Family Relationships and Academic Performance Mediated by Belongingness: Examining Sex Differences among Cuban Students

ABSTRACTThe current study focused on processes underlying Cuban students’ academic performance. Using path analyses, the model examined the relations between family relationships and academic performance mediated by belongingness and moderated by sex differences among Cuban medical students (N = 613; M age = 21.39, SD = 2.05). Findings indicated that improved family relationships significantly predicted increased belongingness to the field of medicine for both male and female students. The relation between belongingness and academic performance was only significant for male students. Thus, improved family relationships informed academic performance via belongingness for male medical students.KEYWORDS: Family relationshipsbelongingnessacademic performanceCubanstudents Disclosure statementNo potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.Additional informationFundingThis research was partially supported by a grant from the Harvard Graduate School of Education Dean’s venture fund (PI Diamond Y. Bravo). Chelsea D. Williams efforts on this article were partially supported by Virginia Commonwealth University’s Institute for Inclusion, Inquiry & Innovation (iCubed). We thank the medical students who participated in this study. We also thank the medical research assistants and faculty for their contributions to the larger study.