The Link Between Emotions and Achievement Over Time: The Mediating Role of Peer Experiences

• In Event: Poster Session 06
  In Poster Session: PS 06 Topic - Social, Emotional, Personality

Abstract

Emotions play a role in children’s learning and academic achievement (Blair, 2002; Raver, 2002; Valiente et al., 2012). In addition to a direct link, emotions contribute to learning and achievement through cognitive, motivational, and interpersonal mechanisms (Zhou et al., 2010). The focus of the current study was on the interpersonal mechanisms or the manner in which children’s positive and negative experiences with peers mediate the relation between emotions and academic functioning.
In the current study, the researcher examined emotional expressivity and emotional experiences of happiness, sadness, and anger and their direct and indirect links to academic engagement and achievement. It was hypothesized that happiness expressivity and experiences would be positively linked to achievement and engagement; sadness and anger expressivity and experiences would be negatively linked to achievement and engagement. It was also hypothesized that emotional expressivity and experiences would be indirectly linked to academic outcomes through positive and negative peer experiences.
Participants were 199 children (104 girls, 94 boys) and their teachers. They participated in the study over two school years, and the average age of children in Time 1 was 10 years. The racial make-up of children included 50% Black, 40% White, and 10 % Other races. Nineteen and 18 teachers participated in Times 1 and 2, respectively. Children rated themselves on their experiences of happiness (α = .58), sadness (α = .57), and anger (α = .64); they also rated their positive (α = .75) and negative (α = .90) peer experiences. Peer nominations were used to assess the emotional expressivity of happiness, sadness, and anger. Academic functioning was assessed with teacher ratings of academic engagement (α = .95) and academic proficiency of reading and math on a standardized test (α = .80).
Path analyses were conducted to test the direct and indirect effects (see Figures 1 and 2). Regarding direct effects, happiness expressivity was positively associated with achievement (β = .21, p < .01) and engagement (β = .22, p < .01); anger expressivity was negatively associated with achievement (β = -.18, p < .05) and engagement (β = -.27, p < .01) in the subsequent year. Anger experiences were also negatively associated with engagement (β = -.16, p < .05) in the subsequent year. Two indirect effects were significant. Negative peer experiences mediated the link between sadness experiences and achievement (β = -.10, p < .01) and the link between sadness experiences and academic engagement (β = -.07, p < .05).
Findings support, to some extent, both direct and indirect links between emotions and academic outcomes. The direct link was more evident for peer-referenced emotional expressivity than for self-reported emotional experiences. Among the emotions assessed, both experiences and expressivity of sadness were consistently associated with negative peer experiences. Negative peer experiences further mediated the link between sadness experiences and academic outcomes. Finally, the findings indicate that the impact of negative peer experiences is stronger than that of positive experiences, which implicates for the priority of directly intervening on children’s negative peer experiences.

Author

• Kyongboon Kwon, University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee
  Presenting Author