Abstract

In this study we explored the contribution of parents’ perceptions of their child’s resilience to their assessments of the child’s abilities and academic proficiencies. We examined whether parents’ perceptions of their child’s resilience would predict, independently of the child’s assessed competencies, their appraisals of the child’s respective competencies across a four-year time span. A group of academically and vocationally educated parents (N = 326) evaluated their child’s resiliencies (education-related, persistence, and confidence) when the child was in the fifth grade. The parents also assessed their child’s competencies in various abilities and school subjects. They then repeated these assessments once the child had entered the ninth grade, i.e., at the end of his/her compulsory education. Linear regression analyses indicated that the parents’ perceptions, especially those of their child’s educational resilience, did have significant effects on their assessments of the child’s verbal–cognitive competencies. In addition, the results suggested that perceptions of a child’s resiliencies might be more pertinent for academically educated than for vocationally educated parents. Accordingly, even though parental assessments of their child’s future competencies are closely associated with the respective assessments of his/her current competencies, the perceptions of the child’s educational resilience may function as a separate basis for parents’ appraisals of their child’s competencies.

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