Extending the PDAC framework to examine associations between school type and character virtues and pupil perceptions of key competencies

Abstract This study examines whether school type is associated with primary pupils’ self-perceived key competencies and whether the associations between character virtues and those self-perceptions vary across school types. The Positive Development and Assessment Competencies (PDAC) framework conceptualises competencies as multidimensional and context-dependent. The present study treats school type as a distal structural indicator of institutional context and tests an empirical extension of PDAC rather than assuming that PDAC predicts school-type moderation. The cross-sectional sample comprised 993 Year 5 and Year 6 pupils from 16 participating schools in Andalusia, Spain (8 public, 5 state-subsidised private, and 3 private schools). Virtues were measured with the I.V.yF. Niños and self-perceived competencies with the #ICOMpri1. Continuous subscale scores were analysed using generalized estimating equations (GEE) with pupils clustered within schools, an exchangeable working correlation, and a bias-reduced covariance estimator. Models adjusted for sex, grade, and grade repetition, and false discovery rate correction was applied. School type showed FDR-adjusted omnibus associations with linguistic communication, knowledge of and interaction with the physical world, and cultural and artistic self-perceived competency. In a sensitivity analysis additionally adjusting for all six virtue scores, only linguistic communication retained an FDR-adjusted school-type association. No school-type-by-virtue interaction survived correction across the 48 interaction tests. These findings provide preliminary evidence that some competency self-perceptions vary with school type while offering no robust evidence that school type systematically changes virtue-competency associations in this sample.