ academic performance in PortugalPublication . Ferrão, Maria Eugénia; Almeida, Leandro S.The main goal of this study is to show that the association between university entrance score and first-year students’ academic performance varies randomly across courses after controlling for students’ sociodemographic, schooling trajectory and motivational variables. The sample consists of 2697 first-year students who were enrolled in 54 courses at a Portuguese public university in 2015/16. Multilevel modelling of academic performance suggests that 34% of variability in grade point average is due to differences among courses and that 80% of such variability is explained by the field of study, whether the university is the student’s first choice, and the student’s gender, age and parents’ level of education. In addition, the results corroborate that the university entrance score is the strongest predictor of first-year academic performance.
- Metaphor creation: A measure of creativity or intelligence?Publication . Barros, Débora Pereira; Primi, Ricardo; Miguel, Fabiano Koich; Almeida, Leandro S.; Oliveira, EmaThe goal of the present study was to verify whether the “Metaphor Creation Test” would really be a measure with unique characteristics of creativity, or a different way of evaluating constructs already known as intelligence. Two differentiated groups were considered: group 1 was comprised by 90 late course students, and group 2 included 73 undergraduate students from Architecture and Urbanism courses. The results showed lower correlation between metaphors production and abstract reasoning (r= .31) comparing with verbal reasoning test (r= .48). Correlations between the constructs reproduced what was already found in other studies, that is, intelligence and creativity are related, but not strongly enough to affirm that they are the same construct; therefore they are different but related constructs.
- O papel dos professores na identificação de crianças sobredotadasPublication . Almeida, Leandro S.; Oliveira, Ema; Silva, Manuela; Oliveira, CristianoEste artigo apresenta os resultados da aplicação de uma escala de descrição dos alunos assumidos pelos professores como sobredotados ou com mais altas capacidades. [...]
- Torrance Test of Creative Thinking: The question of its construct validityPublication . Almeida, Leandro S.; Prieto, Lola; Ferrando, Mercedes; Oliveira, Ema; Ferrándiz, CarmenSome cognitive dimensions are internationally considered by psychologists to describe and to assess creativity. For example, (Guilford, P. (1976). Creatividad y Educaci ´on. Buenos Aires. Ed. Paidos) and (Torrance, E. P. (1977). Discovery and nurturance of giftedness in the culturally different. Reston, VA: Council on Exceptional Children) suggested fluency, flexibility, originality and elaboration are the main cognitive processes used to define and assess creativity. However, data from several empirical studies did not confirm a factor structure in accordance with such cognitive functions, despite of the wide use of TTCT (Torrance Tests of Creative Thinking) in different countries. In this paper, we present new data collected in Spain and Portugal with TTCT. According to our data, those cognitive functions supposedly present on a subject’s performance are not so strong as to explain the variance in scores. Elaboration factors assume some variance explanation, but the main factors are identified with the products in each subtest, suggesting the importance of format, content and demand on TTCT specific tasks. Consequently, we suggest some reflections to amplify the debate concerning the definition of creativity and its evaluation in psychology.
- Escala de Funcionamento Psicológico Positivo: Adaptação e Estudos Iniciais de Validação em Universitários PortuguesesPublication . Oliveira, Ema Patrícia de Lima ; Merino, María Dolores; Privado, Jesus; Almeida, Leandro S.A relevância da investigação centrada no bem-estar tem sido reforçada ao longo das últimas décadas, em especial após a emergência da Psicologia Positiva. Neste âmbito, é necessário investir na construção e validação de instrumentos adequados para avaliar as dimensões inerentes a um funcionamento psicológico saudável. Este estudo pretende adaptar e validar a Escala de Funcionamento Psicológico Positivo (EFPP; Merino & Privado, 2015) junto de uma amostra de universitários portugueses. Participaram no estudo 1131 estudantes de duas universidades, com média de idade de 19.6 anos. Além da EFPP, para efeitos de validade de critério foi aplicada a Satisfaction With Life Scale (SWLS; Diener et al., 1985). Os resultados evidenciam boas propriedades psicométricas da EFPP, tanto ao nível da fiabilidade como da validade. Dada a escassez de instrumentos de avaliação do funcionamento positivo que se tenham revelado satisfatórios no nosso país, a utilização desta escala poderá ser recomendada, particularmente com jovens universitários.