Truancy, School Refusal and Anxiety

Abstract

Truancy in French technical secondary schools is a source of considerable concern which has given rise to the present study. However, issues associated with truancy seldom take into account psychological criteria, as it tends to give rise to an immediate institutional reaction. However, truancy may not be solely the re.ection of a lack of motivation or oppositional de.ant disorder. On the contrary, truancy is considered here as a refusal to attend school in relation to different types of anxiety. Positive reinforcement, a category of school refusal de.ned by Kearney and Silverman (1993) was found to be prevalent in the study described here, re.ecting that a form of social desirability tended to hide an admitted and recognized anxiety. It is concluded that a deeper differential study based on psychological criteria is needed. We emphasize the need to conceive truancy, institutionally as well as scienti.cally, as a process that must take into account emotional dimensions.