Social relationships and emotional experiences during classroom learning: Exploring students' physiological activation patterns

Most research on students' emotional experiences during classroom learning relies on self-reports, which provide limited access to physiological processes associated with emotional experiences. Accordingly, researchers have called for complementary methodological approaches, such as physiological measures.

Therefore, this study assessed students' algorithm-derived physiological activation patterns as proxy measures associated with emotional experiences during classroom learning and examined the extent to which these patterns are related to the quality of student-teacher relationships and peer relationships.

The sample consists of 154 secondary school students. Students were physiologically monitored across four different subjects.

Self-report instruments were used to assess students' social relationship quality. During lessons, students wore sensor wristbands continuously recording electrodermal activity, skin temperature and movement-related signals. Based on these multimodal signals, the bands' algorithm derived two high-arousal physiological activation patterns (i.e., appetitive and aversive) and two low-arousal physiological activation patterns (i.e., attention and passivity). These patterns were aggregated at lesson-level and analysed in relation to social relationship quality using multilevel models.

More positive peer and student-teacher relationships were associated with fewer aversive activation patterns, whereas appetitive activation patterns showed no associations. Passivity patterns were negatively associated with peer relationships, whereas attention patterns showed no associations.

The study provides initial evidence that students' social relationship quality is associated with algorithm-derived physiological activation patterns during authentic classroom learning. More broadly, the study highlights the potential benefits of complementing self-report measures with ambulatory physiological assessments to better understand how social and emotional processes are intertwined in classroom learning.