Psychoticism Trait of Personality and Academic Performance. Correlates of Adolescent Neglect among Senior Secondary School Students in Sokoto Metropolis?

Abstract

The study examined personality trait of psychoticism and academic performance as correlates of adolescent neglect among senior secondary school students in Sokoto metropolis. Descriptive survey design format was used. The total population of senior secondary schools in Sokoto metropolis at the time of the reresearch was 19, 234 from 48 senior secondary schools as documented from Sokoto State Ministry for Basic and Secondary Education. Nine (9) schools constituted the sample for the study, which comprised three male schools, three female schools, and three mixed schools. Stratified, purposive, proportionate and random sampling techniques were employed. The usable sample size of the study was 365 derived from the Research Advisors Table (2006). Two instruments for data collection were used: Eysenck Personality Questionnaire (EPQ: Adult Version for ages16-69) and self-constructed Adolescent Neglect Scale (ANS). Pearson correlation was used on the first and second hypotheses, and independent sample t-test was run on the third hypothesis. The results showed there was significant relationship between adolescent neglect and psychoticism trait of personality, and between neglect of adolescents and academic performance. There was, however, no significant gender difference on the basis of academic performance in relation to neglected adolescents among the samples. The researchers recommended that parents and all other caregivers should ensure that adolescents under their watch are not deprived of basic necessities of life.

Keywords: Adolescent, Neglect, Psychoticism, Superego, Academic performance

Introduction

Psychoticism is a personality disorder associated with low or lack of superego function. The superego is the component of the mind that operates based on internalized moral standards of a person's environment. Such moral standards are principles, conventions, and norms and values acceptable to the society of the individual. The superego psychic function is totally absent at birth; it forms in phases as the individual gradually develops from infancy stage to adulthood. The childhood/adolescence stage happens to be a very crucial period during which moral standards of the society of the growing individual must be imparted. Freud (as cited in Roundy, 2021) theorizes that the superego is the social component of personality that is represented by one’s conscience and is based on one’s ideal of perfection. Conscience is the thought of what is considered wrong based on accepted moral values. While ideal of perfection, or ego ideal, is the thought or belief of what is right in relation to the established moral principles in one's living environment. McLeod (2021) explains that the superego incorporates the values and morals of society which are learned from one's parents and others, which develops around the age of 3 to 5 during the phallic stage of psychosexual development. Going against the established, inherited, accepted moral values of one's society is referred to as psychoticism by psychoanalysts.

Psychoticism is an addition to Eysenck’s original theory of personality which for years had been based on only two personality dimensions— extraversion and neuroticism. Before psychoticism (P) had been added to join E and N, Eysenck had considered it as an independent personality factor, (Eysenck & Eysenck, 1976). However, just as extraversion and neuroticism, P is a bipolar factor, with psychoticism on one pole and superego on the other. High P scorers are often egocentric, cold, nonconforming, impulsive, hostile, aggressive, suspicious, psychopathic, and antisocial. People low on psychoticism (in the direction of superego function) tend to be altruistic, highly socialized, empathic, caring, cooperative, conforming, and conventional (Eysenck, 1992). Psychoticism, as Kelland (2020) highlights, incorporates traits of dominance-leadership,dominance-submission, sensation seeking, and the lack of a superego; and Children who score high on a measure of psychoticism tend to have behavior problems and learning difficulties, they become loners, skip school, commit crimes, and are generally disliked by teachers and peers. Eysenck (as cited in ashton, 2018) suggested that high levels of Psychoticism were associated with criminal behavior, but also with various mental illnesses (including manic depressiveness and schizophrenia) and even with creativity.

Extraversion also is characterized by impulsivity and aggressiveness (Lucas & Diener, 2001), but psychoticism gives more aggression and impulsivity. Morizot (2015) opines that individuals with psychoticism tend to be more egocentric, impulsive and insensitive to others’ feelings and, consequently, more prone to engage in antisocial behaviours. Individuals scored with psychoticism are bound to engage in theft, robbery, rape, misappropriation of public funds, substance abuse, bribery, banditry, insurgency, cultism, insulting others, carriage of unlicensed weapons, and other behaviours considered antisocial.

Furthermore, moral standards (superego) vary from society to society due to differences in religious beliefs, cultural heritage, laws, and civilization. Few behaviours have universal acceptability or unacceptability around the world. This is why there cannot be a universal psychoticism scale for all nations or societies. What's moral or normal in one society may be immoral or abnormal in another society. For instance, behaviours and practices such as early marriage, premarital and extramarital sex, disobedience to parents, cinema going, alcoholism, smoking, pork meat eating, girld-child schooling, and so forth may be normal in some societies, but abnormal and immoral in some other societies. Again, same-sex behaviour (i.e acts of lesbianism and homosexuality) is normal in Spain, Australia, Norway, Italy, United States, Sweden, and in many other civilized societies in Europe and America, and in East and South Asia, but considered highly abnormal and antisocial, extremely disgusting, and punishable in most nations in Western Asia and parts of Africa such as Saudi Arabia, Oman, Iraq, Iran, Qatar, United Arab Emirates, and Nigeria. But habits such as respecting people, keeping trust, taking care of one's kids, sharing information with security personnel, helping one’s parents, and telling the truth are universally acceptable behaviours.

The superego, which is the component of personality that encompasses internalized values and morals, emerges to try to push the ego to act in a more virtuous way (Cherry, 2020). The ego is the psychic function that seeks the intervention of the superego to counter the indiscriminate promptings of the primitive id. Freud (as cited in Mcleod, 2021) defines that the id is the primitive and instinctual part of the mind that contains sexual and aggressive drives and hidden memories. The sexual energy in Freud's psychoanalysis is never intended to refer only to the pleasure or satisfaction that affects genitals. The term sexual libido in the theory refers to any form of pleasure the individual seeks within self or from the outside, which could be by eating, drinking, swallowing, smoking, having sex, stealing, or by victimizing others, and so forth. The id is impulsive, indiscriminate and unconscious part of the psyche which responds directly and immediately to basic urges, needs, and desires which are termed as sexual drives. Freud's theory says that the personality of the newborn child is all id and only later does it develop an ego and super-ego.

Eysenck’s definition of psychoticism is based on a scale or continuum on which there are varying degrees to which an individual might exhibit characteristics of psychoticism (Cummings, 2021). Respondents scored with psychoticism may or may not experience psychosis. Does Eysenck’s model indicate that any person who shows some of the traits that Eysenck identifies as psychoticism become a psychotic? Not necessarily so. Just that respondents with very high scores on the scale may be regarded to have developed psychosis. Psychosis is a brain disease as a result of accident or substance abuse. Eysenck asserted rather that individuals scored with psychoticism may be more susceptible to developing psychosis. However, Luenendonk (2019) explains that if the superego is too strict, the behavior of that person manifests in rigid conduct in real situations, having oftentimes a feeling of guilt and strict judgment towards oneself or to others.

Symptoms of students with psychotic features as outlined by Counselling Center (2022) include disorganized speech and behavior, extremely odd or eccentric behavior, inappropriate or complete lack of emotion, bizarre behavior that could indicate hallucinations, strange beliefs that involve a serious misinterpretation of reality, social withdrawal, and inability to connect with or track normal communication. Eysenck & Eysenck (as cited as in Heaven, Ciarrochi, Vialle, 2007) hypothesized that the uncaring and hostile nature of the high P individual will invariably result in poor academic outcomes. Such a prediction was later supported by many subsequent studies.

Neglect, however , is considered by developmental psychologists, such as Bowlby, Piaget and Vygostky, as a negative attitude among caregivers, who may include parents, older siblings, nannies, school teachers, and authorities. Bradley and Corwyn (2002) see the concept of neglect as the failure to provide basic needed care for an individual irrespective of age such as shelter, food, clothing, supervision, medical care and other basic necessities needed for the person's wellbeing. In the view of Friedman (2010), the impact of neglect does not just end during childhood and adolescence; all care deficits experienced by children often constitute major obstacles during cognitive, behavioral and emotional development during adolescence and further into adulthood. Watson (2005) puts that, “adolescent neglect is the failure to provide basic needed care for the adolescent, such as shelter, food, clothing, education, supervision, medical care and other basic necessities needed for the adolescent's physical, intellectual and emotional development.” Neglect of adolescents may be as a result of several problems on the part of parents such as psychological disorders, poor parenting style, substance abuse, domestic violence, unemployment, poverty, unplanned pregnancy, etc.

Neglect could also be in form of allowing the young individual to witness violence or severe abuse between parents or adults, or be ignored, insulted, or threatened, or not provided with a safe environment and adult emotional support (Cawson, 2002). It is the attitude of neglect that sometimes causes children and adolescents to abscond from school or drop out entirely. This research assesses how adolescent neglect relates to adolescents' extrovert/introvert personality traits in senior secondary schools operating in Sokoto metropolis.

Neglect should not be construed as purely abuse. It is often difficult to distinguish neglect from abuse. Straus, Kinard & Williams ( as cited in Horwath, 2007) regard abuse to be occurring when a parent actively engages in behavior which has a high probability of damaging the individual (physically or psychologically) such as punching or subjecting the child to sexual intercourse. Such acts are abuse regardless of the motive, and regardless of whether the victim does or does not suffer a physical or psychological injury.

Neglect, however, means not engaging in behaviour which will meet the developmental needs of a person, such as not providing adequate food or supervision. As in the case of abuse, failure to provide for these needs is neglect regardless of the motive or reason, and regardless of whether the victim is actually damaged by such neglect. Watson (2005) puts that, abuse refers to acts of commission, whereas neglect refers to acts of omission. Also, as distinguished by GoodTherapy (2022), neglect occurs when an individual who relies on another person for care does not receive the help or attention they need in order to maintain their health and well-being. While abuse may manifest as an intentional withholding of care, neglect most often occurs due to an oversight or a caregiver’s inability to properly care for the person in their charge.

High frequency or chronicity of neglect, however, is what various researchers such as Brandon, M. et al. (2013) and Thornberry, T.P. et al. (2010) have said can have effects on life of adolescents. In the words of Porchia-Usher (as cited in Massey-Stokes, 2018), chronic neglect is defined as an ongoing, serious pattern of deprivation of a child's basic physical, developmental, and/or emotional needs for healthy growth and development.

There are six different forms of neglect that have been explained by various authors and organisations. Such are: (DePanfilis, 2006; Howarth, 2007; Massey-Stokes, 2018; Project-sakinah, 2015; WebMD, 2015; Pekarsky, 2017; Jasper, Mazarin, Levitas, 2022). These are physical neglect, medical neglect, environmental neglect, emotional neglect, educational neglect and inadequate supervision.

Physical Neglect: this is one of the most widely recognized forms. It includes abandonment, expulsion, undernourishment, denial of appropriate clothing, etc.

Medical Neglect: this encompasses a parent’s or guardian's denial of or delay in seeking needed healthcare for the individual.

Environmental Neglect: this is characterized by a lack of environmental or neighborhood safety for the individual. This includes allowing the subject to reside in or visit drug-infested areas, or where dangerous people, insects or diseases are found.

Emotional Neglect: this includes denying the young child the ability to interact or communicate with peers or adults outside or inside the home, inadequate display of affection for the child, allowing him/her to engage in maladaptive behaviour such as abusing and fighting others in the name of defending self or parents, not minding about the feelings of the child, and allowing him/her to witness violence between adults.

Educational Neglect: this includes permitting truancy, not providing the needed learning materials and conducive environment, inattention to the individual's special education needs such as optical eyeglasses, hearing aids, etc.

Inadequate Supervision: this includes lack of proper adequate supervision to the person, exposure to bad peers, and to illicit drugs. Also, entrusting the person to an inappropriate caregiver or guardian falls under this type of neglect.

A neglected child/adolescent however exhibits among others the following signs and symptoms (GoodTherapy, 2022; Brighton and Hove Safeguarding Children’s Partnership, 2022; National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children [NSPCC], 2017): being frequently absent from school, inappropriate clothing , wearing clothes that are constantly dirty or smelly, being frequently hungry, unkempt appearance and poor body hygiene, lacking necessary medical care, begging or stealing things like money or food, being left home alone for long periods of time, taking on the role of a carer for other family members, changes in behaviour, such as becoming clingy, aggressive, withdrawn, depressed or anxious, displaying obsessive behaviour, misuse of drugs, self-harm or attempts at suicide.

When there is intentional or unintentional failure to provide all or part of the basic needed care for the adolescent, such failure is regarded as 'adolescent neglect'. Therefore, adolescent neglect is the situation whereby an adolescent, for certain reasons, does not have his/her basic needs met by those responsible for them. This attitude of neglect denies adolescents the opportunity to realize their goals in life and develop into adults their society will be proud of.

Furthermore, there are various reasons that may put parents and other caregivers at greater risk of becoming neglectful towards adolescents under their care. Such are risk factors that can rob adolescents and younger children all or most care necessary for their upbringing. Glaser (2011), DePanfilis (2006), Stalker and McArthur (2012) and GoodTherapy (2022) have from different perspectives outlined various risk factors for neglect of children and adolescents: domestic violence, chronic medical or mental health issues in family, substance abuse issues, poverty, depression, and absence of or inadequate government commitment in protecting the rights of children and adolescents.

Statement of the Problem

In Sokoto State, adolescent neglect is a widespread phenomenon; adolescents are typically introduced to adult life almost prematurely; families pay little or no attention at all to the consequences of factors that influence the lives of young people. When infants and children are denied enough of good food, clothing, shelter, medicine, training and supervision, we say there is child neglect. In the same vein, when such denial occurs with respect to adolescents, researchers on adolescent development opine that adolescent neglect has occurred. In Sokoto and environs, just as in other parts of Nigeria, children and adolescents raised by well-to-do homes also experience different forms of neglect which cause detrimental long lasting effects during developmental stages of such individuals.

Neglect of adolescents is indeed a common problem in Sokoto State. Sometimes parents and other stakeholders fail to recognize the need to support adolescents just as they support younger children. Observably, many families in Sokoto apparently assume that their children require little guidance when they reach puberty and should be allowed to have independent decisions or fend for themselves. This attitude of neglect denies adolescents the opportunity to realize their goals in life and develop into adults their society will be proud of.

There are different ways in which adolescents in Sokoto are being neglected at home and within the school environment. The researcher, having taught for many years in both private and public schools in the state, has observed that some adolescents are into drugs, out-of-school, drop-out, delinquent, lack adequate school materials, look depressed, lack enough medical care, personal and environmental hygiene, and emotional care in their homes. Similarly, some schools, across Sokoto State, which are supposed to compensate the hope and serve as source of hope for students, are not taking proper adequate care. The researcher has observed that some young people in schools in the state exhibit certain behaviours that serve as surface traits of psychoticism, which include bullying, thuggery, substance misuse, rudeness to teachers, stealing, etc. These immoral habits, coupled with the signs of neglect experience in such senior secondary school students in the state, pushed the researcher to conduct this research in order to find out how adolescent neglect relates to psychoticism trait of personality particularly with respect to adolescent students in senior secondary schools located in Sokoto metropolis.

Research Questions

The research seeks to answer the following questions on senior secondary school students in Sokoto metropolis—

1. Is there significant relationship between adolescent neglect and psychoticism ?
2. Is there significant relationship between adolescent neglect and academic performance.
3. Is there significant gender difference on the basis of academic performance?

Objectives of the Study

The following are objectives of the research in relation to senior secondary school students in Sokoto metropolis—

1. To examine the relationship between adolescent neglect and psychoticism .
2. To study the relationship between adolescent neglect and academic performance.
3. To examine the gender difference on the basis of academic performance.

Research Hypotheses

The research tests the following hypotheses in relation to senior secondary school students in Sokoto metropolis—

1. There is no significant relationship between adolescent neglect and psychoticism.
2. There is no significant relationship between adolescent neglect and academic performance.
3. There is no significant gender difference on the basis of academic performance.

Theoretical Framework

This research is based on three relevant theories: Attachment Theory by Bowlby, Parental Investment Theory by Triveres, and Trait Theory of Personality by Eysenck. The major assumption of Bowlby's attachment theory is that parents are a sanctuary of safety throughout pre-adult life (i.e adolescence). Secure attachments help children and adolescents to develop an internal model of self-competence and a model of dependability for others. While insecure attachments, however, promote feelings of threat, rejection, and personal unworthiness.

The Parental Investment Theory, however, suggests that parents sometimes decrease or completely cease investment in their children when they think that not doing so is more beneficial than the amount of benefit to be derived from investing in their child's education, medical care or other things. Children and adolescents who have abnormal physical features or mental disabilities are at greater risk for experiencing neglect according to the Parental Investment Theory. Another thing that could affect parental investment is the financial burden of childrearing. If parents see a greater benefit in a different use of their finances than investment in their children, they are likely to take advantage of the more lucrative option. In Sokoto State, generally, certain children are neglected due to this.

Eysenck's trait theory revolves around neuroticism, extraversion and psychoticism. With psychoticism observed on a continuum of psychoticism and superego. A respondent on Eysenck's scale can score zero in psychoticism questions unlike in neuroticism and extraversion; this is why superego is not depicted along with psychoticism in hypothesis testing.

Research Methodology

The research design adopted for the study is descriptive research, which primarily focuses on describing the extent of relationships or differences between quantitative variables. A descriptive research helps provide answers to the questions of who, what, when, where, and how with regard to a particular research problem (Baron, 2001).

However, The target population for this study was the population of SS I and SS II students from 48 senior secondary schools in Sokoto metropolis, which was 19, 234. The students' average age was 17. A multi-stage sampling technique was used to arrive at 365 respondents out of nine schools using the Research Advisors table (2006). Stratified, purposive, proportionate and random sampling techniques were employed.

Two instruments were used by the study: Self-developed Adolescent Neglect Scale (ANS) and Eysenck Personality Questionnaire (EPQ: Adult: 16 -69 years of age) The Adolescent Neglect Scale (ANS) is made up of 30 items on a five-point Likert scale ranging from strongly disagree to strongly agree answered by the samples. Scores range from 30 - 150; higher scores (91 - 150) indicate adolescent neglect, while lower scores (30 - 90) shows absence of adolescent neglect. While, on the EPQ, the researcher adopted only the Psychoticism (P) scale consisting of 25 yes or no questions

The validity for Adolescent Neglect Scale was provided by the researcher by exposing the scale to experts in the field of Psychology. While Eysenck and Eysenck (1975) validated the EPQ. Uzoka and Naedo (2013) used EPQ in their study of psychological correlates achievement in sports among Nigerian adolescents and maintained that EPQ had originality of measuring what it ought to measure.

In establishing the reliability of the instruments, test-retest method was used on Adolescent Neglect Scale in a three-week interval, and Eysenck's indices on Psychoticism scale were adopted. The Pearson index obtained on the neglect scale was 0.74, while the alpha coefficients of reliability of the EPQ (Adult) for Nigerian samples were provided by Eysenck, Adelaja and Eysenck (1978), while Eysenck and Eysenck provided the test-retest reliability coefficients of EPQ (Adult) for samples of English University Students. The test-retest time interval was one month. The coefficients for Nigerian samples were 0.64 (males) and 0.40 (females), while the coefficients for English samples were 0.76 (males) and 0.51 (females).

Pearson correlation was run on the first and second hypotheses, and independent sample t-test was used on the third hypothesis.

Data Analyses and Presentations

Among the 365 respondents to whom the Adolescent Neglect Scale (ANS) and Eysenck's personality scale were exposed, a total of 117 were identified as neglected of which 69 were males and 48 were females. There were 32 neglected adolescents with psychoticism trait 24 of whom were males and 8 were females.

Hypothesis 1: There is no significant relationship between adolescent neglect and psychoticism trait in senior secondary students in Sokoto metropolis.

Table 1: Relationship between Adolescent Neglect and Psychoticism among Senior Sec. Sch. Students in Sokoto Metropolis

Abbildung in dieser Leseprobe nicht enthalten

Table 1 shows that the mean and standard deviation of psychotic personality are 5.78 and 2.27 respectively, while adolescent neglect has a mean score of 89.38 and standard deviation of 16.36. The table also indicates that out of 117 neglected adolescents, 32 were psychotic. From the table, it is understandable that r-Cal (0.551) is greater than p -Value (0.036) at 0.05 alpha level, which means a significantly positive relationship between adolescent neglect and psychotic personality trait in adolescents in Sokoto Metropolis. This is in clearer terms an indication that adolescent neglect is significantly related to the trait of psychoticism among adolescents in Sokoto metropolis. This particular finding deductively says that experience of neglect from parents, teachers, government and other stakeholders worsens adolescents in terms of psychoticism trait of personality.

Hypothesis 2: There is no significant relationship between adolescent neglect and academic performance in senior secondary students in Sokoto metropolis.

Table 2: Relationship between Adolescent Neglect and Academic Performance among Senior Sec. Sch. Students in Sokoto Metropolis

Abbildung in dieser Leseprobe nicht enthalten

Table 2 shows a mean score of 38.59 and a standard deviation of 12.10 for academic performances of 117 neglected adolescents, with 89.38 and 16.36 as mean and standard deviation of neglect at 115 degree of freedom. There is an indication that r-Cal (−0.412) is negatively greater the critical p -Value of 0.035 at 0.05 alpha, which shows the presence of a negative relationship between adolescent neglect and academic performance of senior secondary school students in Sokoto metropolis in Sokoto Metropolis. This is in clearer terms saying that the rate of failure in academics in Sokoto State often bemoaned by government and other educational stakeholders is connected with the way our children and adolescents are being deprived of essentials of life. The negative relationship means that the higher the neglect of adolescents the lower their academic performance.

Hypothesis 3: There is no significant gender difference on the basis of academic performance in senior secondary students in Sokoto metropolis.

Table 3: Gender Difference on the Basis of Academic Performance among Senior Sec. Sch. Students in Sokoto Metropolis

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Table 3 indicates there is no significant difference between neglected male and female senior secondary school students in Sokoto on the basis of academic performance in Sokoto Metropolis. This is because t-Cal (0.097) appears lower than the p-Value (0.923) under 115 degrees of freedom at 0.05 level of significance. This finding makes it understandable that there is comparatively no significant difference in the level of pass or fail obtained by neglected male senior secondary school students from the scores obtained by the neglected female senior secondary school students.

Discussions of Findings

The finding from hypothesis one of the study is a broad indication that adolescents in our schools who basically lack enough of learning facilities, supervision and guidance, and who experience emotional neglect in the home or elsewhere, and encounter a lot of environmental hazards and medical deficits are prone to develop psychoticism which cause tendencies for theft, thuggery, prostitution, robbery, disobedience to parents, sexual assault, murder, insurgency, suicide and so on. From this finding therefore, the researcher builds the view that most adolescents having their hands soiled in drug misuse and other crimes may have experienced certain forms of neglect in the home or other places.

Moreover, from the result of hypothesis one, psychotic personality is significantly positively related to adolescent neglect as earlier reported by Egeland, et al. (1983) in a research that studied relationship between child abuse and neglect and development of behavioural problems such as aggression and depression. Aggression and depression are both symptoms of psychoticism which happened to be among the five dimensions of personality which the researcher correlated with adolescent neglect. The positive correlation indicates that as neglect increases, psychotic behaviours also increase, thereby making the individual aggressive, depressed, moody, hopeless, suicidal, and so on. Gilbert et al (2009) also reported a positively significant relationship between neglect and aggressive and violent behaviours (psychoticism) in adolescence in the United Kingdom, which also tallies with the above finding. A research by Jebb (2001) is also in agreement with the finding of this research that anxiety and depression (traits of psychoticism) correlate with child abuse and neglect in Karachi. A research by Harkness & Lumley (2008) also found a relationship between child abuse and neglect and depression (psychotic trait) particularly for adolescents.

The research found a negative relationship between adolescent neglect and academic performance. This is in clear terms saying that the rate of failure in curricular activities in Sokoto State often bemoaned by government and other educational stakeholders is connected with the way children and adolescents are deprived of essentials of life. The negative relationship means that the higher the neglect of adolescents the lower their academic performance. This finding is in agreement with the results by Sepp (1989) who also reported a correlation between child abuse and school performance among school pupils in Johannesburg. He used a sample of 380 grade six pupils. Dortmund (1991) agreed with this research by arriving also at a negative correlation between neglectful parenting and child's academic achievement in Miami with a sample of 700 pupils. Margaret (1988) in Freetown also examined how child abuse affected school performance, and she discovered that pupils with indications of abuse had poorer academic scores. In a study by Lamont (2010) in Birmingham with a sample 230 children, it was found that neglected children had the poorest school performance of all maltreated children. The performance of neglected adolescents was compared with that of physically abused, sexually abused, and a group of non-abused ones.

Hypothesis three result of this research affirms the absence of gender difference on the basis of academic performance in relation to neglected adolescents in senior secondary schools in Sokoto metropolis. There was a t-Cal of 0.097 and a p-value of 0.923 under 115 degrees of freedom at 0.05 level of significance. This finding makes it understandable that there is comparatively no significant difference in the level of pass or fail obtained by male adolescents from that of their female counterparts. This finding could be as a result of the fact that both male and female adolescents who participated in this research attended schools of the same standards, taught by teachers with similar backgrounds, and sent by parents with similar norms and similar attitudes in terms of social values and family systems.

Recommendations

The following are the recommendations of the study based on its findings.

1. Parents and all caregivers anywhere in Sokoto and elsewhere should play their own role of making sure that basic life's necessities in relation to children/adolescents under their care are addressed so that no form of personality disorder develops thereupon. Parents should not discriminate against any gender concerning such basic necessities.
2. Parents also need to control the behaviours and interactions of their wards against possible encroachment of bad peers, and against substance abuse and watching of and participation in antisocial activities, and so forth.
3. Teachers in Sokoto should ensure that they fully discharge their duties and responsibilties in relation to the curricular and extracurricular activities of their students.
4. Schools in Sokoto should consistently make parents, guardians and government aware of all inadequacies or deficiencies with respect to the pupils/students that are within the schools.

Conclusion

The study has indicated that there is a statistically significant relationship between psychoticism trait of personality and neglect in relation to adolescents in Sokoto metropolis in contrast to the null hypothesis. There is, however, a significantly negative relationship between adolescent neglect and academic performance of the adolescent respondents. And there is no significant gender difference on the basis of academic performance in relation to the neglected adolescents.

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