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Collaboration 
Report on the Study of Social and Emotional Skills of 

Chinese Adolescents (III) 

Yipeng Tang, Jie Zheng, Xiaoxue Sun, & Jingzhong Huang 

East China Normal University, Shanghai 200241, China 

OLLABORATION is essential to social and emotional competence. 

Accordingly, collaboration has always been considered a key indica-

tor and core accomplishment of students’ development. People who 

excel at collaboration can successfully cooperate with others, reduce inter-

personal conflict and achieve the final goal by maintaining a positive attitude. 

For children and adolescents, greater collaboration means more pro-social 

behaviors and fewer problem behaviors. Collaboration is also important for 

students’ life development and is closely linked to some life outcome varia-

bles, such as educational expectations, health and well-being, according to 

the OECD. Based on evaluation data out of Suzhou, China, the study under 

review presents the evaluation results of teenagers’ cooperation ability from 

different dimensions and levels. The authors present the research results from 

three aspects, including the predictive variable analysis of collaboration abil-

ity and the life outcome variable of collaboration ability. Analysis shows that 

the students’ empathy, trust, and cooperation capabilities differ depending on 

age, gender, urban & rural areas, and school types; correlation exists in the 

15 kind of abilities of the “Big Five Personalities”. Through regression anal-

ysis from multiple aspects explored the prediction variables; the researchers 

explored the student’s ability of collaboration and cooperation ability in the 5 

major categories of life outcome variables. Specific research results are as 

follows: 

General Situation of Collaboration Ability 

 

 

 

 
 

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BECE, Vol.9, No.1, 2021 1210 

This paper describes the overall performance of students in Suzhou in col-

laboration ability, showing the score of each sub-ability of collaboration abil-

ity, the correlation between collaboration ability and other sub-ability, and 

the differences of age, gender, urban and rural areas, and school types in col-

laboration ability. The study found students in Suzhou self-evaluated quite 

high, and their self-reported empathy, trust, and cooperation abilities were 

higher than the international average (i.e., more than 500 points). Moreover, 

the self-evaluation score of the 10-year-old group was significantly higher 

than that of the 15-year-old group. The correlation between empathy and co-

operation was high (r = 0.76 in the 10-year-old group, r = 0.75 in the 15-

year-old group). There was a moderate correlation between empathy and 

trust (r = 0.51 in the 10-year-old group, r = 0.53 in the 15-year-old group). 

Trust and cooperation were also moderately correlated (r = 0.55 in the 10-

year-old group, r = 0.64 in the 15-year-old group). Collaboration ability and 

other social and emotional abilities show a high level of unity, and students 

who have a high level of collaboration ability tend to have a high level of 

other abilities. There are significant differences in age, gender, and urban and 

rural areas in terms of collaboration ability. On the whole, the 10-year-olds 

were more cooperative than the 15-year-olds. Boys at age 10 were less coop-

erative than girls, but the opposite was true at age 15. But for both 10-year-

olds and 15-year-olds, inner-city students showed higher levels of collabora-

tion than those from rural areas. 

Factors Influencing Collaboration Ability 

The authors used multiple regression to analyze the influence of background 

variables, students’ variables, teachers’ variables, school variables and fami-

ly variables on students’ empathy, trust, and cooperation. 

With concern to background variables, for the 10-year-old group, the 

two variables of family possession and family book collection both had sta-

ble and significant positive effects on students’ cooperative ability (p < 0.01). 

For the 15-year-old group, parents’ highest educational background, family 

ownership, and family book collection had a stable and significant positive 

effect on collaboration ability (p < 0.01). In addition, by comparing the coef-

ficients of the three variables, it appears that the influence degree of family 

ownership is much higher than that of parents’ highest educational back-

ground and family book collection, and the influence coefficient is up to 0.25. 

Generally speaking, family ownership and family book collection have con-

sistent and significant influences on the cooperative ability of the two age 

groups. 

As for the student variables, for the 10-year-old group, the five variables 

of security, friend relationship, good habit friends, indoor activity time, and 

outdoor activity time all have a stable and significant positive influence on 

one’s cooperative ability. In addition, from the size of the standardized coef-

ficient, the influence degree of the three variables of security, friendship, and 

habit friends is much higher than the indoor and outdoor activity time, the 



 

BECE, Vol.9, No.1, 2021 1211 

correlation coefficient is higher than 0.10. For the 15-year-old group, the six 

variables of security, friend relationship, friends with good habits, indoor ac-

tivity time, outdoor activity time, and growth thinking have a stable and sig-

nificant positive impact on the cooperative ability. From the size of the 

standardization coefficient, the influence degree of security, friendship, and 

habitual friends is higher than other variables. In addition, high expectations 

of friends and time spent online had significant negative effects on the 15-

year-old group (p < 0.01, β = was around -0.06). 

Among the teacher variables, for 10-year-old students, teaching age, 

teacher’s education background, and teacher-student relationship all have 

stable and significant positive effects on a student’s collaboration ability (p < 

0.01). For the 15-year-old group, only the teacher-student relationship had a 

stable and significant positive effect on collaboration ability (p < 0.01, β = 

0.24), while teaching age had no significant effect on trust and cooperation. 

Teacher’s education background had no significant effect on empathy. Over-

all, the teacher-student relationship had a consistent and significant effect on 

collaboration in both age groups. 

As for school variables, school belonging, school cooperation atmos-

phere, and off-campus activities all had stable and significant positive effects 

on collaboration ability for 10-year-old students (p < 0.01). From the stand-

ardized regression coefficient, the degree of school belonging (p < 0.01 β = 

0.34, 0.29, 0.39) was higher than that of school cooperative atmosphere (p < 

0.01, β = 0.25, 0.24, 0.22). The influence degree of cooperative atmosphere 

in school was higher than that of off-campus activities (p < 0.01, β = 0.10, 

0.06, 0.10). The 15-year-old group was similar to the 10-year-old group in 

that school belonging, school cooperation atmosphere, and off-campus ac-

tivities had a stable and significant positive effect on their collaboration abil-

ity, and school belonging had the highest effect (p < 0.01,β = 0.38, 0.42, 

0.45). 

As for the family variables, for the 10-year-old group, the three varia-

bles of considerate mother, considerate father, and parents’ high expectations 

all have a stable and significant positive impact on the cooperative ability. In 

terms of the normalization coefficient, the influence degree of understanding 

mother (p < 0.01, β = 0.15, 0.12, 0.14) was higher than that of understanding 

father. In addition, parent-child problems have a significant negative impact 

on collaboration ability. For the 15-year-old group, the five variables of un-

derstanding father, punishing father, understanding mother, punishing mother, 

and high parental expectations all had a stable and significant positive impact 

on a student’s cooperative ability. 

Collaboration and Life 

In terms of education, empathy, trust, and cooperation had positive effects on 

Chinese, Mathematics, and Art scores for 10-year-old students (p < 0.01), but 

some effects were statistically insignificant, such as cooperation on mathe-

matics score (p = 0.17) and empathy on art score (p = 0.17). Cooperation had 



 

BECE, Vol.9, No.1, 2021 1212 

a significant positive effect on educational expectation (p < 0.01, β = 0.07), 

but trust had a significant negative effect on educational expectation (p < 

0.01,β = 0.06). For the 15-year-old group, cooperation has a significant posi-

tive impact on Chinese, Mathematics, and educational expectations. Addi-

tionally, trust has a significant positive effect on artistic achievement and ed-

ucational expectations. From the perspective of global consciousness, both 

empathy and cooperation have significant positive effects on global con-

sciousness, and the influence degree of empathy is higher than that of coop-

eration. However, trust has a significant negative impact on global con-

sciousness, but the impact degree is relatively low. From the perspective of 

health variables, whether 10 years old or 15 years old, collaboration ability 

has a significant positive impact on students’ self-health evaluation (p < 

0.01). From the perspective of subjective well-being, life satisfaction and test 

anxiety, empathy, trust, and cooperation have significant positive effects on 

students’ subjective well-being and life satisfaction. They also seem to im-

prove students’ happiness and satisfaction. Trust and cooperation have nega-

tive effects on test anxiety, which can alleviate the anxiety caused by the test. 

For the 15-year-old group, empathy has a significant positive effect on sub-

jective well-being and a significant negative effect on test anxiety; Trust has 

a significant positive effect on subjective well-being and life satisfaction, and 

a significant negative effect on test anxiety. Cooperation has significant posi-

tive effects on subjective well-being, life satisfaction, and test anxiety. 

Therefore, strategies seeking to improve students’ cooperation abilities 

should take a combined point and surface approach. The role of one or a type 

of factor should not be unilaterally emphasized but rather considered accord-

ing to individuals, families, teachers, schools, and communities. Among oth-

er factors, understanding parenting and time spent online need more attention. 

In addition, the ability to cooperate has positive significance for the devel-

opment of students’ careers, but it still needs to be analyzed scientifically and 

objectively. Collaboration has a positive effect on some life outcome varia-

bles, but for other variables, such as students’ academic performance, the re-

sults of the Suzhou analysis did not convey a completely positive signal. 

 

 

Source: Journal of East China Normal University (Educational Sciences), 2021, 39(09): 

62-76. 

 

Correspondence to:  

Yipeng Tang 

East China Normal University 
Shanghai 200241 

China 

Email: yptang@dedu.ecnu.edu.cn  
 

Conflict of Interests: None. 

Doi: 10.15354/bece.21.rp033 

 

mailto:yptang@dedu.ecnu.edu.cn

