Intro
My research examines student development within relational and ecological contexts, with a particular focus on how family, school, and peer environments jointly shape academic and socio-emotional outcomes.
Rather than treating these contexts as isolated influences, my work is concerned with how patterns of support and risk co-occur and interact across students’ everyday lives.
Research Focus
- Student development across family, school, and peer contexts
- Relational support systems and socio-emotional regulation
- Home–school interactions and mesosystem processes
- Heterogeneity in students’ relational experiences
Theoretical Frameworks
My work is primarily informed by Ecological Systems Theory and Attachment Theory. From an ecological perspective, student development is understood as a product of nested and interacting systems, rather than individual traits alone.
Attachment theory further provides a relational lens for understanding how internal working models formed across family, teacher, and peer relationships may shape students’ emotional regulation and engagement with learning contexts.
Methodological Approach
Methodologically, I am interested in approaches that capture heterogeneity and contextual dependency in developmental processes. My work moves beyond average effects to examine meaningful patterns of relational experience among students.
- Person-centred approaches (e.g., latent profile analysis)
- Multilevel modelling of student- and school-level processes
- Large-scale educational datasets
- Integrating theory-driven and data-driven methods
Chenxi Shhen | Academic Site 