Adolescent Student Psychological Need Thwarting Scale

Abstract

The Adolescent Student Psychological Need Thwarting Scale (AS-PNTS), developed by Adigun (2024), was created to facilitate comprehensive research into how the relational structure of the learning environment impacts adolescent students. The scale’s construction involved extensive research and expert peer evaluation, building upon the theoretical framework of the original Psychological Need Thwarting Scale (PNTS; Bartholomew et al., 2011). The final 9-item AS-PNTS was rigorously tested with grade 7–12 students in a public school district in the Southwest United States, demonstrating strong empirical support across factor analysis, reliability metrics, and validity evidence.

Keywords

Adolescent Students, Autonomy Need Thwarting, Competence Need Thwarting, Divergent Validity, Learning Environment, Psychological Need Thwarting, Relatedness Need Thwarting, Revised Scale, Student-Teacher Relationships

Authors

Adigun, Olajumoke Beulah

Purpose

The primary purpose of the AS-PNTS is to accurately measure adolescent students’ self-reported experiences regarding the negatively consequential aspects of their student-teacher relationships. This measurement is crucial for understanding how detrimental interactions within the educational setting contribute to psychological distress or disengagement among students.

By focusing specifically on the relational dynamics within the classroom, the scale provides researchers and educators with a targeted instrument to identify specific interaction patterns that actively impede student well-being and academic functioning, thereby enabling the development of targeted intervention strategies.

Construct

The scale measures Psychological Need Thwarting, a core concept derived from Self-Determination Theory (SDT). Psychological Need Thwarting refers to the active attempts by others (in this context, teachers) to interfere with or suppress students’ fundamental psychological needs for autonomy, competence, and relatedness.

The AS-PNTS operationalizes this construct by assessing specific behaviors and environmental conditions that lead students to feel controlled (thwarting autonomy), ineffective (thwarting competence), or socially isolated or rejected (thwarting relatedness) within the academic setting. The scale conceptualizes this as a second-order factor encompassing the three basic psychological needs.

Validity

The validity of the AS-PNTS was established through multiple statistical approaches, confirming its ability to measure the intended construct accurately.

• Construct Validity: This was strongly supported by the outcomes of the factor analysis, which confirmed that the items loaded onto the hypothesized underlying structure of psychological need thwarting.
• Convergent Validity: Evidence for convergent validity was demonstrated through model testing, which examined the hypothesized relationship between high scores on the AS-PNTS and indicators of student disengagement. The resulting structural model showed an acceptable fit, suggesting that need thwarting aligns theoretically with negative academic outcomes.
• Divergent Validity (Discriminant Validity): Divergent validity was confirmed by model testing the relationship between the AS-PNTS and home academic emphasis. The acceptable fit of this model indicated that the scale measures a distinct construct—student-teacher relational dynamics—that is separate from, though potentially related to, external factors like parental academic support.

Reliability

The reliability of the AS-PNTS was assessed using internal consistency measures to ensure that the items consistently measure the same underlying construct.

The analysis revealed that the AS-PNTS functions as a highly reliable multidimensional composite. Specifically, the calculated McDonald’s omega coefficient was 0.91. This value is exceptionally high, indicating excellent internal consistency and coherence across the 9 items retained in the final model.

Factor Analysis

The structural integrity of the AS-PNTS was rigorously tested using Confirmatory Factor Analysis (CFA). The CFA confirmed the a priori hypothesized specification for the scale structure.

The statistical results indicated that a second-order specification, where the specific need thwarting factors (Autonomy, Competence, Relatedness) load onto a single, overarching factor of Psychological Need Thwarting, provided a significantly better fit to the observed data than a simpler first-order specification. During the refinement process, seven initial items were removed due to low commonality (r² < 0.55), resulting in the optimized 9-item scale model. Furthermore, robust evidence for measurement invariance was established, confirming that the scale functions equivalently when administered to both high-school and middle-school student populations.

Instrument

Test Type: Inventory/Questionnaire

Format: 9-item self-report scale

Language Available: English

Population Group: Adolescents (Male and Female)

Age Group: 13-17 years (Grade 7–12)

Population Details: Respondents were adolescent students located in the United States, specifically within a public school district in the Southwest region.

Test Methodology: The validation process utilized comprehensive psychometric methods, including Test Validity, Construct Validity, Convergent Validity, Discriminant Validity, Test Reliability, Internal Consistency, Factor Analysis, Confirmatory Factor Analysis (CFA), and Measurement Invariance.

Keywords

Adolescent Psychology, Educational Measures, Learning Environment, Need Satisfaction, Psychological Needs, Student Attitudes, Student Characteristics, Teacher-Student Interaction, Test Revision

Authors

Author ORCID Identifier: http://orcid.org/0000-0002-8682-5016

Affiliation Email addresses: [email protected]

Correspondence Address: Olajumoke Beulah Adigun, Oklahoma State University

Permissions & Fee and Test Year

The scale was formally developed and tested in 2024. Test items are currently not publicly available. Researchers interested in obtaining the test items or usage permissions must contact the author or publisher directly. No files are available for download.

Reference’s

• Adigun, O. B. (2024). Conceptualization and measurement of adolescent students’ psychological need thwarting based on the student–teacher relationship. Learning Environments Research, 27(2), 217–239. DOI: 10.1007/s10984-023-09476-8
• Bartholomew, K., Ntoumanis, N., Ryan, R. M., & Thøgersen-Ntoumani, C. (2011). Self-determination theory and the measurement of psychological need thwarting: Introducing a new multidimensional scale. Journal of Counseling Psychology, 58(2), 178–192.

Items of the Adolescent Student Psychological Need Thwarting Scale

IMPORTANT: The following scale items must be preserved in their original language and must not be changed in any way.

No test items are provided in the source content. For obtaining test items, please contact the author or publisher.