The Mediating Role of Academic Stress in Explaining the Causal Relationships between Self-Regulation and Self-Determination with Academic Engagement

Abstract

Purpose: Academic engagement plays an important role in improving academic performance and therefore, it is necessary to identify the factors affecting it. As a result, the aim of the present study was determine the mediating role of academic stress in explaining the causal relationships between self-regulation and self-determination with academic engagement.   Methodology: This research was a descriptive from type of correlation. The population of the present research was the high school students of Tehran city in the 2021-2022 academic years, which from them 407 people were selected by cluster random sampling method. The research instruments were included the self-regulation questionnaire (Bouffard et al., 1995), self-determination questionnaire (Ilardi et al., 1993), academic stress scale (Sun et al., 2011) and academic engagement questionnaire (Reeve, 2013). The data of this study were analyzed with using the structural equation modeling method in SPSS-22 and AMOS-24 software.   Findings: The findings of this research showed that the model of academic engagement based on the self-regulation and self-determination with the mediation of academic stress had a good fit. Also, self-regulation and self-determination had a negative and significant effect on the academic stress and had a positive and significant effect on the academic engagement and academic stress had a negative and significant effect on the academic engagement (P<0.05). In addition, self-regulation and self-determination had a positive and significant effect on academic engagement with the mediation of academic stress (P<0.05).   Conclusion: Considering the direct and indirect effects of the present research, in order to improving academic engagement can provide the basis for increasing self-regulation and self-determination and reducing academic stress.