BECE. Newsletter 

Vol.18, No.1, 2024, BECE 1900 

 

 

 

 

The Effects of Criticism on the Behavioral  

Improvement Intention of Junior and Senior  

Secondary School Students: The Role of the  

Teacher-Student Relationship 

By Cheng, Y., Yan, L., & Zhang, F. 
Correspondence to: Feng Zhang, Ningbo University, China. E-mail: 

zhangfeng@nbu.edu.cn  

HE CULTIVATION of good behavioral habits in students is among the 

chief goals of school education. The teacher’ praise and criticism play 

important roles in this process. As opposed to praise, criticism is a negation 

of student misconduct, which is usually deemed negative feedback by the 

students criticized, but in the teacher’ eyes, is meant to make them aware of 

and correct their misbehavior. Currently, there remain divides among re-

searchers on the effects of criticism in the education process. Recruiting 228 

8th- and 11th-graders from a middle school and a high school in X City, this 

study seeks to explore the effects of different types of criticism (outcome, 

process, and person criticism) on the relationship between the secondary 

teacher and their students as well as on the latter’s behavioral improvement 

intention. Also examined is the role of the teacher-student relationship in the 

relation between the type of criticism and student behavioral improvement 

intention.  

Research Findings: 

 As opposed to outcome criticism, the effects of process criticism 

and person criticism on the teacher-student relationship varied in 

the two education phases. For the high school students, process 

criticism could help enhance their perception of the close rela-

tionship with their teacher, whereas person criticism had the op-

posite effect. For the middle school students, both process criti-

cism and person criticism could weaken their perception of the 

close relationship with their teacher. 

 Both process criticism and person criticism impacted the students’ 

behavioral improvement intention by changing their perception 

of the relationship with their teacher, though with differential fea-

tures in junior and senior secondary education. In junior second-

ary education, both of them had negative impacts on student be-

havioral improvement intention by undermining the close rela-

tionship between the teacher and students. In senior secondary 

T 

mailto:zhangfeng@nbu.edu.cn


 

Vol.18, No.1, 2024, BECE 1901 

education, process criticism helped augment the behavioral im-

provement intention of the students by bolstering the teacher-

student relationship, whereas person criticism negatively affected 

their behavioral improvement intention by impairing the teacher-

student relationship. 

Research Implications: 

 Long-term experience of person criticism has the potential of es-

tablishing negative self-concepts in students, who would choose 

to reject the opportunities for self-improvement. The teacher 

must avoid it in administering criticism to students. 

 There are differences in the effects of process criticism on the 

behavioral improvement intention of junior and senior secondary 

school students, as well as in the impact routes. The teacher must 

be mindful of the possible negative consequences of process crit-

icism for middle school students. 

 Junior secondary students in their early adolescence have diffi-

culty distinguishing process and person criticism and compre-

hending the positive intent of teacher criticism, which means 

middle school teachers, face more challenges in correcting their 

students’ misbehavior. 

 
Source: Psychological Development and Education, 2024; 41(1):42-50.