Comparison Processes in Students’ Academic Self-Concept Formation

• Applicant: Professor Dr. Fabian Wolff
• Subject Area: Developmental and Educational Psychology ; General and Domain-Specific Teaching and Learning
• Term: since 2022
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 491501609

Academic self-concepts can be defined as students’ subject-specific self-perceptions of their academic abilities. They are significant predictors of performance, motivation, and career choice, and thus belong to the most important constructs in educational psychology. Among the multiple factors involved in students’ self-concept formation, three types of comparisons have shown to be particularly relevant self-concept determinants in precious research: social comparisons (comparisons of one’s own achievements with achievements of others), temporal comparisons (comparisons of one’s own achievements with one’s own prior achievements), and dimensional comparisons (comparisons of one’s own achievements in different subjects). To date, numerous studies have shown that students generally have a higher (lower) self-concept in a subject if they show a higher (lower) achievement in this subject compared to their classmates, at earlier times, and in other subjects. Nevertheless, there are still important research gaps concerning both the psychological processes involved in students’ self-concept formation through comparisons and the effects of comparisons on students’ self-concepts. In the present project, we will address these research gaps in three work packages (WPs), based on a newly developed comparison model of students’ academic self-concept formation. In WP1 (“Processes”), we will pursue five central research questions dealing with the psychological core mechanisms taking place when students make social, temporal, and dimensional comparisons. Specifically, we will examine a potential dissimilarity focus in comparisons, the consciousness of comparisons, the choice of comparison standards, the order of social, temporal, and dimensional comparisons, and the interdependence of these comparisons in eight empirical studies, using multi-methodological approaches. In WP2 (“Effects”), we will deal with the effects of social, temporal, and dimensional comparisons on academic self-concepts. To this end, we will conduct a meta-analysis of all studies examining the simultaneous effects of social, temporal, and dimensional comparisons and a meta-analysis of all published self-concept interventions. Moreover, we will develop an own intervention to foster students’ academic self-concepts by changing various beliefs and cognitions that have shown to relate to the strength of comparison effects, and we will test this intervention in five validation and generalization studies. Finally, in WP3 (“Integration”), we will develop a comprehensive comparative theory of students’ academic self-concept formation. This comparative theory will be based on the findings of WP1, WP2, and further studies examining comparisons and be the first to integrate social, temporal, and dimensional comparisons.

• DFG Programme: Independent Junior Research Groups