Teacher Support and Academic Stress: The Mediating Effects of Self-Regulated Learning in Physics among Senior High School STEM Students

Academic stress among students ascends from multidimensional pressure points derived from workloads, competitions, and fear of failure. Despite the pursuit of investigating the influence of teacher support on academic stress, more clarity is still needed in uncovering the nuances of academic stress and how it is affected by other factors. In this study, the researchers determined the mediating effects of self-regulated learning in the relationship between teacher support and academic stress in physics among Senior High STEM students using a descriptive causal research design employed randomly on 210 Grade 12 STEM students in the Division of Sultan Kudarat. An adopted survey questionnaire underwent validity and reliability tests and was subjected to confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) distributed through Google Forms to gather necessary data. The mean and standard deviation, Pearson’s r correlation, simple linear regression analysis, and mediation analysis utilizing the Preacher and Hayes (2008) approach were used. The results revealed that the extent of teacher’s support, academic stress, and self-regulated learning were high. Moreover, the high extent of teacher’s support significantly positively predicted self-regulated learning and academic stress. More so, teacher support has a direct effect on self-regulated learning. Further, a partial mediation exists between teacher support and academic stress through self-regulated learning. Thus, teachers must provide adequate support to their students in maximizing their learning experiences so they can contribute to the development of students’ self-regulated learning skills. With sufficient support, students can enhance their self-regulated learning strategies, which helps them minimize academic stress.