PERSONALITY TYPE AS A PREDICTOR OF TEACHING EFFICACY AND CLASSROOM CONTROL IN EMERGENCY CERTIFICATION TEACHERS

The present study focused on the personality types of emergency certification teachers as predictors of classroom management and self-efficacy beliefs. Results indicated limited relationship between personality and management and efficacy beliefs. For the small effect observed, however, extraversion v. introversion was the salient personality variable and relationships were in expected directions. Marginal score reliabilities may have attenuated the observed effects.

Research has found that specific personality traits of teachers are reflected in classroom instruction, especially through the teacher's use of various instructional strategies and material (Erdle, Murray, and Rushton, 1985). They also found that a positive relationship existed between individual personality constructs and learning styles. Thus, it is possible that certain personality types may exhibit better self-efficacy and classroom control orientations that enhance learning.

Grindler and Straton (1990) found that the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI) results could be used to help teachers develop different teaching methods and more readily accept a variety of materials and technology. Studies indicate that extroverted, stable, and tough-minded personalities tend to be more receptive to the use of new ideas (Grant & Cambre, 1990; Katz, 1992). "Intuitive/thinking" types (or those educators who are creative, analytical, logical, and imaginative) are more receptive to using various strategies and technology than "sensory" types who are practical, realistic, and sociable (Katz, 1992; Smith, Munday, & Windham, 1993; Sudol, 1991). Also, "sensory/feeling" types of teachers are interested in examining meanings and relationships and are least likely to be comfortable with the use of newer methodologies and technology than other personality types (Grindler & Straton, 1990; Smith, Munday, & Windham, 1993). These personality types speak directly to teachers with propensity toward various efficacy and classroom control orientations.

Teacher efficacy has surfaced as a variable often linked with effective teaching and learning (cf. Henson, in press; Tschannen-Moran, Woolfolk, 1998). Given the potential value of the construct, many researchers have examined the relationship between self-efficacy and teachers' classroom management activities, and linked teacher efficacy to a variety of school variables such as facilitating small group discussion and persistence with struggling students (Gibson & Dembo, 1984; Podell & Soodak, 1993).

The proficient use of classroom management strategies and issues are generally high on the list of teachers' concerns about education (Johns, MacNaughton, & Karabinus, 1989; Woolfolk, 1998; Emmer, Evertson, Clements, & Worsham, 1997; Martin, Yin, & Baldwin, 1998). Therefore, it is relevant to examine the relationships between teachers' classroom management and self-efficacy beliefs to provide insights about success (efficacy) as it relates to classroom management behavior.

Purpose

The study focused on the personality types of teachers and their classroom management and self-efficacy beliefs. There is little information on the identification of personality types as they relate to self-efficacy beliefs and effective management strategies and which teachers are most or least likely to incorporate them into instructional practice. Therefore, we examined whether personality types could serve as predictors of teaching efficacy and both instructional and people management beliefs. Further, we investigated these variables in the context of emergency certification teachers who are relatively new to the teaching profession. The relationships examined may inform our understanding of personality and classroom management practice in alternative certification teachers.

Method

Participants and Procedures

Participants included 120 teachers pursuing secondary teacher certification through an emergency permit teacher education program at a mid-sized university in Northeast Texas. Participants held at least a Bachelors degree, were in their first year of teaching, were assigned a public school mentor teacher, and received regular visits from university supervisors.

Three questionnaires and a demographic form were administered during regularly scheduled class times. The teachers' age indicated the non-typical nature of the participants as compared to traditional preservice teachers (20-25: 34.2%, 26-30: 19.2%, 31-35: 7.5%, 36-40: 10%, 41-45: 12.5%, 46-50: 7.5%, 51-55: 4.2%, 56+: 5.0%). Most taught in high school (56.7%) or middle school (32.5%) with smaller numbers teaching elementary school (4.2%) or across levels (5.9%). However, the teachers predominantly expressed their preferred choice of certification as secondary level (80.8%) with much fewer desiring grades 4-8 (12.5%), K - 4 (4.2%), or multiple (2.4%) certifications. Participant ethnicity was 76.7% White, 18.3% African-American, and 5.0% Hispanic.

Instrumentation

Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI). The MBTI (Form G, 1993) was used as a measure of personality type. The MBTI is a widely used personality inventory with positive evidence of construct validity for its scores (Thompson & Borrello, 1994). MBTI scores represent four theoretically based psychological types grounded in Jung's (1971/1921) personality theory, each of which is a function of bipolar personality characteristics. In the present study, four scale scores were created by subtracting one of the bipolar dimensions from the other, yielding continuous scores representing which bipolar dimension is predominantly held and to what degree (Extraversion - Introversion, Sensing - Intuition, Thinking - Feeling, and Judging - Perceiving). As an example, one participant received an Extraversion score of 23 and an Introversion score of 4. The Extraversion v. Introversion scale score was 19 (23-4), representing a strong tendency toward Extraversion (Introversion tendencies, and the other personality tendencies listed second above, would be represented by negative scores and strength by absolute value of the score).

Attitudes and Beliefs on Classroom Control Inventory (ABCC). We used the ABCC (Martin, Yin, & Baldwin, 1998) to assess classroom control orientation. The ABCC includes 26 items with a 4-point Likert scale and proposes to measure three orthogonal dimensions of classroom management control: instructional, people, and behavioral management. Each scale was derived to assess a continuum of control (cf. Glickman & Tamashiro, 1980; Wolfgang, 1995) ranging from interventionist to interactionalist to non-interventionist, with interventionists expressing the greatest need/desire to control and manipulate the classroom environment. According to Martin et al. (1998, p. 7), the instructional management scale (14 items) "includes aspects such as monitoring seatwork, structuring daily routines, and allocating materials;" the people management scale (8 items) "pertains to what teachers believe about students as persons and what teachers do to develop the teacher-student relationship;" and the behavioral management scale (4 items) "includes setting rules, establishing a reward structure, and providing opportunities for student input."

Hoy and Woolfolk's (1993) revised Teacher Efficacy Scale. We used Hoy and Woolfolk's 10-item shortened version of the Teacher Efficacy Scale (TES; Gibson & Dembo, 1984), which originally had 16 items. The teachers responded to a 6-point Likert scale anchored at "strongly agree" and "strongly disagree." The revised TES purports to measure two orthogonal dimensions: general teaching efficacy and personal teaching efficacy. However, recent research has suggested that the general teaching efficacy really assesses something of an external versus internal locus of control orientation, rather than outcome expectancy, which was the original intent of the scale (Coladarci & Fink, 1995; Guskey & Passaro, 1994; Henson, Bennett, Sienty, & Chambers, 2000; Tschannen-Moran et al., 1998). Therefore only the 5-item personal teaching scale was used as a measure of a teacher's reported confidence in his or her ability to positively impact student learning. The unweighted mean of these items were used as scale scores in subsequent analyses.

Data Analysis

The ABCC and revised TES were submitted to principal components analysis to examine factorial structure. Factor scores were saved and used as dependent variables in subsequent analyses. Canonical correlation analysis was used to examine whether personality variables are predictive of personal teaching efficacy, instructional management, and people management factor scores.

Results

Factor and Reliability Analyses

ABCC. The interitem correlation matrix of the ABCC was submitted to a principal components analysis to evaluate factorial structure. Nine eigenvalues were greater than one but the scree plot suggested two factors. Two factors were retained and rotated to the oblimin (delta = 0) criterion. The interfactor correlation was near zero (r = .03), so an orthogonal solution (varimax) was used (Pedhazur & Schmelkin, 1991). The two factors corresponded to the instructional and people management factors and explained 25.20% of the correlation matrix variance. The expected third factor, behavioral management, was problematic and did not possess strong internal structure. The low coefficient alpha for scores on this scale (alpha = .12) also pointed to this dynamic.

Using a .35 criterion, three of the four behavioral management items had substantial coefficients on the people management factor, indicating that these factors may actually assess the same construct. This finding is consistent with Henson and Roberts' (2001) confirmatory factor analysis of the ABCC, which also suggested unity between these factors. Factor scores for the instructional and people management factors were created via the regression method for use in subsequent analyses. Coefficient alphas for instructional and people management (including the three items from behavioral management) scores were .73 and .68, respectively. Descriptive statistics for the observed variables are reported in Table 1.

Personal teaching efficacy. The interitem correlation matrix for the five personal teaching efficacy items from Hoy and Woolfolk's (1993) revised version of the Teacher Efficacy Scale (Gibson & Dembo, 1984) were also submitted to principal components analysis. Two eigenvalues greater than one was observed but the scree plot indicated a clear one-factor solution. One personal teaching efficacy factor was extracted that explained 45.3% of the correlation matrix variance (coefficient alpha = .68). Personal teaching efficacy factor scores were created via the regression method for use in subsequent analyses.

Predicting Management and Efficacy Beliefs with Personality

A canonical correlation analysis was conducted with the four personality scale variables used as predictors of the instructional management, people management, and personal teaching efficacy factor scores as criterion variables. Table 2 presents the canonical results.

Only the first function explained a substantive portion of variance between the variable sets with a squared canonical correlation of 8.53%. The full model was not statistically significant using the Wilks' lambda criterion, F(12, 299.26)=1.46, p=.135. The small effects observed across the functions indicated little shared variance between the variable sets. However, the effect for the first function was considered substantive in the context of this research and is reported here. The second and third functions were not interpreted.

Examination of the standardized canonical function coefficients and structure coefficients indicate that this effect was largely due to the extraversion v. introversion continuum in the predictor set and personal teaching efficacy and people management in the criterion set. Further, extraversion was positively related to personal teaching efficacy but negatively related to people management beliefs.

Discussion

The present findings point to a limited relationship between personality and efficacy and classroom management beliefs as measured here. Only the first function in the canonical correlation analysis yielded an effect of any substance and it was small at 8.53%. This small effect was primarily due to the relationship between extraversion v. introversion as a predictor of personal teaching efficacy and classroom management.

The canonical results indicate that emergency certification teachers that tended to be more extraverted also tended to report higher teaching efficacy. Because the extraversion scale in the MBTI measures a certain level of self-confidence, this finding is consistent with the theoretical expectation for self-efficacy.

Further, extraversion was negatively related to people management beliefs. Because high scores on the ABCC are indicative of more interventionist management orientations, increased extraversion tended to relate to more non-interventionist perspectives.

In sum, it appears that personality may not be as strongly related to efficacy and classroom management as expected. Of course, the lack of relationship noted here may be due to the current operationalization and measurement of the variables. The score reliabilities of the three dependent measures were marginal and may have attenuated the effects observed. With an average alpha of .70, the maximum effect theoretically possible for any two variables would be about 50% (Henson, 2001).

In this context, the 8.53% effect noted becomes more relevant. Nevertheless, it appears that the extraversion v. introversion continuum (secondarily, thinking v. feeling) is the salient personality type to the exclusion of the others. The relationships noted, however, were in expected directions. It is possible that increased extraversion in emergency certification teachers may lead to positive instructional practice as regards teaching efficacy and people management beliefs.

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ROBIN K. HENSON

University of North Texas

SHARON M. CHAMBERS

Texas A&M University - Commerce

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