Mental Flexibility, Planning Ability and Perception of Locus of Control in Situations of Successes and Failures among Preschool Children

Sara Filipiak

Abstract


 

The aim of the research was the analysis of the connections between cognitive flexibility, planning ability and locus of control in the situations of successes and failures in the group of preschool children. 97 examinees participated in the research (Mmonths = 59) attending to kindergartens in Lublin. The following methods were used in the study: The Scale of Locus of Control for Preschool Children by Barbara Szmigielska (1996), Tower of London TOL DX, second edition (Culbertson, Zillmer, 2011) and an experimental trial examining mental flexibility based on the Dimensional Change Card Sort (DCCS) by Philip D. Zelazo (2006) and the Wisconsin Card Sorting Test, in the Polish adaptation of Aleksandra Jaworowska (2002). It was assumed that the high efficiency of cognitive flexibility and planning abilities should coexist with more internal than external locus of control. Children who plan better and are able to change their attitude fluently during their work have more effective actions. This, in turn, should favor a higher internalization of successes, and in the case of failures, it should lead to the development of more adaptive strategies aimed at modifying one’s own actions to avoid failures in future. The hypothesis has been confirmed. Additional analyzes carried out with reference to gender revealed, that girls and boys didn’t differ in terms of the analyzed variables.


Keywords


cognitive flexibility; planning ability; locus of control in situations of successes and failures; preschool age

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DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.17951/j.2018.31.3.23-37
Date of publication: 2019-02-26 17:52:10
Date of submission: 2018-06-10 16:07:29


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