Poster #231 - Academic Peer Group, Openness to Experience, and Social and Psychological Adjustment in Chinese Adolescents

• In Event: 1-005 - Poster Session 01
  In Poster Session: PS 01 Section - Social Relationships

Integrative Statement

Academic achievement has been valued in both traditional and contemporary China (Stevenson et al., 1990), since it may serve as an important gateway to improve one’s social and economic status (Liu et al., 2018). Most of adolescents in China are affiliated with a peer group (Chen, Chang, & He, 2003), however, these groups vary in their academic functioning (Chen, Chang, Liu, & He, 2008). It has been found that the membership in peer groups high on academic achievement benefit adolescents in many ways, including increment in their school engagement, academic achievement, and social adjustment (Chen et al., 2003; Chen et al., 2008; Shin & Ryan, 2014).
It is unclear how adolescents’ academic peer group functioning is related to their psychological adjustment in China. According to the reputation effect, peers and teachers treat adolescents differently based on their group affiliations (Zhao et al., 2016). Adolescents who belong to a highly achieving group may receive more respect and praise from peers and teachers (Phillipson & Phillipson, 2007), thus have better psychological adjustment. In addition, they may have more opportunities to discuss their homework, receive or provide help from or to peers on academic tasks through group interactions, which may increase their academic self-confidence and life satisfaction.
Furthermore, even though peer groups have an impact on each member, the extent to which each adolescent is affected varies and is closely related to their individual characteristics. It would be interesting to identify moderators of peer group influence in this line. Openness to experience is one of the big five personality traits (McCrae & Costa, 1999) and has been found to be positively related to perceived peer group influence (Deuling et al., 2011). Individuals who are highly open to experiences have higher tolerance of others’ different beliefs and ideas (Driskell et al., 2006). Therefore, it is likely that those adolescents have more meaningful and positive academic discussions with their peers and benefit more from their group’s academic functioning.
In the present study, I explored the main effect of group-level academic achievement on adolescent social and psychological adjustment, as well as the moderating role of openness to experience in these associations using a Chinese sample. 1742 students in Grade 7 and Grade 10 completed a measure of peer group networks and self-report measures of openness to experience, depression, perceived academic ability, and life satisfaction. In addition, the participants were group-administered peer assessment measures of social competence.
The results showed that after controlling for individual-level academic achievement, group-level academic achievement was positively related to social competence, perceived academic ability, and life satisfaction, and negatively related to depression (Table 1). Moreover, openness to experience moderate these associations. Specifically, the relations between group-level academic achievement and adjustment were much stronger in those who are highly open to experience (Figure 1). These results not only expand the potential benefits of affiliating with highly achieving groups to the psychological adjustment domain, but also show that these benefits may vary according to adolescents’ different level of openness to experience.

Author

• Lingjun Chen, University of Pennsylvania
  Presenting Author