EMOTIONAL REGULATION AND ITS IMPACT ON ACADEMIC RESILIENCE IN ADOLESCENTS IN SOME SELECTED SECONDARY SCHOOLS IN THE NORTH WEST REGION OF CAMEROON

Abstract

Adolescents’ ability to regulate their emotions has been increasingly linked to their capacity to adapt academically in the face of adversity. Emotional regulation refers to processes by which individuals influence which emotions they have, when they have them, and how they experience or express them (Gross, 2014). Research indicates that adaptive strategies, such as cognitive reappraisal, are associated with psychological well-being and academic persistence, whereas maladaptive strategies, such as suppression, correlate with poorer adjustment outcomes (Gross & John, 2003; Aldao et al., 2010). Academic resilience, defined as the ability to achieve positive academic outcomes despite challenges or setbacks, is a protective factor strongly associated with emotional regulation (Martin & Marsh, 2006; Cassidy, 2016). In contexts affected by social and political crises, such as the North West Region of Cameroon, resilience has become crucial to sustaining adolescents’ learning outcomes and school engagement (Masten, 2014; Ungar, 2012). This study guided by the Gross’s Process Model of Emotion Regulation and Resilience Theory, adopted a mixed-methods design to explore the impact of emotional regulation on academic resilience among adolescents in secondary schools in the North West Region. A total of 120 students participated in the quantitative phase, where standardized tools including the Emotion Regulation Questionnaire (Gross & John, 2003) and the Academic Resilience Scale (Martin & Marsh, 2008) were administered. Complementary qualitative interviews and focus group discussions with 12 students, 8 teachers and 4 administrators provided deeper insights into contextual influences on emotional coping and academic perseverance. Quantitative data were analyzed using descriptive statistics, regression, and correlation analyses, while qualitative data were subjected to thematic analysis. Findings revealed that students employing adaptive strategies such as cognitive reappraisal and problem-focused coping reported higher academic resilience scores, aligning with prior findings that effective emotional regulation enhances perseverance, motivation, and self-efficacy (Tugade & Fredrickson, 2007; Pekrun et al., 2002). Conversely, suppression and avoidance strategies were negatively related to resilience, corroborating studies that link maladaptive regulation with academic disengagement and stress (Aldao et al., 2010; Gross, 2015). Qualitative findings underscored the importance of social support from teachers, peers, and families in moderating the relationship between emotional regulation and resilience, echoing the sociocultural perspective that resilience is not merely an individual trait but also a socially embedded process (Ungar, 2012; Vygotsky, 1978). The study recommends integrating social-emotional learning (SEL) frameworks into school curricula to enhance students’ regulation skills and resilience capacities (Durlak et al., 2011). Teacher training programs should emphasize emotionally supportive pedagogy and trauma-informed practices to address the psychosocial realities of learners in crisis-affected contexts. Furthermore, policymakers are encouraged to provide counseling services, resilience-building initiatives, and mental health support as part of inclusive education strategies. This research contributes to the discourse on sustainable education by demonstrating how emotional regulation underpins resilience, enabling adolescents to persist academically despite adversity.