Students With Self-Identified Special Educational Needs and Disabilities (si-SEND) : Flourishing or Languishing!

International Journal of Disability, Development and
Education
ISSN: 1034-912X (Print) 1465-346X (Online) Journal homepage: http://www.tandfonline.com/loi/cijd20
Students with Self-identified Special Educational

Needs and Disabilities (si-SEND): Flourishing or
Languishing!
Grace Skrzypiec, Helen Askell-Williams, Phillip Slee & Adrian Rudzinski
To cite this article: Grace Skrzypiec, Helen Askell-Williams, Phillip Slee & Adrian Rudzinski
(2016) Students with Self-identified Special Educational Needs and Disabilities (si-SEND):
Flourishing or Languishing!, International Journal of Disability, Development and Education,
63:1, 7-26, DOI: 10.1080/1034912X.2015.1111301
To link to this article: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/1034912X.2015.1111301
Published online: 26 Nov 2015.
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Download by: [Universite Laval] Date: 05 April 2016, At: 18:22

International Journal of Disability, Development and Education, 2016
Vol. 63, No. 1, 7–26, http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/1034912X.2015.1111301
Students with Self-identified Special Educational Needs and

Disabilities (si-SEND): Flourishing or Languishing!
Grace Skrzypiec* , Helen Askell-Williams, Phillip Slee and Adrian Rudzinski
School of Education, Student Wellbeing and Prevention of Violence Research Centre, Flinders
University, Bedford Park, South Australia
Students’ wellbeing is an essential component of their ability to function well, not

only at school but also in all life domains. Many studies have investigated student
wellbeing. However, empirical studies about the wellbeing of students with special
Downloaded by [Universite Laval] at 18:22 05 April 2016
educational needs and disabilities (SEND) are scarce. Furthermore, many studies
have adopted a deficit view of wellbeing and mental [ill]-health. This study adopted
a more positive perspective. We administered a questionnaire assessing social-
emotional and psychological wellbeing, global self-concept, resilience, bullying,
mental ill-health and school satisfaction to 1930 students, aged 13–15 years, who
were attending seven mainstream schools in South Australia. Of those students, 172
self-identified as having SEND. Results showed significant differences, with students
who self-identified with SEND not faring as well as other students on all measures.
In particular, just over one third (39.9%) of students who self-identified as having
SEND reported that they were flourishing, compared with just over half (57.6%) of
the students who did not indicate that they had special needs. The findings indicate
that more attention needs to be given to designing and implementing supports to
improve the wellbeing and school satisfaction of students who self-identify as having
SEND.
Keywords: bullying; disability; flourishing; languishing; mental health difficulties;
si-SEND; special education; SDQ; wellbeing
Introduction
In the last two decades there has been a proliferation of studies showing that students
with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND) are at risk of poor psycho-social
and mental health outcomes (Davies, 2005; Emerson, 2003; Mather & Ofiesh, 2005;
McBride & Siegel, 1997; Spendelow, 2011; Terras, Thompson, & Minnis, 2009). For
example, research by Emerson and Hatton (2007) found that young people with learn-
ing disabilities were more than six times more likely to have a diagnosable psychiatric
disorder than their non learning-disabled peers. Likewise, Kaptein, Jansen, Vogels, and
Reijneveld (2008) estimated that the prevalence of mental [ill-]health problems in chil-
dren with intellectual disabilities ranged from 30 to 60%. Compare these statistics to
the 14% prevalence of mental health difficulties in the general adolescent population
(Sawyer, Miller-Lewis, & Clark, 2007) which, while alarming, are much less than
reported for students with an intellectual disability.
In Australia, as part of the evaluations of a national mental health initiative for
young children, an examination was made of the mental health of children in primary
*Corresponding author. Email: grace.skrzypiec@flinders.edu.au
© 2015 Taylor & Francis

8 G. Skrzypiec et al.
schools and early childhood and care settings. Based on Goodman’s (2001) Strengths
and Difficulties Questionnaire (SDQ), amongst the primary school children it was found
that children without a disability had a 1:8 chance of developing mental health prob-
lems, compared to children with one disability who had a 1:3 chance. Children with
more than one disability had a 1:2 chance of developing mental health problems (Dix,
Shearer, Slee, & Butcher, 2010). Meanwhile, the KidsMatter Early Childhood study
(Slee et al., 2012) found that approximately 84% (81–87%) of young children without a
disability were identified as being in the normal range of mental health, with about
16% (13–19%) being in the borderline to abnormal ranges of mental health. For chil-
dren with one disability, the prevalence of mental health difficulties soared to approxi-
mately 26% (23–30%). These findings have broadly suggested that young children
without a disability have a 1 in 6 chance of experiencing mental health difficulties
(being in the borderline or abnormal range), children with one disability have a one in
four chance, while children with multiple disabilities have a one in two chance of expe-
riencing mental health difficulties (Dix, Jarvis, & Slee, 2013).
Studies investigating the mental health of children with SEND have typically
focused on specific disabilities, such as autism (Howlin, 1997; Kim, Szatmari, Bryson,
Streiner, & Wilson, 2000; Stewart, Barnard, Pearson, Hasan, & O’Brien, 2006), Down
syndrome (Spendelow, 2011), or Asperger syndrome (Davies, 2005). However, studies
of children’s and adolescents’ mental health often take a deficit approach: Specifically,
they are concerned with mental ill-health. There is an alternative view, namely, that
mental health is:
A state of wellbeing in which the individual realises his or her own abilities, can cope with
the normal stresses of life, can work productively and fruitfully, and is able to make a con-
tribution to his or her community. (World Health Organization [WHO], 2014, p. 1)
As previously noted, there is a dearth of studies investigating this positive view of

wellbeing and mental health in relation to students with SEND. An aim of our study
was to fill this gap by undertaking an empirical investigation of the subjective wellbe-
ing, mental health and school satisfaction of students with SEND.
Promoting Student Wellbeing in Schools

Schools are key settings for the promotion of students’ wellbeing and mental health
(Askell-Williams & Cefai, 2014). For example, the UK government has been working
in collaboration with the Personal Social and Economic Health Association to assist
schools with teaching students about mental health and to banish the stigma associated
with mental health difficulties (Department for Education [DFE], 2014). In the United
States, the Collaborative for Academic, Social and Emotional Learning (Collaborative
for Academic Social & Emotional Learning [CASEL], 2014a, 2014b) promotes a range
of programs to deliver social and emotional education in schools with a view to foster-
ing students’ personal resources for positive mental health. In Australia, the National
Mental Health Policy (2008), the Fourth National Mental Health Plan (2009–2014) and
the Roadmap for National Mental Health Reform (2012–2022) (Department of Health
[DoH], 2014), identify promotion, prevention and early intervention for positive mental
health as essential actions. Meanwhile, the Melbourne Declaration on the Educational
Goals for Young Australians recognises that:
Students with Self-identified Special Educational Needs and Disabilities 9
Personal and social capability assists students to become successful learners, helping to
improve their academic learning and enhancing their motivation to reach their full poten-
tial. Personal and social capability supports students in becoming creative and confident
individuals with “a sense of self-worth, self-awareness and personal identity that enables
them to manage their emotional, mental, spiritual and physical wellbeing”, with a sense of
hope and “optimism about their lives and the future”. On a social level, it helps students to
“form and maintain healthy relationships” and prepares them “for their potential life roles
as family, community and workforce members”. (Ministerial Council on Education,
Employment, Training and Youth Affairs [MCEETYA], 2008, p. 9)
In countries such as Australia, where mainstreaming of students is strongly advo-

cated, individuals with SEND are present in all schools. Therefore, including the per-
spectives and needs of such students in school-based wellbeing and mental health
promotion initiatives, such as those mentioned above, is essential.
Measuring Special Educational Needs and Disabilities (SEND)

A failing of the research literature according to Vehmas (2010), is “that the concept of
special need has not been defined … satisfactorily” (p. 88). Vehmas concurred with
Wilson (2002) that, “[special needs] is used in special education practice as a kind of
semi-technical or specialised term which creates the impression that everyone already
knows what they are talking about” (pp. 88–89). In practice young people with a “dis-
ability” or with “special needs” are grouped together in educational policies and proto-
cols. For example, the UK Department of Education provides the following explanation
for parents:
Children and young people with Special Education Needs (SEN) all have learning difficul-
ties or disabilities that make it harder for them to learn than most children and young peo-
ple of the same age. These children and young people may need extra or different help
from that given to others. (DFE, 2014, p. 7)
A similar perspective prevails in Australia. The Australian Curriculum, Assessment

and Reporting Authority (ACARA, 2012), which seeks to “support all Australians to
become successful learners, confident and creative individuals and active and informed
citizens” (p. 4), acknowledges that some students require additional support to achieve
these goals. This group of students are deemed to have “SEN”. Almost all (97%) of
Australian school age children with a recognised disability attend school and most
(89%) participate in classes in mainstream schools (Australian Institute of Health &
Welfare [AIHW], 2006).
Our research examined the wellbeing and school satisfaction of students with
SEND, broadly defined. This approach aligns with the way that students with a diverse
range of educational needs and disabilities (e.g. Autism, Asperger’s Syndrome, Atten-
tion Deficit Disorders, Emotional Disturbance) are categorised as one broad group by
government and educational institutions that develop policies and provide funding for
their education. In particular, we wished to determine how students with SEND were
faring when compared to other students.
It may be the case that not all students who have SEND have officially “recog-
nised” SEND (Abedi & Faltis, 2015), as some students may have not been assessed or
don’t meet the accepted criteria on diagnostic tests. However, we consider it likely that
middle school students who self-identify as having “special needs” are likely, either: (a)
to have experienced some level of special attention for their educational needs, or (b)
have a subjective awareness that they need extra assistance with their learning.
Therefore, an assumption underlying our approach to gathering students’ perspectives is
that students who self-identify as having SEND are likely to have SEND to a greater or
lesser (but not trivial) degree. Therefore, in order to capture a broader range of students
who have SEND, rather than relying upon existing formal diagnoses that may be
restrictive, our approach was to ask the students themselves to advise us whether they
considered themselves to have SEND. To acknowledge that SEND students in our sam-
ple self-reported that they had SEND, we refer to them in this paper as students with
self-identified-SEND [(si)SEND].
We examined the languishing, moderate mental health and flourishing dispositions
of students who identified and did not identify as having SEND. The impetus of this
study was that it would provide an avenue for students with (si)SEND to be included
and to add their voices to research on the wellbeing of middle-school students; to allow
them agency in providing information about their individual subjective wellbeing along-
side their classmates.
Measuring Mental Health and Wellbeing

An individual is deemed to have a satisfactory level of mental health if a disorder that
meets the DSM-V (American Psychiatric Association [APA], 2013) criteria has not been
diagnosed. This view, which incorporates concepts of “normal” and “abnormal”, has
involved scrutiny of the concepts of deficit and impairment.
However, although a deficit approach to mental health and wellbeing has typically
been the perspective taken in the past, a more positive approach is to consider the pres-
ence of positive feelings toward one’s life and the level of functioning well in life as an
assessment of wellbeing (Keyes, 2006). It is clear that children with a mental illness are
not mentally healthy, but it is “extremely dubious to assume that children without a
mental illness are necessarily mentally healthy” (Keyes, 2006, p. 396). Rather, the state
of a person’s mental health may be described across a continuum, so that individuals
experiencing unhappiness and difficulties, but who have no mental health disorder, are
considered to be languishing (Keyes, 2002). Languishing is a state of being which
occurs at the lower end of the mental health spectrum. Individuals with the most posi-
tive state of mental health are at the higher end of the spectrum: they are deemed to be
flourishing. Most people, according to Keyes (2006), have a state of being that is
located between languishing and flourishing on the spectrum, and are said to be experi-
encing moderate mental health. Boundaries between these states of wellbeing are not
clearly defined and people can move along the spectrum at different stages of their
lives.
Notwithstanding the need of a more positive approach, the conceptualisation of
young people’s wellbeing has been fraught with definitional issues (Engels, Aelterman,
van Petegem, & Schepens, 2004; Noble, McGrath, Wyatt, Carbines, & Robb, 2008)
and no consensus has been reached in defining wellbeing (Fraillon, 2004). According to
O’Hare and Gutierrez (2012) “most analysts have conceptualized child wellbeing as a
broad concept involving multiple dimensions” (p. 6), although there seems to be no
agreement about what comprises those dimensions or how many they number in total.
However, Lau and Bradshaw (2010) noted that, although it may not be an easy con-
struct to measure, subjective wellbeing is the essence of wellbeing to which other
domains, such as health and social/family connections, merely contribute.
In his studies of wellbeing, Keyes (2002) investigated the concepts associated with
subjective wellbeing. He surmised that “the study of subjective wellbeing has been
divided into two streams of research, one that equates wellbeing with happiness and the
other with human potential that, when realized, results in positive functioning in life”
(p. 4). Keyes suggested that the first stream follows the “hedonic tradition” and is
related to emotional wellbeing, while the second stream pursues “the tradition of eudai-
monia” (p. 5) and is associated with social and psychological wellbeing. The concern
of individuals in the first approach is with their happiness and general satisfaction with
life, whereas in the second approach individuals are more concerned about becoming
well functioning citizens. Keyes proposed that a state of flourishing is present when
people show a high level on at least one of three indicators of hedonia (emotional well-
being) and just over half of the 11 indicators of eudaimonia (social and psychological
wellbeing). By contrast a young person is languishing when levels of hedonia and
eudaimonia are low. Languishing “is a state that lacks positive functioning and has an
emphasis on the individual merely existing from day to day” (Liddle & Carter, 2010,
p. 9). Individuals who are neither languishing nor flourishing are said to be experienc-
ing moderate mental health. Keyes developed an instrument referred to as the “Mental
Health Continuum” (MentHC) to measure subjective wellbeing in this way. The short
form of this instrument contains three subscales that measure emotional, psychological
and social wellbeing. Together, the scales provide an indication of whether individuals
are flourishing, have moderate mental health or are languishing.
We utilised Keyes (2002) approach to assess the state of subjective wellbeing of stu-
dents with (si)SEND compared to students who did not self-identify as having SEND.
There is a certain consilience between assessing students’ self-identification, that is, their
subjective assessment, of their SEND, alongside assessments of their subjective assess-
ment of their wellbeing. In addition to assessing subjective wellbeing, we also examined
students’ mental ill-health using Goodman’s (1997), SDQ. We also included measures of
other constructs, such as resilience and global self-concept, which previous research had
indicated were closely related to flourishing (see Skrzypiec, Askell-Williams, Slee, &
Rudzinski, 2014), as well as a measure of school satisfaction (developed by the authors).
In addition, a substantial body of research has indicated that students with disabili-
ties are at greater risk of being bullied (Evangelous et al., 2008; Swearer, Wang, Maag,
Siebecker, & Frerichs, 2012). Therefore, we examined the frequency of bullying of stu-
dents with (si)SEND, as several research studies have established that involvement in
bullying is associated with maladjustment and social and emotional difficulties amongst
victims and bullies (Gini & Pozzoli, 2008; Skrzypiec, Slee, Askell-Williams, &
Lawson, 2012).
Procedures
Ethics approval to conduct this study was obtained from the South Australian Catholic
Education Office, the Independent Schools Association of South Australia, the Depart-
ment of Education and Children’s Development, and from the Flinders University
Social and Behavioural Research Ethics Committee.
Sample
Maximum variation sampling was an objective of our study. The sampling strategy
involved the selection of at least one school from each of the three educational
jurisdictions in South Australia, as well as schools servicing high, medium and low
socio-economic status (SES) geographical areas, in order to account for potentially
confounding socio-economic effects on schooling and wellbeing (Bradley & Corwyn,
2002). The convenience sampling of schools was stratified, and included one Catholic,
three government and three Independent schools.
Nearly 2000 (n = 1983) students participated in the study by completing our pur-
pose-built Wellbeing Questionnaire. Of these, 53 (2.7%) questionnaires were discarded
after scanning because they had not been completed appropriately (e.g. socially desir-
able responding; circling the same response for all questions) or had more than 50% of
missing responses. The sample of students whose data was included in the final analysis
numbered 1930. Of these students, 172 self-identified as having SEND (9.3%, missing
(si)SEND item = 90) (Table 1).
As shown in Table 2, over one quarter (30.6%) of the students with (si)SEND were
from government schools, 21.0% from a Catholic school and the remainder (48.6%)
were students attending Independent schools. Significantly more males reported that
they had (si)SEND (53.9%) compared to females (χ2(1) = 12.0, p < .001). About one
fifth (22.1%) of the students with (si)SEND were under 13 years of age, while 10.1%
were over 15. Just over two-thirds (67.8%) of the students with (si)SEND were aged
13–15 years. The average age of the students with (si)SEND was 13.7 years (SD = 1.4).
Socio-economic (SES) Background

The Socio-economic Indexes for Areas (SEIFA) produced by the Australian Bureau of
Statistics (Australian Bureau of Statistics [ABS], 2008) was used to provide an estima-
tion of the socio-economic background of participants. According to government policy
makers in the Department of Education, Employment and Workplace Relations, the
SEIFA index, while not perfect, is currently the best measure of socio-economic back-
ground available in Australia (personal communication, Lucio Krbavac, 30 April 2013).
Table 1. Types of schools participating in the study

SES DECD disadvantage
School location Type categorya
1. School Low SES Government Birth—Year 12 Coeducational 2
A
2. School Low SES Government Year 8–Year 12 Coeducational 3
B
3. School Medium Government Year 8—Year Coeducational 6
C SES 13
4. School High SES Independent Reception— All boys NA
D Year 12
5. School High SES Catholic Reception— Coeducational NA
E Year 12
6. School High SES Catholic Reception— All girls NA
F Year 12
7. School High SES Independent Year 7–Year 12 Coeducational NA
G
8. School Medium Independent Reception— Coeducational NA
H SES Year 12
a
low number indicates high disadvantage.
Table 2. Number of male and female “self-identifying SEND” students from each school
Male Female Total
School Number % Number % Number %
1. School A 15 50.0 15 50.0 30 100.0
2. School B 10 52.6 9 47.4 19 100.0
3. School C 1 50.0 1 50.0 2 100.0
4. School D 8 100.0 0.0 8 100.0
5. School E 17 48.6 18 51.4 35 100.0
7. School G 22 55.0 18 45.0 40 100.0
8. School H 17 51.5 16 48.5 33 100.0
Total 90 53.9 77 46.1 167 100.0

Note: Missing (gender) = 5.
SEIFA deciles were used as the control socio-economic (SES) background variable in
our study.
The percentages of the Australian population in the three SES categories of low,
medium and high are 25, 65 and 10%, respectively (ABS, 2008). In our study, students
with (si)SEND were represented in the expected proportions. Students without (si)
SEND from low SES backgrounds were underrepresented, while those from middle
SES backgrounds were over-represented.
Questionnaire
A pilot study with a separate group of students showed that the respondents found our
Wellbeing Questionnaire easy to understand and relatively simple to complete. Students
who were identified by their teachers as having limited literacy skills were provided
with support from an adult school assistant to complete the questionnaire. The assistant
supported the student to read and respond to each item (assistants were instructed not
to attempt to influence nor interpret the student’s response). The questionnaire com-
prised the following sections:
Self-identified SEND. To begin, students with (si)SEND were identified through the
question: “Do you have any limitations, impairments or special needs [bolded in the
text] that restrict any of your everyday activities or learning at school?” (response,
“yes”/“no”). Information about the type and nature of the special needs was not
requested.
Social, Emotional, and Psychological Wellbeing: MentHC (Keyes, 2006). Students
were asked to respond to questions about how often in the past month they experienced
hedonic and eudaimonic feelings: “never”, “once or twice”, “about once a week”, “2 or
3 times a week”, “almost every day” and “every day”. For example, being “satisfied
with life” was one of the three hedonic items, and “that you had experiences that chal-
lenged you to grow and become a better person” was one of the 11 eudaimonic items.
The 14-item (short form) of the MentHC has been found to have good internal consis-
tency (α > .80) as well as discriminant validity in adults (Keyes et al., 2008; Lamers,
Westerhof, Bohlmeijer, ten Klooster, & Keyes, 2011) and adolescents aged 12–18
(Keyes, 2005).
Global Self-concept: Global Self-concept Scale (Marsh, 1990). These six items mea-
sured the amount of time youth felt good about themselves: “never”, “rarely”, “some-
times”, “most of the time” or “always”. A sample item from this scale is “I’m as good
as most other people”.
Resilience: Connor–Davidson Resilience Scale (CD-RISC; Connor & Davidson,
2003). Students were asked to respond to 10 items taken from the CD-RISC by consid-
ering how each statement applied to them “over the last month”, using responses “not
true at all”, “rarely true”, “sometimes true”, “often true”, and “true nearly all the time”.
For example, “I tend to bounce back after illness, injury or other hardships”.
School Satisfaction, School Contentment, School Connectedness and Support. These 21

items were from the School Contentment section of the Longitudinal Study of
Australian Children (LSAC; Daraganova & Sipthorp, 2011) together with eight other
questions devised by the research team. An item from the LSAC study, for example,
was “My school is a place where I feel happy”. The additional questions covered areas
such as belonging (I feel proud of belonging to my school) and feeling supported at

school (I feel supported by my school in the things that I do) that were not included in
the LSAC group of questions. The items were on a 7-point Likert Scale ranging from
“very strongly disagree” to “very strongly agree”.
Bullying. A single question asked students to indicate “How often this year have you
been bullied or harassed by a student or students at school?” using a scale “every day”,
“most days”, “one or two days a week”, “about once a week”, “less than once a week”
and “never” (Skrzypiec, Slee, Murray-Harvey, & Pereira, 2011). This question enabled
the identification of students who had been bullied once a week or more often (i.e.,
seriously bullied).
Mental Ill-health: The SDQ (Goodman, 2005). The SDQ is a screening instrument
for mental ill-health (Goodman, 1997; ) that includes subscale measures of emotional
symptoms (e.g. “I worry a lot”), conduct problems (e.g. “I get very angry and often
lose my temper”), hyperactivity (e.g. “I am restless. I cannot stay still for long”), peer
problems (e.g. “Other people my age generally like me”) and pro-social behaviour (e.g.
“I try to be nice to people. I care about their feelings”. The pro-social subscale is not
included in the total mental ill-health score). The 20 mental ill-health items were on a
3-point scale ranging from “not true”, “somewhat true” to “certainly true”.
Student Demographics. These included questions about students’ Year level, age, gen-
der, and home postcode, which was used as a proxy for family SES determined using
the SEIFA index (ABS, 2008).
Results
Social, Emotional, and Psychological Wellbeing
Analysis of the MentHC component of our questionnaire began with a Confirmatory
Factor Analysis. The original model proposed by Keyes (2006) showed an adequate fit
(χ2 (74) = 792.1, p < .000; RMSEA = 0.072, 90% CI: 0.068–0.077, probability
RMSEA ≤ .05 = 0%; CFI = 0.941; TLI = 0.928; SRMR = 0.035). Following trimming
(see Appendix 1), the model showed a very good fit with our data (χ2 (31) = 142.3,
p < .000; RMSEA = 0.044, 90% CI: 0.037–0.051, probability RMSEA ≤ .05 = 90.5%;
CFI = 0.986; TLI = 0.979; SRMR = 0.018).
There were significant differences between students with (si)SEND and other stu-
dents in the MentHC categories of flourishing, moderate mental health and languishing
(Mann–Whitney U test, Z = −3.5, p < .001, ES (r) = .08).
Flourishing
Students who did not identify as having (si)SEND (55.7%) were more likely than stu-
dents with (si)SEND (41.4%) to report experiencing wellbeing “almost every day” or
“every day” (see Figure 1).
Moderate Mental Health

A larger proportion of students with (si)SEND (49.3%) than students without (si)SEND
(38.6%) had moderate mental health. Nearly half (49.3%) of the students with (si)
SEND were found to have moderate mental health (see Figure 1).
Languishing
Overall, 9.2% of students with (si)SEND were considered to have been languishing as
their experience of wellbeing was “never” or “once or twice” during the past month, as
shown in Figure 1. This was a larger proportion than students without (si)SEND
(5.6%).
Global Self-concept
Students without (si)SEND had higher global self-concept scores than students with (si)
SEND (Mann–Whitney U, Z = −5.5, p < .000, ES (r) = .13), although the effect size of
this difference was small. As shown in Figure 2, just over two in five (42.1%) of stu-
dents with (si)SEND, compared to nearly two thirds (63.6%) of students without (si)
Figure 1. Experience of wellbeing (MentHC) of students who did and did not self-identify as
having SEND
Figure 2. Sense of a positive global self-concept of students who did and did not self-identify
as having SEND
SEND, reported that they had a sense of a positive global self-concept “most of the
time” or “always”.
Resilience
Students without (si)SEND generally reported higher resilience scores than students
with (si)SEND (Mann–Whitney U, Z = −4.4, p < .000, ES (r) = .10). As shown in
Figure 3, just over one third (38.0%) of students with (si)SEND compared to over half
(55.3%) of students without (si)SEND, reported that they felt resilient “most of the
time” or “always”.
Figure 3. Incidence of being resilient of students who did and did not self-identify as having
SEND
School Satisfaction, School Contentment, School Connectedness and Support

Students with (si)SEND (73.5%) were less likely than students without (si)SEND
(81.8%) to report feeling satisfied with school (Mann–Whitney U, Z = −3.274,
p < .001, ES (r) = .08), but this difference was very small (see Figure 4).
The level of contentment at school reported by students with (si)SEND differed
from students without (si)SEND. Nearly three quarters (74.0%) of students without (si)
SEND reported contentment at school and only 8.4% reported not being content, com-
pared with 58.2 and 14.3% of (si)SEND, respectively (Mann–Whitney U, Z = −3.9,
p < .000, ES (r) = .09).
Students without (si)SEND (82.3%) were more likely than students with (si)SEND
(68.5%) to report a sense of school connectedness (Mann–Whitney U, Z = −3.75,
p < .0001, ES(r) = .08), although this difference was very small (see Figure 5).
Students without (si)SEND (85.1%) were more likely than students with (si)SEND
(75.0%) to feel supported at school (Mann–Whitney U, Z = −2.927, p < .05, ES (r) =
.07), although this difference was very small (see Figure 6).
Bullying
As shown in Table 3, just over half (50.6%) of students without (si)SEND reported that
they had “never” been bullied, while a further 31.8% reported that they had been bul-
lied less than once a week. The comparable bullying figures for students with (si)SEND
were just over one-third (37.5%) who had “never” been bullied and 35.7% who had
been bullied less than once a week. Students who report being bullied about once a
week or more often are considered to have been “seriously bullied” (Slee, 1998). Fol-
lowing this delineation, over one quarter (26.8%) of students with (si)SEND, compared
to nearly one in five (19.2%) students without (si)SEND reported being “seriously bul-
lied” at school (Table 3). Furthermore 8.4% students with (si)SEND compared to 5.4%
students without (si)SEND reported being bullied most days or everyday of the week.
Figure 4. Level of satisfaction with school of students who did and did not self-identify as
having SEND
Figure 5. Extent of school connectedness of students who did and did not self-identify as having
SEND
Figure 6. Extent of feeling supported at school of students who did and did not self-identify as
having SEND
Mental Ill-health
A total SDQ difficulties score for each student was calculated using the procedure rec-
ommended by Goodman (2001). The results showed that 42.4% of students with (si)
SEND were classified in the normal mental health range, 20.3% were borderline, and
37.3% were “of concern” (we prefer the term “of concern” to Goodman’s term “abnor-
mal” for respondents within this score range).
The proportions of male and female students with (si)SEND categorised in the
ranges of normal, borderline and of concern are shown in Tables 4 and 5.
As shown, over one quarter (30.9%) of the (si)SEND males and nearly half (46.5%)
of the (si)SEND females had total SDQ scores that fell in the of concern range, sug-
gesting the presence of mental ill-health.
The mean scores of the SDQ classifications for males and females with (si)SEND
aged 11–13 and 14–16 years are shown in Table 5, together with the means and stan-
dard deviations for Australian young people in a similar age range (Mellor, 2005;
Table 3. Bullying status of students who did and did not self-identify as having SEND
How often this year have you been bullied or harassed by a student or students at school?
Less than once About once a One or two
Never a week week days a week Most days Every day
Count % Count % Count % Count % Count % Count %
Without SEND
835 50.6% 524 31.8% 109 6.6% 92 5.6% 70 4.2% 19 1.2%
Not bullied Not seriously Seriously bullied → 19.2%
bullied
With (self-identified) SEND

63 37.5% 60 35.7% 15 8.9% 16 9.5% 9 5.4% 5 3.0%
Not bullied Not seriously Seriously bullied → 26.8%
bullied
Table 4. Proportion of male and female students with self-identified SEND in each category of
the SDQ by age group
Male Female
Aged 11–13 Aged 14–16 Aged 11–13 Aged 14–16
SDQ
classification Count % Count % Count % Count %
Emotional Normal 30 81.1 35 71.4 19 54.3 17 42.5
symptoms Borderline 4 10.8 10 20.4 5 14.3 4 10.0
category Of concern 3 8.1 4 8.2 11 31.4 19 47.5
Subtotal 37 100.0 49 100.0 35 100.0 40 100.0
Conduct problems Normal 21 56.8 28 56.0 21 65.6 24 60.0
category Borderline 4 10.8 5 10.0 3 9.4 4 10.0
Of concern 12 32.4 17 34.0 8 25.0 12 30.0
subtotal 37 100.0 50 100.0 32 100.0 40 100.0
Hyperactivity Normal 20 55.6 25 51.0 15 42.9 15 37.5
Of concern 9 25.0 14 28.6 15 42.9 19 47.5
Subtotal 36 100.0 49 100.0 35 100.0 40 100.0
Peer problems Normal 20 57.1 25 50.0 24 68.6 21 53.8
Of concern 4 11.4 6 12.0 3 8.6 8 20.5
Subtotal 35 100.0 50 100.0 35 100.0 39 100.0
Total SDQ Normal 14 43.8 21 42.9 16 50.0 13 33.3

Of concern 7 21.9 18 36.7 10 31.3 23 59.0
Subtotal 32 100.0 49 100.0 32 100.0 39 100.0
Youthinmind, 2012). Some of the Total SDQ scores and subscale means of students
with (si)SEND fell outside the normal range for Australian young people. This included
males with (si)SEND aged 14–16 and females with (si)SEND aged 11–16 whose scores
20
Table 5. Mean SDQ scores of male and female students with slef-identified SEND in our study compared to Australian norms
G. Skrzypiec et al.
Male Female
Our study Australian norms Our study Australian norms
11–13 years 14–16 years 11–13 years 14–16 years 11–13 years 14–16 years 11–13 years 14–16 years
Emotional symptoms 3.7 (2.0) 4.2 (1.9) 2.0 (1.9) 2.1 (2.0) 5.6 (2.7) 6.4 (2.8) 2.6 (2.1) 2.9 (1.9)
(normal) (normal) (normal) (normal) (borderline) (borderline) (normal) (normal)
Conduct problems 3.1 (1.8) 3.5 (2.1) 2.0 (1.8) 2.4 (1.9) 2.6 (1.8) 3.4 (2.1) 1.3 (1.5) 1.7 (1.5)
(normal) (normal) (normal) (normal) (normal) (borderline) (normal) (normal)
Hyperactivity 5.3 (1.9) 5.9 (1.6) 3.2 (2.3) 4.0 (2.4) 6.0 (2.3) 6.0 (2.2) 2.6 (2.2) 3.1 (2.2)
(normal) (normal) (normal) (normal) (borderline) (borderline) (normal) (normal)
Peer problems 3.0 (2.2) 3.4 (1.9) 1.7 (1.6) 1.6 (1.6) 2.7 (1.9) 3.8 (1.9) 1.4 (1.6) 1.4 (1.4)
(normal) (borderline) (normal) (normal) (normal) (borderline) (normal) (normal)
Total SDQ 15.2 (5.7) 17.0 (5.0) 8.8 (5.5) 10.1 (6.0) 16.8 (7.0) 19.5 (6.4) 8.0 (6.1) 9.1 (4.8)
(normal) (borderline) (normal) (normal) (borderline) (of concern) (normal) (normal)
were indicative of clinically significant problems that would require further exploration
by mental health professionals such as counsellors, psychologists or psychiatrists.
Discussion
This study has highlighted significant differences in the subjective wellbeing and mental
ill-health of students with and without (si)SEND. Indeed, students with (si)SEND were
well below their peers without (si)SEND in all associated areas of wellbeing examined
in this study (social, emotional, and psychological wellbeing, global self-concept, resili-
ence, school satisfaction, school contentment, school connectedness and support, bully-
ing and mental ill-health). When compared to students without (si)SEND, students with
(si)SEND were more likely to be languishing rather than flourishing, and to be showing
difficulties with their mental health. The magnitude of these differences cannot be
understated. In a recent systematic review of interventions to promote mental health and
wellbeing, Carta, Di Fiandra, Rampazzo, Contu, and Preti (2015) stated that “Since
many adult mental disorders have their onset during childhood or adolescence, early
intervention and prevention of mental health disorders during childhood and adoles-
cence are mandatory” (p. 17). While we concur with this approach for all children and
adolescents, we would stipulate that early intervention and prevention are imperative for
young people with (si)SEND. The present findings regarding the mental health of
Australian middle school students with (si)SEND are in accord with findings from the
KidsMatter Primary and KidsMatter Early Childhood disability evaluations (Dix et al.,
2010, 2013) reported above. Nearly half of the female students with (si)SEND and one
third of the male students with (si)SEND in our study had total SDQ scores that were
“of concern” for their mental ill-health.
Furthermore, we would suggest that having (si)SEND should be added to the risk
factors of mental disorders in school-age children identified by Carta et al. (2015) and
furthermore, that female students with (si)SEND aged 14–16 warrant a specific focus.
We would anticipate that programs designed specifically to improve difficulties with
mental ill-health and to overcome any tendencies towards languishing would be of ben-
efit to students with (si)SEND.
Just over one third of students in our study with (si)SEND reported flourishing com-
pared with more than half of the students who did not indicate that they had (si)SEND.
This finding suggests that more must be done to close the wellbeing gap between stu-
dents with (si)SEND and their peers. As Weare (2015) has recently advised in her What
Works report, a key requirement is to specifically focus school policies and practices on
challenging prejudices around disability. In our view, this includes challenging preju-
dices about what extra provisions need to be made to enable students with (si)SEND to
fully participate in a positive school life. Building the resilience and the global self-
concept of students with (si)SEND, for example, by allowing them to encounter “suc-
cess” and “mastery” and other eudaimonic experiences, would assist them to make
some progress along the mental health spectrum towards flourishing. Of great benefit to
students with (si)SEND would be assistance to achieve a good level of positive func-
tioning in life and developing their potential for mastery in specific learning areas.
Further areas of focus for wellbeing could be programs to address social and emotional
needs as well as ensuring that school experiences are satisfying and fulfilling. As Weare
recommends, there is a need to support the provision of more intense work on social
and emotional skill development for pupils experiencing difficulties, including
one-to-one and group work.
Research by Slee (2005) found that 22.7% of South Australian students in the
middle school years were bullied about once a week or more, which is less than the
concerning rate of bullying reported by students who self-identified as having SEND in
the current study. The findings in our study show that bullying of students with (si)
SEND continues unabated and suggests that anti-bullying programs should be carefully
considered for their impact on students with (si)SEND. For example, including students
with (si)SEND in anti-bullying programs such as the “coping with bullying” interven-
tion (Skrzypiec, Slee, Roussi-Vergou, & Andreou, 2013) would develop students’
coping abilities and resilience and therefore improve their wellbeing. Furthermore, sev-
eral studies have shown that students with affective empathy are less likely to bully
others as well as be bullied by others (Andreou, 2004; Skrzypiec et al., 2014; Sutton,
Smith, & Swettenham, 1999). On this basis we would suggest that anti-bullying pro-
grams incorporate lessons that assist students to gain an understanding and an affective
empathic view of their peers who have (si)SEND.
Limitations
Our study has a number of limitations. Although we designed a convenience sample
with stratification, students from low SES backgrounds were under-represented. As
such, our findings are more likely to reflect the social circumstances of students from
middle and upper SES groups. We chose self-identification of SEND with the purpose
of capturing responses from students with diagnosed and un-diagnosed SEND. How-
ever, due to the anonymous nature of our data we were unable to confirm the students’
self-assessments. We had no information of the types of special needs of our partici-
pants. Care should be taken in generalising our findings to other settings.
The data for this study was generated from self reports and while some self report
forms have been found to be reliable and valid (e.g. Goodman’s (2001), SDQ), and it
can be predicted that students would be good informants about their own feelings and
subjective wellbeing (e.g. see Holfve-Sabel, 2014), future research could triangulate
assessments from other informants such as teachers and parents/guardians.
Conclusion
Our findings suggest that students with (si)SEND in the middle years of school are less
likely to be flourishing and more likely to languishing than their peers without (si)
SEND. In addition, the results from this study add to existing research that shows that
students with SEND are more likely than students without SEND to have mental health
difficulties. In addition to these difficulties, it is imperative that the wellbeing and men-
tal health needs of students with (si)SEND be addressed through intervention programs
tailored to improve their resilience, global self-concept, school satisfaction and their
social, emotional and psychological wellbeing including providing a safe learning envi-
ronment free from bullying.
Acknowledgement
The findings reported here are based on research conducted as part of the IB MYP well-being
study funded by the International Baccalaureate Organization (IBO) to Flinders University. The
content of this publication does not necessarily reflect the views or policies of the IBO. Opinions
reflect those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect those of the funding agency.
Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.
ORCID
Grace Skrzypiec http://orcid.org/0000-0001-6821-2673
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Appendix 1. Mental Health Continuum

Keyes’s (2006) MentHC did not fit our data well until four items were dropped (two from the
psychological wellbeing factor: “That you had something important to contribute to society” and
“That you belonged to a community (like a social group, your school, or your neighbourhood)”
and two from the social wellbeing factor: “That you liked most parts of your personality” and
“That your life has a sense of direction or meaning to it”. These were items that students could
have been confused about in their adolescent stage of life. To satisfactorily fit the MentHC model
to our data, four items were dropped from the scale. This suggests that the MentHC Scale, origi-
nally developed for adults, requires adjustment in order to better suit young people. Further
research is required to better formulate social, emotional and psychological items for a MentHC
Scale so that it is more appropriate for young people.
Figure A1. MentHC model.

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Students with Self-identified Special Educational

Grace Skrzypiec, Helen Askell-Williams, Phillip Slee & Adrian Rudzinski

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*Corresponding author. Email: grace.skrzypiec@ﬂinders.edu.au

© 2015 Taylor & Francis

As previously noted, there is a dearth of studies investigating this positive view of

Promoting Student Wellbeing in Schools

In countries such as Australia, where mainstreaming of students is strongly advo-

Measuring Special Educational Needs and Disabilities (SEND)

A similar perspective prevails in Australia. The Australian Curriculum, Assessment

Measuring Mental Health and Wellbeing

Socio-economic (SES) Background

Table 1. Types of schools participating in the study

Total 90 53.9 77 46.1 167 100.0

School Satisfaction, School Contentment, School Connectedness and Support. These 21

such as belonging (I feel proud of belonging to my school) and feeling supported at

Moderate Mental Health

School Satisfaction, School Contentment, School Connectedness and Support

With (self-identiﬁed) SEND

Total SDQ Normal 14 43.8 21 42.9 16 50.0 13 33.3

Appendix 1. Mental Health Continuum

Figure A1. MentHC model.

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