Frontiers in psychology · 2026
Academic social comparison orientation and adaptive academic help-seeking among university students: academic anxiety as a mediator and academic self-efficacy as a moderator.
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Almailabi Bandar Salah
Аннотация
INTRODUCTION: Academic help-seeking is a self-regulatory academic behavior that may be shaped by students' evaluative experiences and beliefs about their academic capability. This study examined whether academic anxiety statistically mediates the association between academic social comparison orientation and adaptive academic help-seeking, and whether academic self-efficacy moderates the association between academic anxiety and adaptive academic help-seeking among university students.
METHODS: A cross-sectional online survey was conducted with 218 undergraduate students from two Saudi universities. The main model was analyzed using partial least squares structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM) with 5,000 bootstrap resamples.
RESULTS: Academic social comparison orientation was positively associated with academic anxiety (β = 0.374, p < 0.001), and academic anxiety was negatively associated with adaptive academic help-seeking (β = -0.234, p = 0.001). Academic social comparison orientation also showed a negative direct association with adaptive academic help-seeking (β = -0.192, p = 0.004). The indirect effect through academic anxiety was negative and statistically significant (β = -0.087, p = 0.005), consistent with partial statistical mediation. Academic self-efficacy moderated the anxiety-help-seeking association (β = 0.153, p = 0.010), with the positive interaction indicating that the negative association between academic anxiety and adaptive academic help-seeking became weaker as academic self-efficacy increased.
CONCLUSION: The findings suggest that academic anxiety partially statistically mediated the association between stronger academic social comparison orientation and lower adaptive academic help-seeking, whereas academic self-efficacy statistically moderated the negative association between academic anxiety and adaptive academic help-seeking, such that this association was weaker at higher levels of academic self-efficacy. Given the cross-sectional design, the findings should be interpreted as statistical associations consistent with the proposed theoretical model rather than as evidence of causal effects.
METHODS: A cross-sectional online survey was conducted with 218 undergraduate students from two Saudi universities. The main model was analyzed using partial least squares structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM) with 5,000 bootstrap resamples.
RESULTS: Academic social comparison orientation was positively associated with academic anxiety (β = 0.374, p < 0.001), and academic anxiety was negatively associated with adaptive academic help-seeking (β = -0.234, p = 0.001). Academic social comparison orientation also showed a negative direct association with adaptive academic help-seeking (β = -0.192, p = 0.004). The indirect effect through academic anxiety was negative and statistically significant (β = -0.087, p = 0.005), consistent with partial statistical mediation. Academic self-efficacy moderated the anxiety-help-seeking association (β = 0.153, p = 0.010), with the positive interaction indicating that the negative association between academic anxiety and adaptive academic help-seeking became weaker as academic self-efficacy increased.
CONCLUSION: The findings suggest that academic anxiety partially statistically mediated the association between stronger academic social comparison orientation and lower adaptive academic help-seeking, whereas academic self-efficacy statistically moderated the negative association between academic anxiety and adaptive academic help-seeking, such that this association was weaker at higher levels of academic self-efficacy. Given the cross-sectional design, the findings should be interpreted as statistical associations consistent with the proposed theoretical model rather than as evidence of causal effects.