David William Putwain

Young people in education are known to experience test anxiety which can have significant implications for their mental health and well-being (Hembree, 1988). Test anxiety is a situation-specific f...

Achievement emotions are influenced by a series of antecedents, but the role of some of them – such as personality traits and emotion regulation (ER) strategies –, particularly in primary and middle school students, remains underexplored. Guided by the Control-Value Theory, this study examined the additive contribution of demographic variables (sex and age), personality traits, and ER strategies to 10 school-related achievement emotions. A sample of 330 fourth, sixth, and seventh-grade students completed measures of Big Five personality traits, two behavioral (Actively Approaching and Withdrawal) and two cognitive (Positive Refocusing and Catastrophizing) ER strategies, and five positive (enjoyment, pride, hope, relief, and relaxation) and five negative (anxiety, anger, shame, hopelessness, and boredom) school-related emotions. Linear mixed models were estimated, with variables entered hierarchically, to assess the additive contribution of each group of factors. Results showed that females reported higher anxiety and lower boredom, while older students reported lower positive and higher negative emotions. Personality traits and ER strategies displayed consistent patterns of associations across emotions: Extraversion, Conscientiousness, Openness, Actively Approaching, and Positive Refocusing were associated with higher positive emotions and lower negative emotions, and vice versa for Neuroticism, Withdrawal, and Catastrophizing. Despite the cross-sectional design, which limits causal interpretations, these findings highlight the role of both stable individual characteristics (sex, age, and personality) and more malleable factors (ER strategies) in students’ emotional experiences at school. The results may inform future research and interventions aimed at promoting adaptive ER in educational settings.

Control–value theory (CVT) is a robust framework for understanding the antecedents of achievement emotions. However, few studies examined the interaction between control and value appraisals across a broad range of emotions. The aim of this study was to explore the interactive role of control and value in predicting 10 achievement emotions—three positive activating emotions (enjoyment, pride, and hope), two positive deactivating emotions (relief and relaxation), three negative activating emotions (anxiety, anger, and shame), and two negative deactivating emotions (hopelessness and boredom)—felt in relation to the academic setting of studying. We recruited 166 and 126 Italian university students attending two consecutive psychological modules (General Psychology and Developmental and Educational Psychology) within the same degree programme. Data were collected via self-report questionnaires, with partial overlap between samples, as a substantial proportion of students participated in both modules. Through regression analyses, control and value showed the expected pattern of associations, being positively related to positive emotions and negatively related to negative emotions. Evidence for interaction effects was limited across emotions and modules: significant interactions emerged for anger and shame in the first module and for enjoyment and relaxation in the second, although these effects were generally small in magnitude. Overall, the findings provide partial support for CVT assumptions, suggesting that value may moderate the relation between control and achievement emotions in specific contexts, but not in a consistent or uniform way across emotional outcomes.

Objectives: Research on structured, manualized psychotherapeutic interventions for high test anxiety (TA) in adolescents remains limited, particularly those integrating acceptance, mindfulness, and compassion-based strategies. These psychological processes have been identified as protective factors for test anxiety, fostering adaptive emotional regulation and resilience. The AcAdeMiC program (Acting with Acceptance, Mindfulness, and Compassion to Cope with Test/Exam Anxiety) was developed to help adolescents manage test anxiety by strengthening these competencies, and its preliminary version demonstrated good feasibility indicators (Pires et al., 2025). Method: This pilot randomized trial assessed the efficacy of a restructured version of AcAdeMiC, which consists of four sequential modules focusing on developing acceptance, mindfulness, and self-compassion as key psychological skills. The study examined efficacy throughout treatment and variance in outcome measures. Thirty-five adolescents ( Mage = 15.63 years, SD = 0.88) were randomized to either an experimental group (EG, n = 17) or a waitlist control group (CG, n = 18), but due to missing data and procedural constraints, effective sample sizes for some repeated-measures analyses included only 15 participants from the experimental group. Results: The retention rate was 85.71%, with no baseline differences between groups. Self-reported ( p < 0.001; η _p ² = 0.57) and clinician-rated ( p < 0.001; η _p ² = 0.66) test anxiety severity decreased over treatment, with notable improvements between modules. Significant group x time effects were observed for test anxiety and self-compassion ( d = 0.40). Conclusions: These findings offer preliminary evidence supporting the efficacy of the AcAdeMiC program in reducing test anxiety and increasing self-compassion, contributing to a biopsychosocial and contextual framework for intervention. They also provide a foundation for a larger-scale randomized controlled trial to further validate the program’s efficacy. Preregistration This trial was registered at ClinicalTrials.gov (Identifier: NCT04861116).

Background: Academic buoyancy is conceptualized as students' capacity to cope with academic challenges. Studies that examine how academic buoyancy and coping responses are reciprocally related, or that include relations with achievement, are lacking. Aims: The study examined reciprocal relations among academic buoyancy, coping and achievement. Sample: The sample comprised students aged 16–19 years in upper secondary education. At the first wave of data collection, there were 533 students (138 male, mean age = 16.4 years). Methods: Data were collected in five waves over two school years. Achievement was collected in waves one, three and five. Academic buoyancy and coping were measured in waves two and four via self‐report questionnaires. Results: Data were analysed in a structural equation model. Adaptive coping positively and non‐adaptive coping negatively predicted subsequent academic buoyancy. Additionally, academic buoyancy predicted subsequent achievement. A positive indirect relation from adaptive coping to subsequent achievement was mediated by adaptive coping. Conclusions: The findings show that personal resources can operate in cycles of resource gain as ‘co‐travellers’; effective coping can build academic buoyancy, and academic buoyancy can lead to better achievement. Moreover, study support for students could include ways to develop effective coping responses.