Teacher-Student Relationships and Student Outcomes: A Systematic Review of Meta-Analyses and Second-Order Meta-Analysis

Teacher-student relationships (TSRs) play a vital role in establishing a positive school climate and promoting positive student outcomes. Several meta-analyses have suggested significant associations between TSRs and, for example, academic achievement, a lack of disruptive behavior, school engagement, peer relationships, motivation, executive functions, and general well-being. However, these meta-analyses have differed substantially in TSR-outcome relationships, moderators, and quality, thus complicating the interpretation of these findings. In this preregistered systematic review of meta-analyses plus original second-order meta-analyses (SOMAs), we aimed to (a) synthesize the meta-analytic evidence on relationships between TSRs and student outcomes, (b) map influential moderators of these relationships, and (c) assess the methodological quality of the meta-analyses. We synthesized over 70 years of educational research in 24 meta-analyses encompassing a total of 116 effect sizes based on more than 2 million prekindergarten and K-12 students. We conducted several three-level SOMAs and found that TSRs had similar strong significant relationships with eight clusters of outcomes: academic achievement, academic emotions, appropriate student behavior, behavior problems, executive functions and self-control, motivation, school belonging and engagement, and student well-being. Age, gender, and informant (student-, peer-, or teacher-assessments) were the most frequently examined moderators in prior research, and our moderator analyses suggested student grade level and social minority status as moderators. We further found large differences in quality between the meta-analyses, and these differences were not associated with the TSR-outcome relationships. These results map the field of TSR research; present their relationships, moderators, and meta-analytic quality; and show how TSRs can contribute to improving outcomes in students via relationship building. Future research should follow meta-analytic open science procedures to improve quality and reproducibility.