Teacher Perceptions of Past Classroom Behaviors Influence Adolescents’ Receptivity and Responsiveness to a Belonging Intervention

Abstract

This study shows how receptivity and responsiveness can influence the efficacy of an intervention helping adolescents reappraise worry or uncertainty following the difficult transition to middle school. The intervention was implemented at-scale in a diverse sample of sixth-grade public school district students followed through eighth grade (N = 1,180; 41% Black or Latinx; 44% low socioeconomic status). Results suggest the intervention’s effects on grade point average are confined to a racially and socioeconomically diverse subgroup of adolescents who had high teacher evaluations of their classroom behaviors in kindergarten that declined over the early elementary school years (i.e., “Disengagers”). These findings suggest that adolescents’ past school experiences with educators may bound the extent to which interventions can promote success in school.