A Comparative Study Of The Relationships Among Teacher-Student Relationship And Emotional Adjustment In Non-Left-Behind And Left-Behind High School Students

The teacher-student relationship is very important for the growth of teenagers.The positive teacher-student relationship can promote students' emotional adjustment.However,it is not clear that the same teacher-student relationship can have the same positive effect on non-left-behind and left-behind adolescents.According to ecological systems theory,the development of adolescents is influenced by the interaction between individuals and their external environment.Teachers give different care to each student every day,especially in high school.Adolescents' social comparative consciousness increases along with the awakening of their self-consciousness.However,it is not clear whether social comparison orientation will play a moderating role in positive teacher-student relationship when it is used to improve their self-esteem and emotional adjustment.Also,there is a lack of theoretical guidance as to whether and how interventions should be treated differently.In this study,high school students were divided into two groups: those who had not been left behind(N=216)and those who had been left behind(N=304).By comparing their differences in teacher-student relationship,self-esteem,emotional adjustment(including depression,anxiety and loneliness)and social comparison orientation,this paper analyzed the mediating role of self-esteem in teacher-student relationship affecting emotional adjustment,and explored the moderating effect of social comparison orientation in the above relationships.Valuable results were as following.(1)Left-behind high school students had lower self-esteem but higher depression,anxiety and loneliness.Whether the students were left-behind or non-left-behind,females scored higher in anxiety but lower in self-esteem than males.(2)Teacher-student relationship was significantly negatively associated with depression,anxiety and loneliness of left-behind and non-left-behind high school students.The positive teacher-student relationship served as a protective factor for their mental health.However,compared with non-left-behind high school students,the relation between teacher-student relationship and self-esteem was weaker in left-behind high school students.(3)The relationship between teacher-student relationship and emotional adjustment was partially mediated by self-esteem among non-left-behind students.But the relationship was totally mediated among left-behind students.(4)Social comparison orientation played a moderating role between teacher-student relationship and self-esteem of non-left-behind high school students.That is,teacher-student relationship had a significant impact on self-esteem of the high school students with low levels of social comparison orientation,but not on those with high levels of social comparison orientation.(5)Between teacher-student relationship and loneliness,the social comparison orientation only played a moderating role in the non-left-behind high school students.Social comparison orientation moderated not only the relationship between teacher-student relationship and self-esteem but also the direct relationship between teacher-student relationship and loneliness.To be specific,both the direct and indirect effects of teacher-student relationship on loneliness were significant to students with low levels of social comparison orientation but not to those with high levels of social comparison orientation.Generally speaking,when the external environment exerted an influence on the individual,its effect varied from family environment to personality differences.