A Meta-Analysis of the Relationship between Social Support and Academic Performance

Social support as a relevant and effective variable on academic performance has been investigated in many studies, and the different and sometimes contradictory results of these studies highlight the necessity of a meta-analytical study. This study aimed to combine the findings of 12 years of Iranian and international investigations which had studied the relationship between social support and academic performance. The statistical population included Iranian and internationally published and available studies related to the subject from 2009-2021. Based on the inclusion and exclusion criteria, 55 studies and 101 effect sizes were selected. Finally, after sensitivity analysis and removal of extreme effect sizes, 79 effect sizes were analyzed. The results showed that the combined effect size was 0.189 for the fixed model and 0.220 for the random model. In this study, gender and age were studied as qualitative and quantitative moderator variables, respectively. The results showed that there was no significant difference in the effect sizes of the relationship between social support and academic performance based on gender. The meta-regression results also showed that by increasing the age mean, the effect size decreases to a very small significant amount and a small part of the total heterogeneity is explained by the age mean of the initial studies. As a result, based on obtained effect size, social support is effective in increasing students' academic performance.