Conference Agenda

Teacher student relationships play a significant role in adolescents’ academic outcomes. This may be particularly true for girls in maths: additional positive social feedback that supports their self-beliefs may be especially critical in a subject and industry in which girls are consistently underrepresented. However, there are two critical gaps in the literature regarding the extent to which teacher-student relationships can mitigate the risks that gender poses in maths. First, very little research has examined teacher-student relationships as multidimensional in adolescence (i.e., closeness, conflict); instead, most research focuses only on closeness. This means little is known about how conflict shapes girls’ aspirations in maths. Second, there is little multidimensional longitudinal research regarding teacher-student relationships in adolescence. It is thus currently unknown the extent to which closeness and conflict can form cycles of change overtime (i.e., shifting or reinforcing internal working models), or the extent to which student characteristics inform relational quality. This study directly addresses these gaps via a cross-lagged panel analysis of how adolescent Australian girls’ (N = 368; M_age = 14.87) experiences of closeness and conflict with their math teacher and their aspirations in maths are reciprocally related over two academic terms (approximately 5 months). Findings revealed that T1 conflict significantly negatively predicts T2 closeness over time, but not vice versa. No reciprocal relationships existed among aspirations and relational dimensions, suggesting aspirations are relatively stable. Relational quality was informed by girls’ maths competence beliefs. These results offer important insight for theory and intervention. Regarding theory, it suggests that conflict may be a more salient informant of relational quality and quality change for girls. It also indicates a need to refine theory regarding which student characteristics contribute to relational quality. Lastly, the results indicate that targeting conflict specifically may be critical for intervention effectiveness in high school.

Empathy, the ability to be sensitive to others’ emotions while intentionally adopting others’ perspectives to understand their feelings, is crucial to adaptive social relationships, particularly during adolescence, and is influenced by various factors. Literature has highlighted the role of attachment to parents, as it lays the foundation for the development of emotional and mentalization skills that can impact empathy. Given the decrease in emotional closeness with parents and the consequent increase in closeness with peers that occurs during adolescence, attachment to peers has also been suggested as a potential predictor of empathy.

This study explored the role of distinct social dimensions (attachment to parents and peers), mentalization abilities, and emotion regulation difficulties in the development of affective and cognitive empathy in 534 Portuguese adolescents (207 boys), aged 14 to 19 years (M = 16.21, SD = 0.92).

Affective empathy was predicted by attachment to peers, mentalization, and difficulties in emotion regulation, whereas cognitive empathy was predicted by mentalization. Furthermore, the effect of attachment to parents on both affective and cognitive empathy was mediated by mentalization and difficulties in emotion regulation. In addition, the effect of attachment to parents on cognitive empathy was also mediated by attachment to peers.

These findings enable a deeper understanding of the foundations of affective and cognitive empathy in adolescents, revealing the roles of different factors involved in the development of empathic abilities and the relations among these variables.

Empathy influences adolescents’ ability to relate to peers and their perceived quality of peer relationships (QPR). Empathy develops through interactions across multiple contexts, with play representing a salient developmental domain. Beyond analog or digital modalities, play has been conceptualized in terms of its experiential qualities, notably as a state of positive immersion akin to psychological flow. Attachment security (AS) supporting emotional regulation and openness to shared affect may play a role in the extent to which positive immersion during play (PIP) promotes empathy and subsequently QPR. This study investigated the relationship between PIP and perceived QPR, examining empathy as a mediator and AS as a moderator of this indirect pathway.

The study used data collected in autumn 2025 through a school-based online survey in Switzerland as part of project ***. PIP was measured with a subdimension of the CAPPAC scale, empathy with the empathic concern subdimension of the IRI, QPR with PROMIS-SF, and AS with IPPA-B. Data were analyzed in SPSS using Hayes’ PROCESS macro.

The analytical sample comprised 662 adolescents aged 10–15 years (M = 12.36, SD = 0.90; 51% girls). Results revealed a significant interaction between PIP and AS in predicting empathy (b = −.109, p = .011). PIP was positively associated with empathy at low and average levels of AS, but not at high levels. Empathy significantly predicted QPR (b = .166, p < .001), and the direct effect of PIP on QPR remained significant (b = .140, p < .001), indicating partial mediation.

Thus, when experienced as a positively immersive state, play may serve a protective function for adolescents with less secure attachment patterns, supporting the relevance of play as a socio-emotional context, aligned with recent attachment literature conceptualizing Internal Working Models (IWM) as products of ongoing learning.