Abstract

School connectedness has become a central priority in contemporary education systems, particularly in reform-oriented contexts where schools are expected to promote students’ psychosocial development alongside academic achievement. Grounded in Bioecological Theory, this study examines how school-based and family support mechanisms relate to students’ school connectedness and how these relationships are conditioned by the comfortable educational environment. Using survey data from 11,524 secondary school students in Kazakhstan, the study applies Partial Least Squares Structural Equation Modeling to test direct and moderating relationships among personal development support, psychological and pedagogical support, family engagement in education, the comfortable educational environment, and school connectedness. The results indicate that all three support mechanisms and the comfortable educational environment are positively associated with students’ school connectedness. Moreover, the findings reveal consistent negative moderation effects: as students’ perceptions of environmental comfort increase, the strength of the associations between each support mechanism and school connectedness decreases. Importantly, these interaction effects reflect attenuation rather than substitution, suggesting that the contribution of targeted supports varies across contextual conditions. By demonstrating that relational supports operate differently depending on the broader environmental climate, the study advances a context-sensitive understanding of school connectedness within centralized reform systems. The findings offer practical implications for policymakers and school leaders, highlighting the importance of aligning structured support strategies with the overall psychological quality of educational environments rather than assuming uniformly additive effects.

Keywords

References

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