Emotion Regulation Strategies and Academic Buoyancy Among Senior Secondary Students in Enugu State

This study empirically examines the relationship between emotion regulation strategies and academic buoyancy among senior secondary school students in Enugu State, South East Nigeria. Academic buoyancy, the capacity to successfully navigate routine academic setbacks such as poor test scores, criticism, and assignment difficulties, is a practically significant construct that predicts sustained academic engagement, yet its psychological antecedents within Nigerian secondary school populations are underexplored. The study employs a cross-sectional survey design, recruiting 320 SS2 students from nine secondary schools across Enugu East, Enugu North, and Nkanu West Local Government Areas. The Cognitive Emotion Regulation Questionnaire, the Academic Buoyancy Scale, and a validated academic engagement measure were used as instruments. Data were analysed using hierarchical multiple regression and mediation testing. Results indicate that adaptive emotion regulation strategies, specifically positive reappraisal and perspective-taking, significantly predict academic buoyancy, while maladaptive strategies, particularly catastrophising and self-blame, are significant negative predictors. Academic buoyancy partially mediates the relationship between adaptive regulation and academic engagement. Gender and school type moderated the strength of these relationships. These findings extend emotional regulation theory to the academic persistence context in South East Nigeria and suggest that targeted emotion regulation skill building may be a cost-effective approach to strengthening student resilience in secondary schools. The Enugu State Ministry of Education is advised to include emotion regulation components in secondary school counselling curricula. Keywords: emotion regulation, academic buoyancy, senior secondary school, Enugu State, psychological resilience.