Abstract
AbstractSelf‐affirmation, operationalized as value‐affirmation interventions, can have long‐term beneficial effects on the academic performance and trajectories of members of negatively stereotyped groups, thus reducing achievement gaps. Yet, there is significant heterogeneity in the effectiveness of value affirmations, and we do not yet have a clear understanding of why. In this introduction to the special issue, we review the literature on self‐affirmation theory in educational contexts, providing overviews of the heterogeneity in the effectiveness of affirmation interventions, the methods of implementation, potential moderators, and underling processes. We identify several questions that are important for researchers to address, the answers to which would progress the field towards being able to more confidently implement value‐affirmations in contexts in which, and/or for groups for whom, they are most likely to produce benefits. We then introduce the articles included in this special issue, which showcase several of the latest theoretical and empirical advances to self‐affirmation theory in educational contexts.
Highlights
Including mental and physical health and wellbeing (Blanchflower & Oswald, 2000, von dem Knesebeck et al, 2011; Schütte et al, 2013), life expectancy (Meara et al, 2008), trust (Easterbrook et al, 2015), and income (Britton et al, 2020)
Reflecting the historical and structural inequalities that have existed in their societies, members of groups that have historically been minoritized, alienated, stigmatized, and/or excluded from education tend to perceive educational environments as psychologically threatening; as places in which they and their group are not valued or wanted, and are expected to fail. This can make members of those groups feel as if they do not belong in education, that education is not for ‘people like them’, and may induce experiences of stereotype threat—a fear of confirming a negative stereotype about their group (Easterbrook et al, 2019; Spencer et al, 2016; Steele & Aronson, 1995; Veldman et al, 2019; Walton & Cohen, 2007). These psychological factors are associated with reduced confidence and wellbeing (Iyer et al, 2009; Spencer & Castano, 2007), increased stress (Hadden et al, 2020), and can impede learning (Taylor & Walton, 2011), performance (Flore & Wicherts, 2015; Nguyen & Ryan, 2008; Shewach et al, 2019; Walton & Spencer, 2009), and motivation within educational contexts (Manstead, 2018)
Psychological factors contribute to educational inequalities, which makes interventions that target psychological states and processes potentially effective techniques to reduce educational inequalities (Easterbrook & Hadden, 2021)
Summary
If researchers and practitioners are to realize the potential of self-affirmation on a large scale, this heterogeneity must be better understood. In one study, self-affirmation interventions were found to improve the attainment of minority students only in classrooms in which all pupils’ average attainment levels (for reading) improved at an above average rate (Dee, 2015) This is in line with theoretical suggestions that, for long-term effects to occur, the interventions must be implemented in social environments that are sensitive enough to react to small initial boosts in performance so that recursive effects can be initiated (Walton & Yeager, 2020). There is the possibility that the interventions operate through different processes for different groups experiencing different psychological states (Çetinkaya et al, 2020), but there have not been any investigations of moderated mediation or mediated moderation in the self-affirmation literature that we are aware of
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