The engaged lives of encouraged students: Academic encouragement, grit and academic engagement in Chinese first year undergraduate students

Abstract

Although research has shown that two types of academic encouragement (i.e., challenge-focused and potential-focused encouragement) generally increase academic engagement, few studies have explored how they relate to academic engagement among first-year undergraduate students. Moreover, little is known on psychological mechanisms linking encouragement to educational outcomes. This study explored the indirect effects of encouragement on academic engagement via grit’s dimensions (i.e., perseverance of effort and consistency of interests) among 485 Chinese first-year undergraduate students. Results showed that overall academic encouragement, challenge-focused encouragement and potential-focused encouragement positively predicted perseverance of effort and academic engagement. However, the predictive effects of overall academic encouragement, challenge-focused encouragement and potential-focused encouragement on consistency of interests were faint. Results also indicated that overall academic encouragement, challenge-focused encouragement and potential-focused encouragement indirectly predicted academic engagement through perseverance of effort rather than consistency of interests. These findings underscore the importance of identifying pathways through which specific types of encouragement indirectly relate to academic engagement.