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Which Class Matters? Juxtaposing Multiple Class Environments as Frames-of-Reference for Academic Self-Concept Formation

American Psychological Association
Journal of Educational Psychology
Authors:
Moritz Fleischmann
Moritz Fleischmann
Moritz Fleischmann
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Nicolas Hübner at University of Bonn
Nicolas Hübner
Herb Marsh at Australian Catholic University
Herb Marsh
Jiesi Guo at Institution for Positive Psychology and Education
Jiesi Guo
  • Institution for Positive Psychology and Education
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Abstract

Equally able students have lower academic self-concept in high achieving schools or classes, a phenomenon known as the big fish little pond effect (BFLPE). The class (more so than the school) has been shown to be the pivotal frame-of-reference for academic self-concept formation—a local dominance effect. However, many school systems worldwide employ forms of course-by-course tracking, thus exposing students to multiple class environments. Due to the high correlation between multiple student environments, the frame-of-reference used for academic self-concept formation in course-by-course tracked systems is unclear to date. We addressed this unresolved issue by using data from a comprehensive survey that measured the entire population of Austrian eighth-grade students in the domain of mathematics in 2012. General secondary school students were in the core subjects (i.e., mathematics, German, and English) grouped according to ability, whereas regular class composition was the same in all other subjects. Using cross-classified multilevel models, we regressed math self-concept on average math achievement of students’ school, math class, and regular class. Consistent with the local dominance effect, we found the BFLPE on the school level to be weak after controlling for the class levels. We found a stronger BFLPE on the regular class level and the strongest BFLPE on the math class level. Our study demonstrates the importance of multiple class environments as frames-of-reference for academic self-concept formation.
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Which Class Matters? Juxtaposing Multiple Class Environments as
Frames-of-Reference for Academic Self-Concept Formation
Moritz Fleischmann
1
, Nicolas Hübner
1
, Herbert W. Marsh
2, 3
, Jiesi Guo
2
, Ulrich Trautwein
1
, and
Benjamin Nagengast
1
1
Hector Research Institute of Education Sciences and Psychology, University of Tübingen
2
Institute for Positive Psychology and Education, Australian Catholic University
3
Department of Education, Oxford University
Equally able students have lower academic self-concept in high achieving schools or classes, a phenomenon
known as the big fish little pond effect (BFLPE). The class (more so than the school) has been shown to be the
pivotal frame-of-reference for academic self-concept formation—a local dominance effect. However, many
school systems worldwide employ forms of course-by-course tracking, thus exposing students to multiple class
environments. Due to the high correlation between multiple student environments, the frame-of-reference used
for academic self-concept formation in course-by-course tracked systems is unclear to date. We addressed this
unresolved issue by using data from a comprehensive survey that measured the entire population of Austrian
eighth-grade students in the domain of mathematics in 2012. General secondary school students were in the core
subjects (i.e., mathematics, German, and English) grouped according to ability, whereas regular class composition
was the same in all other subjects. Using cross-classified multilevel models, we regressed math self-concept on
average math achievement of students’school, math class, and regular class. Consistent with the local dominance
effect, we found the BFLPE on the school level to be weak after controlling for the class levels. We found a
stronger BFLPE on the regular class level and the strongest BFLPE on the math class level. Our study demon-
strates the importance of multiple class environments as frames-of-reference for academic self-concept formation.
Educational Impact and Implications Statement
A positive perception of one’s academic abilities—termed academic self-concept—is a desirable educa-
tional goal. As a consequence of social comparison processes, academic self-concept is assumed to be
negatively affected when students are placed in classrooms composed of high achieving classmates. We
investigated these comparison processes in course-by-course tracked systems in which students are mem-
bers of several class environments. Our findings suggest that students build their academic self-concept
in a certain domain, for instance in math, to a major extent in comparisons with domain-specificclass
environments (e.g., the math class) and to a minor extent with domain-unrelated class environments. Our
study contributes to the psychological understanding of academic self-concept formation and refines big
fish little pond effect implications in course-by-course tracked systems: Students’academic self-concept
in a certain domain may be hurt when placing them in high achieving domain-specific classes but it will
to a lesser extent also be hurt when placing them in high achieving domain-unrelated classrooms.
Keywords: academic self-concept, big fish little pond effect, social comparison, course-by-course track-
ing, cross-classified multilevel model
Supplemental materials: https://doi.org/10.1037/edu0000491.supp
This article was published Online First October 14, 2021.
Moritz Fleischmann https://orcid.org/0000-0002-1490-0785
Nicolas Hübner https://orcid.org/0000-0003-3528-8086
Herbert W. Marsh https://orcid.org/0000-0002-1078-9717
Jiesi Guo https://orcid.org/0000-0003-2102-803X
Ulrich Trautwein https://orcid.org/0000-0003-0647-0057
Benjamin Nagengast https://orcid.org/0000-0001-9868-8322
Nicolas Hübner is now at the Institute of Education, University of Tübingen.
Moritz Fleischmann was a doctoral student at the LEAD Graduate School
& Research Network [GSC1028], which was funded within the framework
of the Excellence Initiative of the German federal and state governments.
This research project was supported by the Postdoctoral Academy of
Education Sciences and Psychology of the Hector Research Institute of
Education Sciences and Psychology, Tübingen, funded by the Baden-
Württemberg Ministry of Science, Research and the Arts.
We thank the Federal Institute for Educational Research, Innovation &
Development of the Austrian School System for providing the data and
supporting us during our research project.
Correspondence concerning this article should be addressed to Moritz
Fleischmann, Hector Research Institute of Education Sciences and Psychology,
University of Tübingen, Europastraße 6, 72072 Tübingen, Germany. Email:
moritz.fleischmann@uni-tuebingen
127
Journal of Educational Psychology
©2021 American Psychological Association 2022, Vol. 114, No. 1, 127–143
ISSN: 0022-0663 https://doi.org/10.1037/edu0000491
This document is copyrighted by the American Psychological Association or one of its allied publishers.
This article is intended solely for the personal use of the individual user and is not to be disseminated broadly.
... characteristics at the individual level van Ewijk & Sleegers, 2010;Zimmer & Toma, 2000). This has been widely discussed as an important factor influencing student achievement (van Ewijk & Sleegers, 2010) and motivation (Fleischmann et al., 2022). ...
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... The academic self-concept has been defined in a variety of ways since its inception, but most researchers have defined the academic self-concept as the self-perception of a student's competencies in an academic subject such as math. [41][42][43][44] It implies that a student's perceived classroom environment influences his or her academic self-concept initially, which in turn is assumed to be an antecedent of enjoyment. ...
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