,O”mal o,.wml Pryrhology. V”l 27, pp. 35-45, 1989 Pergamon Press plc Printed m the USA oozz-4405/89/13 00 + 00 0 ,989 TheJournal 01 School Psychology. Inr A Teacher Assessment of Self-Controlling Skills and Their Relationship to Self-Control and Adjustment Ratings john #! Fantuzzo California State University, Fullerton Cynthia A. Rohrbeck George Washington University A. Dirk Hightower University of Rochester zyxwvutsrqponmlkjihgfedcbaZYXWVU The present study involved a teacher assessment of 13 self-controlling skills across elementary school grades for urban and suburban locations and an assessment of the relationship between these skills and students’ self-control and adjustment ratings. One hundred and eight first- through fifth-grade teachers completed the Teacher Assess- ment of Self-Control Skills (TASCS) rating instrument on the students in their classes and the Teacher Self-Control Rating Scale (TSCRS) and the Teacher-Child Rating Scale (T-CRS) for four randomly selected children from their classes. There were significant relationships between the presence of self-controlling skills and ratings of self-control and adjustment in upper elementary school grades. Additionally, signifi- cant differences were found in the level of self-controlling skills across elementary school grades and urban and suburban locations. The implications of the findings for the development of self-control training curricula are discussed. Self-control skills have been frequently cited as key competencies necessary for school and other types of life adjustments (Anderson & Messick, 1974; Hum- phrey, 1982; Zigler & Trickett, 1978). P ro p onents of self-control training as- sert that children who have the ability to maintain and alter their own goal- directed behavior with a minimum of external support are better equipped to manage life’s problems and challenges (Kanfer & Phillips, 1970; Karoly, 1977) than children who are solely dependent on adult direction. In recent years, researchers and clinicians have underscored the prevention potential of self-control training in school (Durlak &Jason, 1984). Research findings not only have documented the effectiveness of these techniques in strengthening a wide array of positive classroom behaviors (Gross & Drab- man, 1982) but also have suggested that these procedures are relatively more Received June 23, 1986; final revision received June 3, 1988. Address correspondence and reprint requests to John W. Fantuzzo, Graduate School of Educa- tion, University of Pennsylvania, 3700 Walnut St., Philadelphia, PA 19104-6216. 35