Prospective Study
Copyright ©The Author(s) 2015. Published by Baishideng Publishing Group Inc. All rights reserved.
World J Diabetes. Apr 15, 2015; 6(3): 527-533
Published online Apr 15, 2015. doi: 10.4239/wjd.v6.i3.527
Perception of difficulty and glucose control: Effects on academic performance in youth with type I diabetes
Tiffany M Potts, Jacqueline L Nguyen, Kanika Ghai, Kathy Li, Lawrence Perlmuter
Tiffany M Potts, Jacqueline L Nguyen, Kathy Li, Lawrence Perlmuter, Department of Psychology, Rosalind Franklin University of Medicine and Science - College of Health Professions, North Chicago, IL 60064, United States
Kanika Ghai, Pediatric Endocrinology, Advocate Children’s Hospital, Park Ridge, IL 60068, United States
Author contributions: Potts TM and Perlmuter L designed the research project; Ghai K provided the patient population and the testing space; Potts TM performed the research; Potts TM, Nguyen JL, Li K, and Perlmuter L analyzed the data; Potts TM, Nguyen JL, Li K and Perlmuter L wrote the paper.
Ethics approval: The study was reviewed and approved by the Rosalind Franklin University of Medicine and Science Institutional Review Board and the Advocate Health Care Institutional Review Board.
Clinical trial registration: Not available.
Informed consent: All study participants, or their legal guardian, provided informed written consent prior to study enrollment.
Conflict-of-interest: There are no conflicts of interest related to this study.
Data sharing: No additional data are available.
Open-Access: This article is an open-access article which was selected by an in-house editor and fully peer-reviewed by external reviewers. It is distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited and the use is non-commercial. See: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/
Correspondence to: Lawrence Perlmuter, PhD, Professor, Department of Psychology, Rosalind Franklin University of Medicine and Science - College of Health Professions, 3333 Green Bay Road, North Chicago, IL 60064, United States. lawrence.perlmuter@rosalindfranklin.edu
Telephone: +1-847-5788754 Fax: +1-847-5788765
Received: August 6, 2014
Peer-review started: August 6, 2014
First decision: August 28, 2014
Revised: October 7, 2014
Accepted: February 4, 2015
Article in press: February 9, 2015
Published online: April 15, 2015
Core Tip

Core tip: The objective of the current study was to investigate the association between perceptions of difficulty and academic performance in adolescents with type 1 diabetes. Perceptions of difficulty are reflected in executing cognitive activities as well as in the task of glucose regulation. Glucose control needs to be understood, not so much from a biological perspective but as an effortful process that is also reflected in academic challenges. The problem of anergia observed generally in patients with diabetes seems to broadly affect a variety of tasks and challenges. Thus, the novelty of the study is in showing that the regulation of glucose in diabetic patients is another example of the broad challenges confronted in the life of patients with diabetes.