Academic identification as a mediator of the relationship between parental socialization and academic achievement

This study examines whether academic identification, or one’s psychological and emotional investment in academics, mediates the association between child-reported parental educational socialization and standardized achievement test scores among a predominantly ethnic minority sample of 367 urban middle school students. We predicted that academic identification would mediate the relationship between five forms of perceived parental academic socialization (future-oriented, teaching-oriented, effort-oriented, shame-oriented, and guilt-oriented) and achievement when controlling for prior achievement. We found confirmation for this effect among analyses involving teaching, future, and guilt forms of socialization. For teaching, this effect was not present for Black boys. Direct effects indicated that teaching and future socialization was inversely related to student achievement, but when mediated by academic identification it was positive. Guilt was only related to achievement through academic identification. Results suggest the importance of the manner in which parental educational socialization is engaged.