From Friends to Feelings: Negative Peer Influence on Student Boredom and the Moderating Roles of Teacher-Student Relationship Quality and Cognitive Ability.

While emotions are socially shaped, research on academic emotions has neglected the potential influence of peer emotions. This study investigated whether students' boredom is influenced by their classroom friends' boredom and whether teacher-student relationship quality and cognitive ability moderate these influences. Participants were 3415 7th Grade students (Mage = 12.44(0.45); 49.69% females) from 27 Flemish schools. Longitudinal social network analyses demonstrated peer influence effects on academic boredom, controlling for selection and network effects. Teacher-student relationship quality and cognitive ability did not moderate this influence, but higher teacher-student relationship quality predicted less increases in boredom. Findings indicate that boredom can spread through classroom friendship networks, regardless of student ability, and that high-quality teacher-student relationships protect against increases in boredom.