The Effects of Student Engagement on Academic Achievement Among College Students

Abstract

This research study used the multidimensional construct of student engagement to predict students’ academic achievement. Student engagement was analyzed by exploring variables related to cognitive, behavioral, and emotional engagement. It was predicted that variables related to emotional engagement (i.e., social support and test anxiety), behavioral engagement (i.e., study behaviors and procrastination), and cognitive engagement (i.e., goal orientation, grit, locus of control, and metacognition) would have a significantly relation to overall college GPA. A hieratical multiple regression was used to analyze the relation between student engagement and overall college GPA. The overall model that contained measures of emotional, behavioral and cognitive engagement was significant and explained 57% of the variance in students’ overall college GPAs. As predicted, prior achievement as measured by student reading ACT scores were a significant, unique predictor of overall college GPA. This relation remained significant in every step of the model. Variables related to emotional engagement (i.e., social support), and behavioral engagement (i.e., study behaviors) were found to have a significant relation to overall college GPA. Unlike what was hypothesized, variables related to cognitive engagement (i.e., goal orientation, grit, locus of control, and metacognition) were not found to uniquely predict overall college GPA.