One of the objectives of any school action plan is to achieve full schooling and regular school attendance for all students during the stages of compulsory schooling. Numerous studies have analysed the influence of different personality factors on the academic career of students. In particular, interest in analysing perfectionism, as a multidimensional construct of great impact during childhood, has grown in recent years. However, little research has investigated the relationship between childhood perfectionism and school attendance. This study aims to analyse the predictive capacity of perfectionism on school refusal. In order to carry out this research, 452 Spanish children enrolled in the second and third cycle of Primary Education participated in this study. The procedure consisted of completing two questionnaires: the Child and Adolescent Perfectionism Scale, to assess perfectionism, and the School Refusal Assessment Scale-Revised for Children, for school refusal. All statistical analyses were carried out with SPSS 24. The results show that self-oriented perfectionism is a positive and statistically significant predictor of high levels of school refusal in order to avoid school situations that generate negative affectivity, as well as to obtain tangible reinforcement external to school. On the other hand, socially prescribed perfectionism turned out to be a positive and statistically significant predictor of high levels of school refusal in order to escape from school situations that generate social aversion, fear of evaluation or in order to capture the attention of significant others. From these findings it is concluded that it is necessary to continue reflecting on which personality traits interfere in the emergence and maintenance of this behaviour.
