Student-Teacher Relationship and Its Influencing Factors among Middle School Students in Guangdong

Abstract

The student-teacher relationship is a basic interpersonal relationship formed by mutual communication and interaction between teachers and students in education and teaching, mainly including teaching, ethical, interpersonal, and legal relationships (Chen Qi & Liu Rude, 1997). Teachers are important others for middle school students. The relationship between teachers and students is an important interpersonal relationship for middle school students, which significantly impacts their socialization. The aim of this paper wastoexplore the characteristic of student-teacher relationship of middle school students in Guangdong Province, China, and analyze its influencing factors. Stratified random sampling method was used to select 1011 middle school students from 3 cities in Guangdong province. They were investigated with Student-Teacher Relationship Scale (STRS), General Big Five Personality Factor Scale (GFFS), Emotional Support Questionnaire for Middle School Students to Understand Teachers (ESQUT) and a self-compiled questionnaire for influencing factors of middle students’ student-teacher relationship. The survey results indicated the following three points,First, the total scores of STRS and ESQUT were (85.30±17.3) and (49.53±10.29), respectively; Second, the scores of 5 dimensions of GFFS were (45.37±12.33), (52.70±9.60), (54.11±9.81), (53.08±11.43) and (51.20±8.80), respectively; Third, the result of multivariate stepwise linear regression showed that the following 13 factors including grade, family economic status, mother’s education level, father’s education level, academic performance, teachers’ main role, teachers’ attitude to the popular culture, teachers’ class management style, teachers’ educational style, respect, encourage, openness and altruism were positively correlated with the total score of STRS (β=188～803, all P<01), and the following 6 factors including origin, school location, only child or not, the greatest shortcoming of teachers, students’ attitude to the popular culture and sociality were negatively correlated with the total score of STRS (β=-203～-699’ all P<05). It is therefore suggested that the student-teacher relationshipof middle school students in Guangdong is very good, and the social cultural atmosphere, family educational concept, rearing style, teaching, and education style may be the main influencing factors of student-teacher relationshipof middle school students.