How Does Gender Relate to Social Skills? Exploring Differences in Social Skills Mindsets, Academics, and Behaviors?

Background: Despite growing attention on the importance of students’ social-emotional learning (SEL) needs on their achievement and behaviors, little is known about the importance of social skills mindsets on student outcomes. Additionally, few studies have examined the relation between mindsets and outcomes and differences by gender.  According to gender intensification theory, girls may be socialized in a way that they value interpersonal relationships more than boys do, and as a result, ascribe higher importance to social skills. However, to date, no known study investigated the interaction effect of social skills mindsets and gender on the academic achievement and behavior outcome among high school students as they enter into high school. Entering high school is a major life transition for students, and social skills are particularly critical as they adjust into their new school environment. Based on a cohort of 9^th grade students as they enter high school, this study investigates whether gender differences exist in the relations among social skills mindsets, academics, and behaviors.

Method: The Social Skills Improvement System (SSIS) was administered to an entire class of high school freshmen students in a semi-urban city in central Illinois (n=323). Academics (grade point averages) and behavior (attendance and office disciplinary referrals) records were from school administrative data. Two multiple regression models were applied. In the first model, the direct effects of social skills and social skills mindsets were entered together with the variable for gender. In the second model, the two-way interaction terms (social skills × gender, social skills mindsets × gender, social skills × social skills mindsets) were added. The interaction term of social skills mindsets, social skills frequencies and gender were used as the independent variable and grade point averages (GPAs), attendance, disciplinary referrals were used as dependent variables. Changes to the F-tests and R² were observed across the models.

Results: Higher levels of social skills mindsets were associated with positive improvements in GPA (𝛽 = .241, p ≤ .001), attendance (𝛽 = .175, p ≤ .05). In addition, the interaction terms for social skills mindsets and gender were significant for the models with GPA (𝛽 =−.330, p ≤ .001), attendance (𝛽 =−.240, p ≤ .001) and disciplinary referrals (𝛽 = .265, p ≤ .10). The interaction plots showed that female students with higher social skills mindsets had higher GPAs, higher attendance rates, and lower disciplinary referrals than their male counterparts with higher mindsets. Male students with lower mindsets had higher GPAs, higher attendance rates and lower disciplinary problems compared to female students with lower mindsets.

Conclusion and Implications: This study adds to the existing literature on social skills mindsets and academic and behavior outcome among high school freshman students. Our finding suggests that more attention should be given to understand students’ social skills mindsets and gender difference in promoting students’ positive adjustment into high school. Our results serve as a basis for future research efforts to develop social skills mindsets interventions for freshman students as they enter high school.