Longitudinal Relations Between Adolescents’ Prosocial Behavior and Self-Efficacy in Self-Regulated Learning

A small number of studies has found that Prosocial Behavior (PB; i.e. voluntary actions aimed to benefit others, like helping, consoling, donating; Eisenberg, et al., 2006) was associated with academic achievement across adolescence (e.g., Gerbino et al., 2018; Wentzel, 1993). It was hypothesized that prosocial adolescents may be more motivated and engaged with school, because they experience a supportive social and learning environment (e.g., Jennings & Greenberg 2009). Findings have also showed that Self-efficacy in Self-Regulated learning (SE-SRL) is crucial for students’ motivation and persistence (Bandura, 1997). SESRL reflects perceived capacities in self-monitoring, in setting goals and using self-motivational strategies for learning. So, our study is aimed to identify the role of PB in supporting adolescents’ learning self-regulatory capacities during middle school, when students’ capacities of autonomous self-management of study are crucial, but also strongly taxed. We analyzed reciprocal relations between PB and SE-SRL across middle school years. Participants were 450 adolescents (48.5% boys; mean age = 12) attending at T1 6th grade of junior high school. Participants were drawn from the Genzano Longitudinal Study conducted in Italy. PB was assessed by peer nominations on three items (i.e. sharing, comforting and helping; Caprara & Pastorelli, 1993). SE-SRL was evaluated through 11 items measuring adolescents’ self-efficacy to plan and organize their academic activities, to structure environments conducive to learning and to motivate themselves to do their school work (Caprara et al., 2008). We tested a cross lagged model through path analysis in which peer-reported PB at 6th grade and 7th grade predicted SE-SRL one year later, and SE-SRL at 6th and 7th grades predicted PB one year later, controlling for the longitudinal stability of the two constructs and for socio-demographic characteristics. Findings showed that PB at 6th and 7th grade predicted higher level of students’ SESRL one year later (beta=13 and beta=.12), beyond the high stability of SE-SRL (beta =.60), and the effect of sociodemographic characteristics. Differently, SE-SRL did not predict later PB. Our study corroborates the hypothesis that being perceived prosocial by peers in adolescence may give students a greater chance to be motivated and to experience successful school experience.