Friends or Foes? A Cross Cultural Comparison on the Impact of Perceived Competition on School Belonging

• In Event: Comparative Studies of Educational Policy: Examples from Hong Kong, Mainland China, and South Korea

Proposal

Introduction

School belonging, characterized by the cognitive, emotional, and psychological identification with and engagement in one's school community, has been widely recognized as a crucial factor in promoting positive academic outcomes and overall well-being. However, the pervasive competitive atmosphere in modern educational contexts has raised concerns about its potential impact on students' well-being, particularly on the facet of belonging. This study delves into the mechanisms through which competition influences adolescents' self-perception, confidence, and non-cognitive attributes such as resilience and achievement motivation.
By analyzing the relationship between school belonging and the competitive atmosphere, this study contributes to the broader understanding of how educational environments impact students' holistic development. This could inform educational policies and practices aimed at fostering a balanced and supportive atmosphere that encourages healthy competition while nurturing students' sense of belonging, maintaining a positive school environment that prioritizes both academic excellence and students' well-being.

Theoretical Background

According to De Vos and Dijkstra (2000), school belonging is an emotional state where students perceive themselves as important members of their class or school, accepted by others, valued, and integrated with others. This area of study has garnered international attention. Finn's research has shown that school belonging can enhance academic performance and attendance, while students lacking school belonging exhibit higher dropout rates. The wealth of international research underscores students' need for a sense of belonging in school, which serves as a strong motivator for promoting holistic development and positive learning engagement. As previous studies have showed, there are many potential factors that influence students’ belonging in school, and evidently, school atmosphere/climate plays an important role here.
Excessive competition within educational settings can have detrimental effects despite its natural organizational presence. Adolescents, driven by academic excellence, increasingly engage in extracurricular activities, perceiving peers as rivals. Peer comparisons and academic performance evaluations prevail, impeding peer relationships and well-being. Drawing from social sociology's reference group theory, peers serve functions of conformity and comparison (Kelley, 1952; Merton, 1968; Sacerdote, 2011), where individuals adopt similar behaviors as peers, while social norms enhance performance. Peer groups also function as mirrors for self-assessment. Strong peer capabilities may trigger a "dejection effect," lowering self-esteem.
Existing research by Pop (2013), Falk (2006), and Wu (2020) suggests that a competitive peer atmosphere affects self-assessment, influencing confidence, resilience, and achievement motivation. Diminished self-confidence in academics leads to fear of failure, hindering acceptance of negative performance and extending to other life domains, impacting resilience. Academic motivation can shift to passive learning driven by external expectations, burdensome and obligatory. These dynamics collectively influence school experiences, resulting in reduced belonging, heightened exclusion, and even school avoidance.
This study probes whether perceived competitive atmosphere in schools negatively impact school belonging and examines their influence via achievement motivation, resilience, and self-confidence. The constructed theoretical model seeks to unravel these effects comprehensively.
Educational systems and societal contexts exhibit variations that shape distinct school atmospheres and their influences on student perceptions across countries. For instance, the experiences of adolescents within collectivist and liberal environments diverge markedly. In contexts characterized by high-stakes examination systems, the perceived intensity of competition among adolescents is notably pronounced. Furthermore, in nations where early academic-vocational tracking is implemented, students' perceptions of peer competition may attenuate following differentiation.
Mons (2004) identifies two aspects of tracking model differences in national education systems: horizontal differentiation, involving separate tracks for academic and vocational education, and vertical differentiation, concerning the existence of distinctive ability demarcations within or between schools, encompassing factors like ability grouping and the distinction between elite and regular schools. Subsequently, Hou (2020) refines these models, delineating five archetypes: the dual-track system, curriculum-oriented system, liberal system, egalitarian system, and examination-oriented system. Additionally, Hou introduces an examination-oriented system, prevalent in East Asian countries such as China, Japan, and Korea.
The study applies this framework to international education survey data (PISA 2018) so to categorize 36 countries and regions into five groups. This facilitates an in-depth exploration of the ramifications of competitive atmospheres on students' sense of belonging within diverse national and educational contexts.

Data, Variables, and Methods

The data is from the 2018 Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA). After excluding observations with missing values in key variables, this study got 30 countries selected as representative samples, comprising 173,894 students from 8,413 schools.
Given the study's aim to explore the causal relationship between competitive atmosphere and school belonging, as well as to observe the effects of non-cognitive factors, the model contains multiple observed variables and non-cognitive factors serving both as independent and dependent variables. Therefore, this paper chose path analysis, conducted using the R software, is adopted to construct and analyze the paths of observable variables within the model.
Figure 1 Analytical Framework

Conclusions & Discussions

After conducting mediation analysis using the path analysis method, the study yielded the following conclusions: Students’ perceptions of competitive atmosphere varied among different educational systems. Students from dual-track, curriculum-focused, and egalitarian systems reported significantly weaker perceptions of competitive atmospheres compared to those in the exam-oriented system. The comparison between the liberal and exam-oriented systems, however, showed non-significant differences. Across dual-track, liberal, egalitarian, and exam-oriented systems, the impact of perceived competitive atmospheres on students' sense of school belonging was consistently positive (0.0172***, 0.0666***, 0.0200***, 0.0277***), except in the curriculum-focused system where the impact was negative (-0.0089**).
This discovery prompts plausible explanations. The competitive atmosphere may not inherently be detrimental; adolescents perceiving it intensely could signify their robust engagement in school life and peer interactions. They likely possess a clear understanding of academic goals and the significance of schooling, coupled with a penchant for self-improvement and diligence. Thus, rather than stifling, the competitive atmosphere seems to foster encouragement and stimulation, challenging our initial assumptions regarding its potential to erode friendships and interpersonal relationships among adolescents. Should we embrace or endorse the emergence of a competitive atmosphere? Such a judgment remains intricate, as the intensity of competition may surpass thresholds, resulting in associated stress and negative consequences.

Author

• Siyuan Chen, Peking Univeristy