The role of conscious self-regulation, language competence and non-cognitive properties in the success of the russian language in secondary school

Article considers the problem of psychological predictors of the academic success in learning Russian language in secondary school. An empirical study was conducted on a sample of students from 7–9 grades (N = 286). The students were examined using a set of diagnostic methods, including Morosanova’s Self-Regulation Profile of Learning Activity Questionnaire, method of diagnostics of the learning motivation and emotional attitude to learning (A. M. Prikhozhan), «Big Five — the children’s version», two tasks assessing language competences in the areas of punctuation, spelling, morphology, syntax, semantics, vocabulary, and style (E. D. Bozhovich), and indicators of academic achievement in Russian language. An empirical model of psychological predictors of academic performance in the Russian language was constructed using the structural equation modeling method. The results demonstrate the significant impact of conscious self-regulation to academic achievement in learning Russian language. Conscientiousness itself makes a small contribution to the total year grade, but when students have high self-regulation and low anxiety, it leads to a significant increase in their academic performance. The same positive reinforcing effect is observed in achievement motivation. Language competences such as knowledge of language norms, rules and a sense of language demonstrate an independent influence on the total year grade in Russian, regardless of non-cognitive factors. The obtained results contribute to scientific ideas about the role of self-regulation and non-cognitive predictors of providing various indicators of academic achievements in the success of learning in native language at school. The data can also be used to design psychological and pedagogical interventions aimed at the development of both language competencies of students and conscious selfregulation of their learning activity.