Emotional difficulties are associated with both authorised and unauthorised school
absence, but there has been little longitudinal research and the temporal nature of these
associations remains unclear. This study presents three-wave random-intercepts panel models
of longitudinal reciprocal relationships between teacher-reported ...
Emotional difficulties are associated with both authorised and unauthorised school
absence, but there has been little longitudinal research and the temporal nature of these
associations remains unclear. This study presents three-wave random-intercepts panel models
of longitudinal reciprocal relationships between teacher-reported emotional difficulties and
authorised and unauthorised school absence in 2,542 English children aged 6 to 9 years old at
baseline, who were followed-up annually. Minor differences in the stability effects were
observed between genders but only for the authorised absence model. Across all time-points,
children with greater emotional difficulties had more absences, and vice versa (authorised: ρ
= .23-.29, p < .01; unauthorised: ρ = .28, p < .01). At the within-person level, concurrent
associations showed that emotional difficulties were associated with greater authorised (β =
.15-.17, p < .01) absence at Time 3 only, but with less unauthorised (β = -.08--.13, p < .05)
absence at Times 1 and 2. In cross-lagged pathways, neither authorised nor unauthorised
absence predicted later emotional difficulties, and emotional difficulties did not predict later
authorised absence at any time-point. However, greater emotional difficulties were associated
with fewer unauthorised absences across time (β = -13--.22, p < .001). The implications of
these findings are discussed.
