How does social support relate to emotional availability for learning during COVID-19? A multi-group structural equation model of university students from the U.S. and Israel

Jason Jabbari; Melissa Bessaha; Sana Malik; Dan Ferris; Sophie Brickman; Miriam Schiff; Ruth Pat-Horenczyk; Michal Grinstein-Weiss; Tyler Frank

doi:10.1007/s11218-023-09783-1

How does social support relate to emotional availability for learning during COVID-19? A multi-group structural equation model of university students from the U.S. and Israel

Soc Psychol Educ. 2023 Apr 5:1-25. doi: 10.1007/s11218-023-09783-1. Online ahead of print.

Authors

Jason Jabbari¹, Melissa Bessaha², Sana Malik², Dan Ferris¹, Sophie Brickman³, Miriam Schiff⁴, Ruth Pat-Horenczyk⁴, Michal Grinstein-Weiss¹, Tyler Frank⁵

Affiliations

¹ Social Policy Institute, Brown School at Washington University in St. Louis, St. Louis, USA.
² School of Social Welfare, Stony Brook University, Stony Brook, USA.
³ Psychology Department, University of Colorado, Colorado Springs, USA.
⁴ Paul Baerwald School of Social Work and Social Welfare, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Jerusalem, Israel.
⁵ Public Health Sciences, Brown School at Washington University in St. Louis, St. Louis, USA.

Abstract

Given the social and emotional tolls of the COVID-19 pandemic on college and university students, many students have become academically disengaged during the pandemic. Although some colleges and universities have the capacity to promote social support for their students, research has yet to comprehensively demonstrate the relationship between social support and academic engagement. To fill this gap, we leverage survey results from four universities across the United States and Israel. Through multi-group structural equation modelling, we explore (a) how perceived social support relates to being emotionally unavailable for learning, (b) how this relationship is partially explained through coping and COVID-19 concerns, and (c) how these relationships can differ across countries. We find that students who perceived higher levels of social support had lower rates of being emotionally unavailable for learning. Part of this relationship occurred through greater rates of coping and, subsequently, fewer concerns about the pandemic. We also noticed significant differences in these relationships between countries. We conclude with a discussion of study implications for higher education policies and practices.

Keywords: Academic engagement; COVID-19; Higher education; Social support.

© The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer Nature B.V. 2023, Springer Nature or its licensor (e.g. a society or other partner) holds exclusive rights to this article under a publishing agreement with the author(s) or other rightsholder(s); author self-archiving of the accepted manuscript version of this article is solely governed by the terms of such publishing agreement and applicable law.