Impact of Student-Instructor Relationships on Affective Learning and Test Anxiety Perceptions

This study had three aims; 1) if dimensions of student-instructor relationship (connectedness and anxiety) affect students' affective learning outcomes (motivation, task value, self-efficacy); 2) if instructor anxiety predicted test anxiety; 3) to investigate if lecture sizes influenced instructor connectedness within a private Malaysian university and college. The participants comprised of 286 students (M age = 20. 24, 59% females) who answered the Student Instructor Relationship Scale (SIRS) and the Motivated Strategies for Learning Questionnaire (MSLQ). Multiple regressions showed SIR significantly predicted student affective learning (intrinsic motivation, task value, self-efficacy). As predicted, instructor anxiety positively influenced test anxiety; and lecture size negatively associated to instructor connectedness. However, the lecture size influence was dependent on the students being female; and pursuing undergraduate programs. The findings lend support for academics to focus on rapport building and making a connection with students despite having large lecture sizes, and increase the adoption of collaborative teaching apps.