LA FORMACIÓN DE RELACIONES DE APEGO EN LA EDAD ADULTA

In the sections that follow, the methodology of the current study is described. Research Approval

An IRB protocol (Number 2013-03-0074) was submitted with the Office of Research Support (ORS). Upon review, they determined that the current study did not meet the requirements for human subject research as defined in the Common Rule (45 CFR 46) or FDA Regulations (21 CFR 50 & 56) and therefore IRB review and oversight was not required.

Participants

Participants (n=42) for the current study came from the Model Demo campus at which the project-supported after-school tutoring program was implemented during the spring semester of 2008. All 42 participants were in the second grade. Of these, 59.5% (n=25) were female and 40.5% (n=17) were male. All were classified as limited English proficient and were participating in a transitional bilingual education program in which they received native language literacy instruction as well as English as a second language instruction.

Language Proficiency Level of Participants

The Language Assessment Scales-Oral (LAS-O) – English (De Avila & Duncan, 1990) is a screening device that measures the oral language skills “necessary to succeed in an American mainstream academic environment” (Clearinghouse on Assessment and Evaluation, 2012). It assesses the phonemic, lexical, syntactical, and pragmatic language skills of English language learners, grades 1-12. The LAS-O - English is a standardized measure, which was normed on 3,600 students in Texas and California. It is designed to: 1) aid in the identification of students with limited English proficiency; 2) help determine language dominance; 3) identify placement needs; and 4) determine proficiency levels. It is also intended for use as a measure of change over time. The Story Retelling section utilizes a procedure that is an adaptation of what is known as “focused holistic scoring.” For the procedure to remain reliable and valid, scorers must be proficient, literate speakers of English and participate in a reliability exercise, attaining a reliability level of 90%.

The LAS-O uses a scale of 0 to 5 to evaluate the story retells that children complete. The task involves listening to a recorded story while the examiner points to the corresponding illustrations provided in a four-picture sequence. The child is then asked

to look at the pictures and retell the story that they just heard. Their responses are audio recorded and transcribed. Transcripts are then verified and scored. A score of 3 describes a response that includes a recognizable story line but contains errors in grammar, syntax, vocabulary, or usage that would be uncharacteristic of proficient speakers of standard American English. Scores of 4 and 5 are given to stories that are complete, fluent, and increasingly articulate, and well elaborated. Where language errors surface, they are not uncharacteristic of proficient speakers of standard American English, nor do they detract from the story line.

The LAS-O story retell task was administered, transcribed and scored by members of the Model Demo research team. Scoring disagreements were resolved through consensus. Results for the 82 LAS-O story retells completed by the 42 participating students in this study averaged 2.6 with a median score of 3 (see Table 3.1). Most students were able to communicate the story’s basic storyline but exhibited notable errors and dysfluencies that would be unlikely to be made by proficient speakers of American English.

Table 3.1

Mean and Median LAS-O Scores by Testing Session

N Mean Median SD

LAS-O Mar 42 2.57 3 0.67

LAS-O May 40 2.7 3 0.61

TOTAL 82 2.64 3 0.64

Data Sources

Oral narratives elicited by the Tell A Story about a Picture (TASP) task (described below) and transcribed by Model Demo research staff are the primary data

source for this study. Forty-one of the 42 students completed the TASP assessment twice during the spring semester, 2008: at the start of the after-school tutoring program in March, and again at the conclusion of the program in May. One student completed the TASP assessment only once, during the first administration in March. As a result, 83 English TASP transcripts are included in this study. Of the 41 subjects who told two stories, 36 told a story about the same picture both times and 5 told one story about each picture. All 42 participants completed the English LAS-O story retell at the first administration in March, and 40 participated in the second administration in May, resulting in 82 English LAS-O scores. The LAS-O scores are included in this study in order to help describe participants in terms of their levels of oral story retelling skills and to provide a norm-referenced measure with which to compare this study’s results.

Instruments

Telling a Story about a Picture (TASP). The TASP, based on the Oral Language Evaluation (Silvaroli, Skinner, & Maynes, 1977), is a criterion-referenced, standardized assessment in which students are asked to generate a story using picture stimuli. The pictures used as stimuli must depict a topic familiar to children with enough activity to elicit story elements, which include setting, an initiating event or problematic situation, some attempt to resolve the problem, a consequence, and inference, prediction, or evaluation (Westby, 1992). To elicit this sample, two pictures were used to prompt stories (see Appendix A). One depicted a circus scene where a lion appears to have just escaped from his cage. A boy is running from the lion while onlookers, including a clown and the lion tamer, are watching astonished. The second picture shows a street in what appears to be an urban neighborhood where two or three boys are playing baseball. A window in a building on one side of the street is broken and a woman is standing

beside it, angrily pointing toward the boys on the street. A police officer has grabbed the wrist of one of the boys, who has dropped the baseball bat while running.

Students were given the instructions: “Tell me a story about this picture. Tell me the very best story you can tell me.” Their responses were audiotaped, transcribed and scored to determine the story level on a scale of 0 to 5, where 0 signifies a story that cannot be coded (e.g., is unintelligible); 1 is a non-story in which a child predominantly labels objects in the picture; 2 is a non-story in which a child lists or describes actions or events depicted; 3 is an incomplete story in which a child conveys causal relationships between actions or events and conveys a main idea; 4 is a complete story, which necessarily includes an initiating event or problem, an attempt to resolve the problem, and a consequence or resolution; and 5 is a complete story with mood, evaluation, or inference. Model Demo research team members administered, transcribed and scored the TASP. The story transcripts that resulted from TASP administration are the primary data sources of this study, however the TASP scores from the original study were not used. Confidentiality of Data

The Model Demonstration data are maintained in secure files in the UT Austin Office of Bilingual Education. Student participants were assigned identification numbers. Data used in the current study list only these assigned ID numbers; no names or other identifying information, including names of school campuses, are maintained in this study’s records.