The Relationships between High School Subjects in terms of School Satisfaction and Academic Performance in Mexican Adolescents.

Antonio Granero-Gallegos,Raúl Baños,Antonio Baena-Extremera

doi:10.3390/ijerph16183494

Abstract

Adolescents’ academic performance and the way it is related to their subjective wellbeing are issues of great interest across educational systems. The purpose of this study was to ascertain how satisfaction with high school subjects can predict school satisfaction and academic performance in Mexican students. The sample consisted of 457 high school students in the Baja California and Nuevo León states in Mexico (247 boys, 210 girls); their mean age being 14.10 (SD = 0.84). We used a questionnaire featuring a subject satisfaction scale, an intrinsic school satisfaction scale, and one related to academic grades. We used descriptive analyses, correlations, and structural regression models. In terms of results, the high satisfaction and academic performance levels in physical education, Spanish and English are worth highlighting. Geography and history are the most relevant predictors of academic grades, while Spanish predicts school satisfaction and physical education predicts boredom. In conclusion, satisfaction with mathematics, Spanish, and English are strong predictors of satisfaction (SATF), and the latter in turn predicts Mexican high school students’ academic performance.

Highlights

In recent years, studies related to subjective well-being have grown, assessing their relationship with school dropping-out [1], scholar satisfaction [2], and the practice of sporting-physical activity in the leisure time [3], among others
If we focus on satisfaction with the school, it would be understood as a cognitive–affective evaluation of the satisfaction that the student experiences with their own school experience [19] and with the courses [20]
The psychometric properties of the Satisfaction questionnaire’s dimensions in each of the subjects were studied based on the initial theoretical proposal in Duda and Nicholls [52] and Baños et al [20]

Summary

Introduction

Studies related to subjective well-being have grown, assessing their relationship with school dropping-out [1], scholar satisfaction [2], and the practice of sporting-physical activity in the leisure time [3], among others. Relationships between abandoning sports practice and satisfaction with physical education [12], and with academic performance [13] have been found. Mexico’s academic performance level is well below the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development countries’ average (OECD), [15]. It obtained an average score of 416 in Science, 423 in Reading, and 408 in Math; the OECD

Objectives

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Results

Discussion

Conclusion