title: Toward a Bioecological Model of School Engagement: A Biometric Analysis of Gene and Environmental Factors.
abstract: School disengagement is associated with poor academic achievement, dropout, and risk behaviors such as truancy, delinquency, and substance use. Despite empirical research identifying risk correlates of school disengagement across the ecology, it is unclear from which domain these correlates arise. To redress this issue, the current study used intraclass correlation and DeFries-Fulker analyses to longitudinally decompose variance in three domains of engagement (academic, behavioral, and emotional) using data from the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health. Findings suggest that nonshared environmental factors (that is, environmental contexts and experiences that are unique to each sibling) account for approximately half of the variance in indicators of school disengagement when controlling for genetic influences, and that this variance increases as adolescents grow older and rely less on their immediate family. The present study contributes new evidence on the biosocial underpinnings of school engagement and highlights the importance of interventions targeting factors in the nonshared environment.
authors.affiliation: Assistant professor, School of Social Work, Saint Louis University, Tegeler Hall, 3550 Lindell Blvd., St. Louis, MO 63103.
authors.forename: Brandy R
authors.initials: BR
authors.lastname: Maynard
authors.affiliation: Associate professor, College of Criminology and Criminal Justice, Florida State University; Visiting Distinguished Research Professor, Center for Social and Humanities Research, King Abdulaziz University, Jeddah, Saudi Arabia.
authors.forename: Kevin M
authors.initials: KM
authors.lastname: Beaver
authors.affiliation: Professor, School of Social Work, Saint Louis University.
authors.forename: Michael G
authors.initials: MG
authors.lastname: Vaughn
authors.affiliation: Professor, Department of Sociology, Iowa State University.
authors.forename: Matthew
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: DeLisi
authors.affiliation: Associate director, Meadows Center for Preventing Educational Risk University of Texas at Austin.
authors.forename: Gregory
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Roberts
keywords: academic performance; behavior genetics; prevention; school attachment; school engagement