TY - JOUR
T1 - Reappraising academic and social adversity improves middle school students’ academic achievement, behavior, and well-being
AU - Borman, Geoffrey D.
AU - Rozek, Christopher S.
AU - Pyne, Jaymes
AU - Hanselman, Paul
N1 - Funding Information:
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS. We thank Greg Walton and Geoffrey Cohen for sharing their belonging intervention materials with us and for advice during the design of this project and Dominique Bradley, Evan Crawford, Rachel Feldman, Adam Gamoran, Jeffrey Grigg, Erin Quast, Jackie Roessler, and Alex Schmidt for assistance during the project. Research reported here was supported by grants from the US Department of Education (R305A110136) and the Spencer Foundation (201500044). The content is the responsibility of the authors and does not necessarily represent the views of supporting agencies.
Publisher Copyright:
© 2019 National Academy of Sciences. All rights reserved.
PY - 2019/8/13
Y1 - 2019/8/13
N2 - The period of early adolescence is characterized by dramatic changes, simultaneously affecting physiological, psychological, social, and cognitive development. The physical transition from elementary to middle school can exacerbate the stress and adversity experienced during this critical life stage. Middle school students often struggle to find social and emotional support, and many students experience a decreased sense of belonging in school, diverting students from promising academic and career trajectories. Drawing on psychological insights for promoting belonging, we fielded a brief intervention designed to help students reappraise concerns about fitting in at the start of middle school as both temporary and normal. We conducted a district-wide double-blind experimental study of this approach with middle school students (n = 1,304). Compared with the control condition activities, the intervention reduced sixth-grade disciplinary incidents across the district by 34%, increased attendance by 12%, and reduced the number of failing grades by 18%. Differences in benefits across demographic groups were not statistically significant, but some impacts were descriptively larger for historically underserved minority students and boys. A mediational analysis suggested 80% of long-term intervention effects on students’ grade point averages were accounted for by changes in students’ attitudes and behaviors. These results demonstrate the long-term benefits of psychologically reappraising stressful experiences during critical transitions and the psychological and behavioral mechanisms that support them. Furthermore, this brief intervention is a highly cost-effective and scalable approach that schools may use to help address the troubling decline in positive attitudes and academic outcomes typically accompanying adolescence and the middle school transition.
AB - The period of early adolescence is characterized by dramatic changes, simultaneously affecting physiological, psychological, social, and cognitive development. The physical transition from elementary to middle school can exacerbate the stress and adversity experienced during this critical life stage. Middle school students often struggle to find social and emotional support, and many students experience a decreased sense of belonging in school, diverting students from promising academic and career trajectories. Drawing on psychological insights for promoting belonging, we fielded a brief intervention designed to help students reappraise concerns about fitting in at the start of middle school as both temporary and normal. We conducted a district-wide double-blind experimental study of this approach with middle school students (n = 1,304). Compared with the control condition activities, the intervention reduced sixth-grade disciplinary incidents across the district by 34%, increased attendance by 12%, and reduced the number of failing grades by 18%. Differences in benefits across demographic groups were not statistically significant, but some impacts were descriptively larger for historically underserved minority students and boys. A mediational analysis suggested 80% of long-term intervention effects on students’ grade point averages were accounted for by changes in students’ attitudes and behaviors. These results demonstrate the long-term benefits of psychologically reappraising stressful experiences during critical transitions and the psychological and behavioral mechanisms that support them. Furthermore, this brief intervention is a highly cost-effective and scalable approach that schools may use to help address the troubling decline in positive attitudes and academic outcomes typically accompanying adolescence and the middle school transition.
KW - Academic achievement
KW - Educational intervention
KW - Middle school transition
KW - Social belonging
KW - Student engagement
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85070590471&partnerID=8YFLogxK
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/citedby.url?scp=85070590471&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1073/pnas.1820317116
DO - 10.1073/pnas.1820317116
M3 - Article
C2 - 31358624
AN - SCOPUS:85070590471
SN - 0027-8424
VL - 116
SP - 16286
EP - 16291
JO - Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America
JF - Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America
IS - 33
ER -