Abstract
Self-efficacy is an important predictor of people’s behaviour and wellbeing. In this longitudinal study we investigated patterns of stability and change in early childhood educator self-efficacy (ESE) in child-centred educational practice and its predictors. Early childhood educators completed a questionnaire twice. Latent profile analysis yielded four profiles: decrease profile (21.2%), increase profile (25.0%), low profile (9.6%), and high profile (44.2%). Profiles were used as the outcome of a multinomial logistic regression analysis. The analyses showed that educators’ experience, number of hours worked per week, and institution are significant predictors for profile membership: educators with less professional experience and fewer working hours per week have a higher probability of being in the low profile. Family-based educators have a higher probability of being in the decrease profile than centre-based educators. The lack of opportunities to increase self-efficacy available to less experienced, part-time educators and family-based working educators are discussed in frame of Bandura’s (1997) sources of self-efficacy. Practical interventions such as coaching and tandem building are proposed to strengthen ESE.
Highlights
We examine whether personal characteristics such as educators’ years of experience and working hours per week are associated with latent profile membership of change in early childhood educator self-efficacy (ESE)
The mean score of ESE is very similar at timepoint 1 (M = 4.37, SD = 0.41) and timepoint 2 (M = 4.38, SD = 0.39; no significant mean change); both scores are at a mid to high level of ESE
The highest job satisfaction is found for the high profile for both timepoints, with significant differences to the low profile at timepoint 1 [T (82) = 2.79; p < 0.05; and d = 0.62) and timepoint 2 (T (66) = 2.92; p < 0.05; and d = 0.72)
Summary
Self-efficacy is an important predictor of people’s behaviour and wellbeing In this longitudinal study we investigated patterns of stability and change in early childhood educator self-efficacy (ESE) in child-centred educational practice and its predictors. The lack of opportunities to increase self-efficacy available to less experienced, part-time educators and family-based working educators are discussed in frame of Bandura’s (1997) sources of self-efficacy. Practical interventions such as coaching and tandem building are proposed to strengthen ESE. Numerous studies support the assumption of the importance of self-efficacy on human achievement in many areas like sports, health business, or education (Bandura, 1997)
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