Zhen Zhang, Li Kong, Chunhui Qi
Correcting student misconduct is a central issue in educational psychology and classroom management; teachers often use punishment to correct students' inappropriate behavior. Numerous empirical studies have shown that punishment influences individuals' willingness to change their behavior, but the underlying mechanisms remain to be elucidated. This study employed a scenario simulation method to survey 240 middle school students, aiming to explore the relationship between types of punishment and students' self-reported willingness to change their behavior in response to hypothetical scenarios. Furthermore, the study examined the chained mediating effects of perceived punishment motivation and trust, as well as the moderating effect of group relationship. The results showed that perceived punishment motivation and trust exert a chained mediating effect between punishment type and self-reported willingness to change behavior. Punishment first is associated with enhanced perception of the prosocial motivation behind the punishment, which in turn is associated with higher trust in the punishing teacher, and ultimately with greater self-reported willingness of misbehaving students to change their behavior; that is, perception of punishment motivation and trust sequentially transmit the effects of punishment. Furthermore, this transmission process is moderated by group relationship: when the punisher is a teacher (in-group), the influence of punishment type on students' self-reported willingness through perceived punishment motivation and trust is stronger, whereas this effect is not significant when the punisher is an AI (out-group). These findings reveal the psychological pathway through which punishment influences self-reported willingness to change behavior in a hypothetical scenario via sequential processing of cognitive attribution (perceived punishment motivation) and attitudinal evaluation (trust), and highlight the moderating role of group relationship in this process.