Do Daily Peer Experiences Mediate the Link Between Adolescents’ Peer Status and their School Engagement?

• In Event: Poster Session 01
  In Poster Session: PS 01 Topic - Social Relationships

Abstract

Emerging evidence suggests that adolescents’ emotional and behavioral engagement in school is dependent upon their status among peers. Likeability (i.e., being liked) and popularity (i.e., being visible and powerful) may have differential implications for adolescents’ school engagement (De Laet, et al., 2015; Engels, et al., 2016, 2017), with most consistent evidence for likeability being linked to higher emotional engagement and popularity being linked to lower behavioral engagement. The mechanisms that underlie the links between peer status and engagement, however, are still unknown. The present study extends the current literature by testing adolescents’ daily experiences with peers as a putative mediating mechanism that may drive the links between peer status and engagement. We focused on daily experiences of peer praise and peer conflict, as they are two of the most potent sources of peer relational satisfaction (Ladd et al., 1996). Receiving peer praise from peers may facilitate students’ positive involvement in school, as well as their participation in academic tasks (Erath et al., 2008; Patrick et al., 2007). Peer conflict is a type of negative peer experience that may undermine students’ feelings of belonging in school. Indeed, experiencing peer conflict has been associated with students’ disengaged classroom behavior and desire to avoid school altogether (Ladd et al., 1996; Wentzel et al., 2012).
We hypothesized that well-liked adolescents may be likely to receive regular peer praise, but encounter little peer conflict, in their everyday school life. Thus, we predicted peer praise to mediate the (positive) links between likeability and emotional engagement. We hypothesized that popular adolescents would experience both more peer praise and more conflict. As negative social events have been shown to weigh more heavily than supportive behaviors (Baumeister et al., 2001), we predicted peer conflict to have a bigger effect on students, thus mediating the (negative) links between popularity and behavioral engagement.
A sample of 622 adolescents in 49 classes (Mage=12.67, SD=0.58, 50.3% boys) was recruited from Dutch secondary schools. For up to 10 consecutive school days, they reported on their daily level of emotional and behavioral engagement (adapted from Skinner et al., 2008) and indicated whether they experienced peer praise and conflict that day (adapted from Nezlek, 2014). They also rated each of their peers’ levels of popularity and likeability.
Multilevel structural equation modeling (MSEM) analyses were conducted using Bayesian estimation. We found that (a) there was no direct link between likeability and emotional engagement (b) likeability was linked to lower behavioral engagement, (c) popularity was linked to lower behavioral and emotional engagement, (d) peer praise and conflict covaried with aspects of school engagement, and (e) peer praise, but not conflict, mediated the link between peer status and engagement (see Table 1 and Figure 1).
These findings help explain how students’ peer experience is implicated in their school engagement. For well-liked adolescents, positive peer experiences like peer praise may help them enjoy school more. For popular adolescents, positive peer experiences may serve as a protective factor against experiencing declines in school engagement that they may otherwise show.

Authors

• Daniela E. Ruiz Velasco Leyva
  Non-Presenting Author

• Astrid M.G. Poorthuis, Universiteit Utrecht
  Presenting Author

• Sander Thomaes, Universiteit Utrecht
  Non-Presenting Author

• Janneke van de Pol, Utrecht University
  Non-Presenting Author