Recently in Japan, the number of maladjusted college students with depressive tendencies has increased, and as a result, the importance of prevention and improvement of depressive tendencies has become the subject of focus. Previous studies have revealed that personality traits (neuroticism in particular) and the Sense of Coherence (SOC) were closely related to individual depressive tendencies. Therefore, this study investigates the relationship between depressive tendencies, neuroticism, and SOC. The subjects consisted of 251 college students (133 males and 118 females) with a mean age of 20.0 (±1.0 years) whose degree of depressive tendencies was evaluated by utilizing the Self-rating Depression Scale (SDS). In addition, the Big Five Scales and the Japanese version of the SOC-29 were used to assess neuroticism and SOC, respectively. The findings show that the means of the three scale’s scores are similar to those of previous studies and the SOC scores are negatively related to the SDS scores both directly and via the neuroticism scores. Therefore, strengthening the SOC can effectively reduce depressive tendencies in college students by controlling neuroticism.

To decrease career indecision among undergraduate students, it is important to improve Career Decision-Making Self-Efficacy (CDMSE). However, there are limited studies that have investigated how to enhance CDMSE in such students. Therefore, this study first describes CDMSE and Social Skills (SS) and then clarifies their connection to formulate an intervention method in career education. The participants consisted of 473 university students who completed a questionnaire on CDMSE and SS as well as a questionnaire based survey distributed in October 2010. The results show that a significant relationship exists between CDMSE and SS and that three factors of SS were revealed through a KiSS-18 factor analysis, which indicates that SS is an important factor that improves CDMSE.

The purpose of this study was to examine the relationships between anthropophobic tendency and life events, using a short longitudinal data among university students. The anthropophobic tendency scale and life events scale for university student were administered to 129 Japanese university students on two occasions, with interval about 6 months (the survey at the first time; Time 1 and the survey at the second time; Time 2).

The main results of this study showed that there were significantly positive correlations between anthropophobic tendency and negative life events in interpersonal and achievement domains, whereas there were significantly negative correlations between anthropophobic tendency and positive life events in interpersonal and achievement domains. The findings with cross-lagged effects model also indicated that anthropophobic tendency at Time 1 significantly affected negative life events in achievement domains at Time 2.

Furthermore, it seems to need the research with longitudinal data at long intervals in order to generalize the findings of this study using a short longitudinal data. Despite these limitations, this study may have an important implication for clarifying the question, which there has been little empirical attempt to relationships between anthropophobic tendency and life events. In particular, the results of this study may suggest that we need to examine a support for negative life events in relate to high level of anthropophobic tendency among university students.

This study examines the relationship between refusal, perceived control of time, and psychological stress response by constructing a model on the basis of the assumption that the seven types of refusal are related to perceived control of time and psychological stress response. A total of 139 university students (109 men, 30 women) completed the cross-sectional survey and questionnaire. After conducting a covariance structural analysis, the findings show that compensation, modesty, cheating, and nonverbal refusal are related to depression-anxiety and displeasure-anger through the perceived loss of time, which clarifies the relationship between refusal, perceived control of time, and psychological stress response.

The importance of cooperation between school counselors (SCs) and teachers has been revealed in previous studies. However, such information was based on surveys distributed among SCs and teachers with limited awareness and attitude toward SC-teacher cooperation among school counseling coordinators. Therefore, this study examines the recognition of cooperation as well as the similarities and differences among school counseling coordinators in order to promote effective cooperation. The participants consisted of 43 SCs and 67 school counseling coordinators who completed an open-ended questionnaire. The findings show that the interests of the school counseling coordinators and SCs were closely aligned and that both parties had interest in either the success or failure of cooperation or assuming responsibility for such cooperation. In addition, the SCs’ interest was greater toward the success or failure of cooperation whereas, the school counseling coordinators’ interest was greater toward assuming responsibility for cooperation. Therefore, to effectively realize future cooperation, schools should increase the work hours of SCs, learn from examples of success, deepen the understanding of one another’s specialties, and promote mutual communication.

This study examines the relationship between the acquisition of life skills, stressor, commitment, and enthusiasm in university athletes. The subjects consisted of 272 college athletes (228 males and 44 females) with a mean age of 19.9 (SD=1.15) who completed a questionnaire composed of the following socio-demographic items: Sport Life Skill Scale, Sport Stressor Scale, Sport Commitment Scale, and Sport Enthusiasm Scale. The results of the correlation analysis showed that both “Commitment” and “Enthusiasm” are positively associated with “Life Skill” (both “Interpersonal Skills” and “Intrapersonal Skills”) and that “Enthusiasm” is positively associated with “Stressor” (r=0.12, p<0.05). In addition, the covariance structural analysis showed that the pass coefficients between “Commitment” and “Life Skill” as well as between “Enthusiasm” and “Life Skill” are statistically significant. Therefore, athletes with high commitment and enthusiasm enhance their life skills in everyday college life and club activities, which implies that sports activities for university students promote life skills even if their activity levels are high.

This study examines job turnover intentions and contributing factors of elementary and junior high school teachers in order to formulate preventive measures to decrease the rate of turnover intentions. The participants consisted of 71 elementary school teachers and 99 junior high school teachers who completed a survey regarding the factors that influenced their turnover intentions. The results of a factor analysis conducted on 67 respondents reveal three factors: “interpersonal relationships with students and parents,” “work environment,” and “anxiety about the job of teaching.” In addition, a two-way ANOVA was conducted with the turnover intention score as the dependent variable and three factors as independent variables: (“always thinking” and “thinking relatively often”)×subscales (“interpersonal relationship,” “work environment,” and “anxiety”). Overall, this study shows three significant relationships: 1) the “work environment” factor is associated with significantly higher turnover intention scores compared with the “interpersonal relationships with students and guardians” or “anxiety toward teaching profession” factors; 2) turnover intention scores associated with the “interpersonal relationships with students and guardians” factor are significantly higher than those associated with the “anxiety about the teaching profession” factor; and 3) those who are “always thinking” about turnover intention have higher scores on the turnover-intention scale compared to those who are only “thinking relatively often” about leaving their position. Therefore, to help ameliorate teacher turnover, work environments should be enhanced at the organizational level for teachers to improve their pedagogical skills as well as provide their students with better guidance.

This study examines the validity and reliability of constructing a social interest scale for elementary school students (SISESS). The participants consisted of 134 public elementary school students (64 boys and 70 girls) between the third and sixth grade. The results of a factor analysis reveal two factors: others-schema of social interest (OSSI) (5 items, α=.87) and self-schema of social interest (SSSI) (5 items, α=.77). In addition, the OSSI and SSSI scores are positively associated with the self-worth score (r=.60, p<.01, r=.43, p<.01) and negatively related to the depression score. (r=-.67, p<.01, r=-.37, p<.01). These findings support the validity and reliability of creating a SISESS as a measure of schemata regarding social interest.

[Issue and Purpose] Teachers’ stress is a serious problem at schools. While the number of teachers who take sick leaves has been increasing every year, Special Needs Education was introduced in FY 2007. In addition, Special Needs Education Coordinators were appointed as key persons and were expected to assume new roles. Since Special Needs Education Coordinators have to play diverse roles that did not exist earlier at schools, there is concern regarding the emergence of new stressful situations. Therefore, in order for them to ensure inclusive education, it was decided to identify the characteristics of their stress, so that it would be possible to take preventative measures.

[Methods] In this research, survey results (valid response rate: 40.9%) of 1,000 Special Needs Education Coordinators at elementary and junior high schools in Hokkaido were selected from my research on stressors. The purpose was to identify characteristics of stress from the correlation among five stressors (1. Stressor among teachers; 2. Support rejection stressor; 3. Expertise stressor; 4. Busy stressor; 5. Off-campus support stressor), and the correlation between each stressor and stress response.

[Results] The average values revealed that they felt the stressors of “Expertise stressor” and “Busy stressor” to some extent. However, the average values of the other stressors were low. The average values of the stress responses were also low. Weak correlations or relatively strong correlations were seen for each stressor. Moreover, relatively strong and positive correlations were seen between each stressor and stress response.

[Consideration] At this stage, the average values of stressors and stress responses were not high. However, from the fact that correlations among each stressor were seen, and that relatively strong stress response correlations were obtained from each stressor. This can be considered characteristic of the stress of Special Needs Education Coordinators. Since Special Needs Education will continue to be promoted in the future, increase in stress will be a matter of concern. Thus, it is necessary for the government and educational administration to consider continuous and planned measures for reducing stress.