Psychological Development and Education ›› 2025, Vol. 41 ›› Issue (4): 510-517.doi: 10.16187/j.cnki.issn1001-4918.2025.04.07

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The Effects of Social Mobility Beliefs on Academic Persistence of Chinese Rural Adolescents in Areas out of Povery: The Moderating Role of Academic Coping Strategies

ZHANG Feng1,2, HUANG Silin1, MEI Kehan1, ZHANG Jiatian1, DENG Yiyi1   

  1. 1. Institute of Development Psychology, Beijing Normal University, Beijing 100875;
    2. Psychological Research and Counseling Center, Southwest Jiaotong University, Chengdu 610097
  • Published:2025-07-12

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Abstract: Academic persistence can help adolescents in relative poverty achieve good academic achievement, which helps them improve their family’s socioeconomic situation through education. Thus, it is of great significance to explore the factors that promote academic persistence. Adolescents with non-urban household registration in the areas out of poverty were followed for one year, to reveal the effect of social mobility beliefs on academic persistence and its boundary conditions. The results showed that: (1) Social mobility beliefs at T1 were nonsignificantly related to academic persistence at T2; (2) Academic coping strategies moderated the relationship between social mobility beliefs and academic persistence one year later, and the relationship was significant for adolescents with higher levels of academic coping strategies. In conclusion, the findings indicated that academic coping strategies positively moderate the relationship between social mobility beliefs and academic persistence.These findings emphasized the significance of both upward social mobility beliefs and coping strategies when facing difficult tasks and challenges for rural adolescents’ academic persistence. Moreover, it may also reveal the effectiveness of the connotation of “both ambition and intelligence” educational assistance policy in China’s post-poverty transition period from a psychological perspective.

Key words: rural revitalization, social mobility beliefs, coping strategies, academic persistence, adolescent

CLC Number: 

  • G442
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