Socio-motivational moderators-two sides of the same coin? Testing the potential buffering role of socio-motivational relationships on achievement drive and test anxiety among German and Canadian secondary school students

Abstract

The current cross-national study investigates the potential buffering role of socio-motivational relationships for the association of achievement drive (AD) and test anxiety (TX) in secondary school students from Canada and Germany. One thousand and eighty-eight students (54% girls, M age = 13.71, SD = 0.53, age span 12-15 years) from the state of Brandenburg and 389 students from Quebéc (55.9% girls, M age = 13.43, SD = 0.82, age span 12-16 years) were asked about their socio-motivational relationships with their teachers and peers, their drive for achievement, and TX. Multigroup latent moderated structural equations were conducted to test for the moderator role of socio-motivational relationships that would buffer feelings of TX related to the drive for achievement. The analyses revealed the two-sided role socio-motivational relationships can have for students with different levels of AD; intensifying or mitigating feelings of TX. Thereby, the results of this study extend the buffering hypothesis by Cohen and Wills (1985). Cross-national differences between Canada and Germany were found concerning the studied moderators on the association of AD and TX: While for German students teacher-student relationships acted as moderator, for Canadian students student-student relationships and teachers acting as positive motivators displayed a moderator role.

Keywords: German and Canadian secondary school students; achievement drive; multigroup latent moderated structural equations; socio-motivational relationships; test anxiety.

FIGURE 1

Multigroup latent moderated structural equations (MGLMS) for the Canadian sample. Significant effects are shown as unstandardized coefficients (B), bold pathways are significant at *p < 0.05, **p < 0.001; dotted pathways are not significant. Factor loadings are standardized (based on the standardized results of the weak measurement model seen as the final model only reports unstandardized results). TSR, teacher–student relationships; SSR, student–student relationships; AD, achievement drive.

FIGURE 2

Representation of student–student relationships (SSR) as moderator in the association of achievement drive (AD) and test anxiety (TX) for Canadian secondary school students; the Y-axis measures test anxiety and the X-axis indicates achievement drive.

FIGURE 3

Multigroup latent moderated structural equations (MGLMS) for the German sample. Significant effects shown as unstandardized coefficients (B), bold pathways are significant at *p < 0.05, **p < 0.001; dotted pathways are not significant. Factor loadings are standardized (based on the standardized results of the weak measurement model seen as the final model only reports unstandardized results). TSR, teacher–student relationships; SSR, student–student relationships; AD, achievement drive.

FIGURE 4

Representation of teacher–student relationships (TSR) as moderator in the association between achievement drive (AD) and test anxiety (TX) among German secondary school students; the Y-axis measures test anxiety and the X-axis indicates achievement drive.

FIGURE 5

Multigroup latent moderated structural equations (MGLMS) for the Canadian sample. Significant effects shown as unstandardized coefficients (B), bold pathways are significant at *p < 0.05, **p < 0.001; dotted pathways are not significant. Factor loadings are standardized (based on the standardized results of the weak measurement model seen as the final model only reports unstandardized results). PPM, peers as positive motivators; TPM, teachers as positive motivators; AD, achievement drive.

FIGURE 6

Representation of teachers as positive motivators (TPM) as moderator in the association between achievement drive (AD) and test anxiety (TX) among Canadian secondary school students; the Y-axis shows test anxiety and the X-axis shows achievement drive.

FIGURE 7

Multigroup latent moderated structural equations (MGLMS) for the German sample. Significant effects shown as unstandardized coefficients (B), bold pathways are significant at *p < 0.05, **p < 0.001; dotted pathways are not significant. Factor loadings are standardized (based on the standardized results of the weak measurement model seen as the final model only reports unstandardized results). PPM, peers as positive motivators; TPM, teachers as positive motivators; AD, achievement drive.