Review Reports - Feedback Sensitivity, Scholastic Adjustment and Prosocial Behavior: The Mediation Effect of Academic Self-Efficacy

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

Dear authors:

I find your research interesting. Your manuscript is well structured and of good quality. Therefore, please consider my comments/suggestions only as a contribution to improve what you present to us.

It seems to me that there are three weaknesses in your manuscript.

These are:

- References that are not up to date. Based on the constructs of your research, I did a quick search in indexed databases (e.g. PubMed, WoS) and found that there are, albeit few, more recent publications than the ones you present;

- the "2. Materials and methods" section lacks an adequate characterisation of the instrument (e.g. items, scale,..., and validation of questionnaire); the ethical issues related to the study are not described (e.g. was the questionnaire approved by the ethics committee? It is not clear what the "Institutional Review Board" is);

- the section "4. Discussion" needs to be revised. The discussion of the results that you present is not adequately supported by the references that you present in "1. Introduction" (e.g. in line 279 you write "Several studies ...". I ask you: what are these studies?).

Rew

Author Response

REVIEWER 1

References that are not up to date. Based on the constructs of your research, I did a quick search in indexed databases (e.g. PubMed, WoS) and found that there are, albeit few, more recent publications than the ones you present.

We agree with the reviewer and we now add the discussion of results from more recent studies:

Page 1, lines 30-31

“Recent studies [1] show the significant effects of prosocial behavior (defined as a voluntary behavior aimed to help and share with others”

Page 1, lines 32-35

“In this direction, a large body of research aimed at investigating the predictors of prosocial behavior and scholastic adjustment, showed the significant role played by academic self-efficacy, which consists of the students’ beliefs in their efficacy to reach high academic goals [3,”

Page 1, lines 38-40; Page 2, lines 81-88

“Following this direction, the present study has the overall aim of examining the effects of adolescents’ personality constructs which were only partially investigated by previous studies [6],”

“In this term, Schwab and colleagues [6], recently conducted a study to investigate the role of students’ perception of feedback received by teachers on peer acceptance and academic achievement on a sample of primary school students, suggesting that higher perception of negative feedback was associated with higher peer acceptance. Even if this last finding was very important, this study was conducted on a sample of primary school students, limitating the generalization of this finding to the high school students sample that is facing with the challenges and changes of the adolescence.”

Page 3, lines 115-123

“For example, Zysberg and Zysberg [24], conducted a study on middle and high school students’ sample, to assess the relationships among school climate, academic self-efficacy and academic perfomance. Of interest to this study, results suggest positive significant association between higher academic self-efficacy believes and higher academic achievement. Furthermore, another study conducted by Renee and colleagues [25] on a sample of adolescents, suggest the positive impact of higher self-effocacy believes, in predicting higher prosocial behavior. Based on these studies, it is plausible to hypothesize the strong positive effects of academic self-efficacy believes on high school students’ prosocial behavior and scholastic performance.”

Accordingly, we also modified the study’hypotheses (page 3, line 142; page 4 line 175):

“Regarding the first objective, according with the Feedback Intervention Theory [11], which supported that student’s personality characteristics play a key role in determining the success of the feedback received by teachers and consequently, the academic aspirations, motivation, success and, in accordance with previous studies [14, 13, 15], which suggested that rewards positively affect students’ positive academic functioning by facilitating the learning processes through several cognitive processes, and that punishment negatively affect the positive academic functioning by disengaging the students’ learning, we hypothesize to find the positive and significant effect of higher reward sensitivity in determining higher academic self-efficacy, prosocial behaviors and scholastic performance; we also hypotesize tha high punishment sensitivity determines lower academic self-efficacy, prosocial behaviors and scholastic performance. However, no studies have been conducted analyzing specifically the effect of feedback sensitivity on prosocial behavior, therefore our hypothesis regarding this latter is in part exploratory.

Regarding the second objective, according with the Bandura’s theory [4] about the key role played by self-efficacy beliefs in affecting the persistence and efforts to achieve personal goals by collaborating each other and also by increasing motivations, and in accordance with recent studies [25, 24] which support the positive impact of academic self-efficacy on scholastic and social functioning, we hypotesize that higher youths’ academic self-efficacy beliefs determines higher prosocial behaviors and higher scholastic performance. In particular, we hypothesized that students’ academic self-efficacy beliefs positively affect prosocial behavior by increasing the efforts and the cooperation among students to reach their academic goals and that determines high scholastic performance by increasing students’ academic aspirations and motivations.

Finally, regarding the third objective, based on the aformentioned studies which supported the positive effects of reward sensitivity on the increasement of academic self-efficacy by acting on students goals, aspirations and efforts, and based on the aformentioned studies which suggested the positive effects of academic self-efficacy on both prosocial behavior and scholastic performance by increasing the motivations and the cohoperation among students, we hypothesize to find significant indirect effects of reward sensitivity in explaining expected positive the association between reward sensitivity and scholastic perfomance/prosocial behavior; and in explaining the expected negative significant association between punishment sensitivity and scholastic perfomance/prosocial behavior.”

Page 8, line 323

“Several studies [35,36], emphasize the important role play by personality in affecting psychosocial adjustment and positive long-term outcomes”

Furthermore, we add the new references to the reference list:

“Arslan, G.; Coşkun, M. Student Subjective Wellbeing, School Functioning, and Psychological Adjustment in High School Adolescents: A Latent Variable Analysis. Journal of Positive School Psychology 2020, 4 (2), 153–164.

Leng, J.; Guo, Q.; Ma, B.; Zhang, S.; Sun, P. Bridging Personality and Online Prosocial Behavior: The Roles of Empathy, Moral Identity, and Social Self-Efficacy. Frontiers in Psychology 2020, 11. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2020.575053.

Schwab, S.; Lindner, K.-T.; Helm, C.; Hamel, N.; Markus, S. Social Participation in the Context of Inclusive Education: Primary School Students’ Friendship Networks from Students’ and Teachers’ Perspectives. European Journal of Special Needs Education 2021, 37 (5), 1–16. https://doi.org/10.1080/08856257.2021.1961194

Zysberg, L.; Schwabsky, N. School Climate, Academic Self-Efficacy and Student Achievement. Educational Psychology 2020, 41 (4), 1–16. https://doi.org/10.1080/01443410.2020.1813690.

Patrick, R. B.; Bodine, A. J.; Gibbs, J. C.; Basinger, K. S. What Accounts for Prosocial Behavior? Roles of Moral Identity, Moral Judgment, and Self-Efficacy Beliefs. The Journal of Genetic Psychology 2018, 179 (5), 231–245. https://doi.org/10.1080/00221325.2018.1491472.

Erzen, E.; Ozabaci, N. Effects of Personality Traits, Social Support and Self-Efficacy on Predicting University Adjustment. Journal of Education 2021, 203 (2), 002205742110250. https://doi.org/10.1177/00220574211025059.

Haslam, C.; Haslam, S. A.; Jetten, J.; Cruwys, T.; Steffens, N. K. Life Change, Social Identity, and Health. Annual Review of Psychology 2020, 72 (1). https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev-psych-060120-111721.£

2) The "2. Materials and methods" section lacks an adequate characterization of the instrument (e.g. items, scale, and validation of questionnaire); the ethical issues related to the study are not described (e.g. was the questionnaire approved by the ethics committee? It is not clear what the "Institutional Review Board" is.

We agree with the reviewer about lack of information about the instruments and about the Institutional Review Board. In accordance we now specify who the ethics committee was that gave approval to carry out the study (see page 5, lines 199-200):

“After obtaining approval from the Ethical Committee of La Sapienza University of Rome”

Furthermore, we now better described the full section of measures, by providing items’ example and scale description and the references of the authors who validated the used questionnaires (see page 5, line 200 – page 6, line 250):

“2.4. Measures

2.4.1. Youths’ Gender

Participants’ gender was coded 1 for boys and 2 for girls.

2.4.2. Youths’ Age

Participants’ age was measured by averaging the years of age reported by youths.

2.3.3. Parents’ Education

Participants’ mothers and fathers’ average years of education completed.

2.4.4. Youths’ Social Desirability

Participants completed the Lie Scale from the Big Five Questionnaire [21], which evaluates the tendency of participants to give a more positive image of themselves. Adolescents were asked to rate on 11 items (item example: “I have never criticized anyone”) how typical each answer was for him/her (from 1 = “absolutely false for me” to 5 = “absolutely true for me”). A total score of youths’ social desirability was created by averaging the participants responses (α = .71).

2.4.5. Youths’ Feedback Sensitivity

Participants' feedback sensitivity was assessed using the 12-item BIS/BAS scale by Carver and White [22], which is divided into two subscales to assess Punishment Sensitivity and Reward Sensitivity respectively. Participants rated on a 4-point Likert scale (from 1 = Completely false for me, to 4 = Completely true for me) their total Punishment Sensitivity construct, which was obtained by averaging the participants responses on the 7 related items (e.g., “I worry about making mistakes”; α = .80); while the total Reward Sensitivity construct (alpha = .66) was obtained by averaging the participants responses on the 5 related items (e.g., “When I get something I want, I feel excited and full of energy”; α = .66).

2.4.6. Youths’ Academic Self-Efficacy

Participants’ beliefs in their efficacy were measured on an 11-item scale [23,18,24], that assessed their efficacy in structuring environments conducive to learning and in planning and organizing academic activities (sample item e.g. “How well can you study when there are other interesting things to do?”). Adolescents rated on a 5-point Likert scale (from 1= not well at all, to 5= very well), their perceived capability to manage one’s learning and academic activities, and a total score of academic self-efficacy was created by averaging the participants responses (α = .89).

2.4.7. Youths’ Prosocial Behavior

Participants prosocial behavior was measured using the 16 items (item example: “I try to help others”; α = .92) from the scale of Caprara & Pastorelli [25]. Participants rated on a 5-point Likert scale (from 1, “Never”, to 5, “Always”) the evaluation of the degrees of their helpfulness, sharing, and consoling. A total score of prosocial behavior was created by averaging the participants responses (α = .92).

2.4.8. Youths’ Scholastic Performance

Participants rated their scholastic performance by responding to a subscale from the Youth Self-Report related to the academic achievement [26]. They indicated on a 4-pont Likert scale (from 1 = failing, to 4 = above average) academic performance in 7 subject matters (reading, writing, math, spelling, social studies, science and other matters). A total score of scholastic performance was created by averaging the participants responses (α =. 87).”

The section "4. Discussion" needs to be revised. The discussion of the results that you present is not adequately supported by the references that you present in "1. Introduction" (e.g. in line 279 you write "Several studies ...". I ask you: what are these studies?).

We now modify the discussion section as follows (page 8, line 322 – page 9, line 383):

“4. Discussion

Several studies [35,36], emphasize the important role play by personality in affecting psychosocial adjustment and positive long-term outcomes; despite the large body of existing research on the individual differences (such as, personality traits) that can promote prosocial behavior and scholastic adjustment, there is a gap in literature regarding specific personality characteristics that, in the school context, could affect these outcomes. In this framework, the present study attempts to go beyond this gap by investigating the impact of personal characteristics that in the school context, could impact the implementation of prosocial actions and scholastic performance. We refer to feedback sensitivity. Furthermore, in our study, we included also the investigation of a specific domain of self-efficacy beliefs that, in the school activities, could be particularly relevant in the promotion of prosocial behavior and scholastic performance, academic self-efficacy beliefs.

The first objective of this study was to examine the effect of youths’ feedback sensitivity (reward/punishment sensitivity) on their academic self-efficacy, prosocial behavior and scholastic performance. Regarding our hypothesis, we expected to find a positive and significant effect of higher reward sensitivity in determining higher academic self-efficacy, prosocial behaviors and scholastic performance and to find a negative effects of high punishment sensitivity in determing lower academic self-efficacy, prosocial behaviors and scholastic performance. However, our hypothesis was only partially confirmed. In fact, we found only a positive significant association between negative feedback sensitivity and prosocial behavior. This unexpected result could be interpreted based on the fact that it is plausible that the sensitivity to feedback received in the school context, and in particular reward sensitivity, act at a more significant level on cognitive processes (such as planning school activities) than on behavior. Following this direction, it could be possible that students, who are more sensitive to negative feedback received at school, are less able to apply their cognitive capabilities to reach their academic goals and therefore that they try to find different way to reach those goals such as collaborate with other students. However, it is important to recognize that this explanation is not supported by scientific data and that must be better explored in future studies. Regarding the effects of feedback sensitivity on academic self-efficacy, our results were consistent with the study hypotheses suggesting a positive and significant association between reward sensitivity and academic self-efficacy. In fact, in accordance with the Feedback Intervention Theory [11], which supported the feedback received by teachers affects academic aspirations, motivation, which are proxy of academic self-efficacy believes, our findings highlighted the important role played by rewards in facilitating the learning processes through several cognitive processes which act on the self-efficacy believes system.

The second objective of this study was to investigate the associations between academic self-efficacy believes and both prosocial behavior and scholastic performance. In this term, we hypothesize to find positive significant effects of high academic self-efficacy on high scholastic performance and prosocial behavior. Our finding confirmed this hypothesis suggestinng positive significant associations between academic self-efficacy believes and both school perfomance and prosocial behavior. This finding highlighting the importance of increasing self-efficacy beliefs, in particular acting on their sources (mastering experiences, modelling, positive feedback, emotion regulation) in order to increase scholastic and social adjustment . However, we did not find any significant effect of academic self-efficacy on prosocial behavior. Regarding this finding, it is plausible to speculate that other domain of self-efficacy believes more related to social life, such as collective self.efficacy believes or social self-efficacy believes, could determine an increasement in youths’ prosocial behavior.

Finally, the third objective of this study was to investigate the indirect effect of academic self-efficacy on the association between feedback sensitivity and the studied outcomes. Regarding our hypothesis, we expected to find that reward sensitivity could increase academic self-efficacy which in turn could positively affects scholastic perfomance and prosocial behavior, and that punishment sensitivity could decrease academic self-efficacy which in turn, could negatively affects scholastic performance and prosocial behavior. Our findings confermed this hypothesis only partially. In fact, it seems that only reward sensitivity indirectly affects youths’ high academic performance by increasing their self-efficacy believes. We did not found any significant results for the punishment sensitivity that instead, seems only directed associated with prosocial behavior without having any influences on self-efficacy believes and scholastic performance.”

Reviewer 2 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

This paper examines the direct impact of adolescents' feedback sensitivity (including reward sensitivity and punishment sensitivity) on their prosocial behavior and academic performance, as well as the potential indirect effect of academic self-efficacy in this relationship. The study involved 132 adolescent students from Rome, Italy. Overall, I believe this paper is publishable, but several modifications and improvements must be made before publication.

First, the title may have issues; it reads somewhat ambiguously. I suggest changing it to something like " XX and XX：the mediation effects of xx and xx."

Second, in "1.3. The Present Study," a theoretical framework diagram could be added. Sections "2.3.1. Youths’ Gender" and "2.3.2. Youths’ Age" should be expressed as complete sentences rather than short phrases.

Third, Figure 1 shows that all variables are manifest. Since the author used scales to measure academic self-efficacy and other variables, why not construct the structural equation model using latent variables?

Fourth, there is a lack of content addressing the limitations and shortcomings of the study.

Fifth, the theoretical framework and literature review should be further developed. Although the author has provided some summaries, they are currently quite thin and should be elaborated upon.

Author Response

REVIEWER 2

First, the title may have issues; it reads somewhat ambiguously. I suggest changing it to something like " XX and XX: the mediation effects of xx and xx."

We thank the reviewer for this important advice that allows us to better define our article’s title. We now change the title as follows:

“Feedback Sensitivity, Scholastic Adjustment and Prosocial Behavior: The Mediation Effect of Academic Self-Efficacy”

Second, in "1.3. The Present Study," a theoretical framework diagram could be added.

We now add the theoretical framework diagram (see page 4, lines 177-179):

Figure 1. Theoretical framework diagram

Sections "2.3.1. Youths’Gender" and "2.3.2. Youths’ Age" should be expressed as complete sentences rather than short phrases.

We totally agree with the reviewer about this aspect. We now better described the instrument to measure the study covariates (see page 5, lines 206-210):

“2.3.1. Youths’ Gender

Participants’ gender was coded 1 for boys and 2 for girls.

2.3.2. Youths’ Age

Participants’ age was measured by averaging the years of age reported by youths.”

Third, Figure 1 shows that all variables are manifested. Since the author used scales to measure academic self-efficacy and other variables, why not construct the structural equation model using latent variables?

We agree with the reviewer and to follow reviewer 3 comments, we modified the data analyses by implementing a structural equation model rather than a path analysis using the observed variables (items for each scale) as indicators of latent constructs. Accordingly, we modified both the analysis section and the results section. In relation to your specific comment, we also modified Figure 1 (which in the revised manuscript is Figure 2) as follows (page 8):

Figure 2. Examined Structural Equation Model

Note.*p < .05. **p < .01. Standardized coefficients are reported. Only significant paths are reported

Fourth, there is a lack of content addressing the limitations and shortcomings of the study.

We agree with the reviewer on this point, in fact we have now expanded the section on the limitations of the study (page 10, lines 400-419):

“Despite these strengths there are also some limits of the study that future research could overcome. We did not examine the role played by other variables such as the school, teachers and peers characteristics, that could affect the identified results. Furthermore, all our variables were self- reported by students, it could be useful also to include other reported measures of the investigating variables. In this term, teachers’ evaluation of prosocial behavior by using socio-metric measures and, teachers’ evaluation of scholastic performance, can be useful and could make results more reliable. Also, the evaluation of other important students’ personality characteristics and emotional regulation strategies could be useful to control the studied outcomes. In addition, we used a convenient sample that cannot be considered nationally representative of the general population. The most important limit of the present study consists of the low participation rate, which does not allow us to parameterize more complex models and considerably limit the type of statistical analyses implemented. Lastly, our data are correlational in their nature limiting causal relationships among the examined variables.

Future research should overcome these limits: (a) by relying on a multi-informant approach based also on parents and teachers reported measures; (b) by examining other students’ personality characteristics, such as personality traits; (c) by longitudinally and internationally investigating the associations among the studied variables; (d) by relying on a larger sample of participants that could allow a greater generalization of findings and the implementation of more sophisticated statistical analyses.”

Fifth, the theoretical framework and literature review should be further developed. Although the author has provided some summaries, they are currently quite thin and should be elaborated upon.

We agree with the reviewer and we now extend the introduction by including the discussion of results from more recent studies:

Page 1, lines 30-31

“Recent studies [1] show the significant effects of prosocial behavior (defined as a voluntary behavior aimed to help and share with others”

Page 1, lines 32-35

Page 1, lines 38-40; Page 2, lines 81-88

Page 3, lines 115-123

Accordingly, we also modified the study’hypotheses (page 3, line 142; page 4 line 175):

Page 8, line 323

“Several studies [35,36], emphasize the important role play by personality in affecting psychosocial adjustment and positive long-term outcomes”

Furthermore, we add the new references to the reference list:

Zysberg, L.; Schwabsky, N. School Climate, Academic Self-Efficacy and Student Achievement. Educational Psychology 2020, 41 (4), 1–16. https://doi.org/10.1080/01443410.2020.1813690.

Reviewer 3 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

Either remove the SEM model or revise.

The problem is with the SEM model. The results on lines 261-267: The path analysis model (Figure 1) 261 reported a good fit to the data [χ2 (4) = 1.71, p=0.78, CFI=1.00, RMSEA = 0.00 (90% CI 0.00– 262 0.94), SRMR=0.02].

The model indicates all variance is explained; overfitting means everything is explained, probably due to a small sample size and poor correlation. Another issue is singularity: The Youth Feedback Scale is represented twice, being parceled into two factors.

Note the RMSEA's CI is nonsensical. Holger Steinmetz remarks perfect fit makes the model unintelligble; David Kerry sounds the alarm when RMSEA is low, CFI becomes problematic. RMSEA becomes less useful when degrees of freedom are low. See Shi, D., Lee, T., & Maydeu-Olivares, A. (2019). Understanding the model size effect on SEM fit indices. Educational and psychological measurement, 79(2), 310-334.

I believe the SEM model is inappropriate and does not provide evidence that is usable. As Steinmetz points out, the perfect fit means possibly all relationships matter. Small samples and many factors make SEM difficult in this situation; perhaps SPLS-SEM would be more appropriate?

What is the scale for the Punishment Sensitivity? The section makes it sound like 1-4 is the scale, but Table 1 shows a M of 0.01.

Comments on the Quality of English Language

Fine/few problems

Author Response

REVIEWER3

Either remove the SEM model or revise.

We thank the reviewer for the important suggestions that not only allow us to improve the quality of statistical analyses but also to obtain more sensible results and more interpretable indices. Also the comment 4 of the reviewer 2 was useful in this sense. Accordingly we modified the model to be tested by implementing a Structural Equation Model with latent variables defined by the residuals of the observed variables (the items for each scale). We delate from this model parents’ education as covariate, considering the fact that it was not associated with any studied variables. Accordingly we obtained goodness of fit indices and more sensible results. Consequently, we modified the following parts of the manuscript:

Data analytic approach (page 6, lines 252-270):

“Preliminary descriptive statistics (means, standard deviations; skewness, and kurtosis) of the variable of interest were investigated. Furthermore, Pearson’s correlation analyses have been implemented in order to preliminary investigate the potential significant associations among the studied variables. Then, a structural equation model via MPlus version 8 [27] was implemented to examine: (a) the predictive effects of youths’ reward sensitivity and punishment sensitivity on their academic self-efficacy, prosocial behavior scholastic performance; (b) the predicted effect of youths’ scholastic self-efficacy on their prosocial behavior and scholastic performance; (c) the indirect effect of youths’ scholastic self-efficacy on the associations between feedback sensitivity (reward and punishment) and their prosocial behavior and scholastic performance. We considered youths’ gender, youth’s age and youths’ social desirability as covariates. We also estimated the correlations among the variables. In this model, the main studied variables were used as latent variables defined by observed residuals (each scale’s items).

The following parameters were used to evaluate the model’s goodness of fit: Chi-square Goodness of Fit (χ2) with its degrees of freedom (df), Comparative Fit Index (CFI), Root-Mean-square Error of Approximation (RMSEA), Standardized Root-Mean-square Residual (SRMR). For the fit evaluation we considered the not significant χ2, the CFI values >0.90, RMSEA<0.07, and SRMR <0.08 [28,29].”

Results (page 7, line 294 – page 8, line 321):

“3.3. Structural Equation Model

We ran a structural equation model in which we created latent constructs of the main variables on the base of their observed indicators and we examined: the direct effects of youths’ reward sensitivity and punishment sensitivity on their academic self-efficacy, prosocial behavior and scholastic performance; the direct effect of academic self-efficacy on youths’ prosocial behavior and scholastic perfomance; the indirect effects of academic self-efficacy on the associations between youths’ feedback sensitivity (reward and punishment) and their prosocial behavior and scholastic performance. We considered youths’ gender, youth’s age and youths’ social desirability as covariates. We also estimated the correlations among the variables. The model (Figure 2) reported a good fit to the data [χ2 (1012) = 1167.575, p< 0.01, CFI=.95, RMSEA = 0.03 (90% CI 0.02–0.04), SRMR=0.08].

It emerged that: (a) reward sensitivity was positivetly associated with academic self-efficacy (b) punishment sensitivity was positively associated with prosocial behavior; (c) academic self-efficacy was positively related with scholastic performance and prosocial behavior. Furthermore, we found a significant indirect effect of academic self-efficacy on the association between reward sensitivity and scholastic performance (β = .116; p=.024); it seems that reward sensitivity determine high scholastic performance by increasing academic self-efficacy. We did not found any significant within correlations. Regarding covariates, it emerged that being older is associated with high prosocial behavior and punishment sensitivity. In addition, being girl was associated with high punishment sensitivity. Finally, high social desirability was associated with high academic self-efficacy.”

What is the scale for the Punishment Sensitivity? The section makes it sound like 1-4 is the scale, but Table 1 shows a Mof 0.01.

Thanks to the Reviewer for noticing this error, we have now corrected the table with the actual mean of punishment sensitivity which is 3.01.

Reviewer 4 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

This is a very good study, with a relevant topic, good methodological approach and statistical analysis. Nevertheless, it has large technical flaws and has not been completed, since there is almost no discussion. These issues need to be addressed by a major revision. Otherwise, the manuscript is publishable. Please follow the specific points to perform your revision:

- You do not need to include specific details of your empirical research into the abstract. Just mention your results and make the abstract attractive for readers. It is overly difficult to follow and too technical in its current form.

- Please consider adding additional studies into your theoretical background section. Focus on the more recent studies.

- Please consider moving sub-section 1.3 to Methods and Materials. This sub-section is about the research objectives, and does not belong to the theoretical background. Avoid copying and pasting from your project's research proposal -this shows (e.g. see sentence: The specific objectives of this proposal consist of...). You are not presenting a project proposal, but submitting a scientific article manuscript to a journal.

- Please formally state your hypotheses.

- You do not follow standards of scientific reporting, when writing up your measures. Readers are not interested in your coding of the research instrument. Please describe your measurement and scales. Inform whether you are using an already verified instrument, or scale.

- Please discuss the correlations in Table 2 in depth. If you just leave them there, with a very descriptive discussion of the results, why include this table at all?

- Your Figure 1 does not have a title. The current title is actually a note to appear after the figure.

- Please report on your hypotheses in a table. State your statistical results, and indicate whether your hypotheses have been accepted, or rejected.

- Your Discussion section needs to be re-written. Here we cannot find any references to the previous theoretical or empirical papers in the extant literature, and how they relate to your results. Readers need to be clear on what is your scientific contribution, what are the limitations of the current study, and what are the future research tasks to be conducted.

Author Response

REVIEWER 4

You do not need to include specific details of your empirical research into the abstract. Just mention your results and make the abstract attractive for readers. It is overly difficult to follow and too technical in its current form.

We agree with the reviewer advice and we now change the abstract as follows:

“Abstract: Empirical findings support the important role played by prosocial behavior and scholastic performance in significantly affecting adolescents’ long term psychosocial adjustment. Furthermore, several studies showed the positive impact of academic self-efficacy in affecting adolescents’ social and academic functioning; however, no studies have investigated the effect of other important personality structures, such as students’ feedback sensitivity. The present study aims at investigating the effects of adolescents’ feedback sensitivity (reward sensitivity/punishment sensitivity) on their prosocial behavior and scholastic performance also examining the potential indirect effect of academic self-efficacy on the association between reward/punishment sensitivity and prosocial behavior/scholastic performance. Participants were 132 adolescents (53.1% males; Mage = 16.42, SD) from Rome (Italy). Students’ reward/punishment sensitivity, academic self-efficacy, prosocial behavior and scholastic performance were self-reported. A structural equation model showed a positive and significant effect of academic self-efficacy on scholastic performance and prosocial behavior, a positive significant effect of punishment sensitivity on prosocial behavior, a positive significant effect of reward sensitivity on academic self-efficacy and a significant indirect effect of academic self-efficacy on the association between reward sensitivity and scholastic performance. Results of this study are useful in term of practical implications to promote students’ adjustment.”

Please consider adding additional studies into your theoretical background section. Focus on the more recent studies.

We agree with the reviewer advice and we now include in the theoretical background the description of more recent studies

We agree with the reviewer and we now add the discussion of results from more recent studies:

Page 1, lines 30-31

“Recent studies [1] show the significant effects of prosocial behavior (defined as a voluntary behavior aimed to help and share with others”

Page 1, lines 32-35

Page 1, lines 38-40; Page 2, lines 81-88

Page 3, lines 115-123

Accordingly, we also modified the study’hypotheses (page 3, line 142; page 4 line 175):

Page 8, line 323

“Several studies [35,36], emphasize the important role play by personality in affecting psychosocial adjustment and positive long-term outcomes”

Furthermore, we add the new references to the reference list:

Zysberg, L.; Schwabsky, N. School Climate, Academic Self-Efficacy and Student Achievement. Educational Psychology 2020, 41 (4), 1–16. https://doi.org/10.1080/01443410.2020.1813690.

Please consider moving sub-section 1.3 to Methods and Materials. This sub-section is about the research objectives, and does not belong to the theoretical background. Avoid copying and pasting from your project's research proposal -this shows (e.g. see sentence: The specific objectives of this proposal consist of...). You are not presenting a project proposal, but submitting a scientific article manuscript to a journal.

In accordance with the reviewer suggestion we move the section 1.3 to methods. Furthermore, we delate typos from the proposal:

“2. Materials and Methods

2.1. The Present Study

Notwithstanding the important insights gained by those previous lines of work, there is a surprising lack of research considering the role of feedback sensitivity on adolescents’ adjustment and the potential effects of this latter on students’ academic self-efficacy which in turn could affects adolescents social and scholastic functioning. Accordingly, the present study has the overall aim of investigating the effects of adolescents’ feedback sensitivity (reward sensitivity/punishment sensitivity) on their prosocial behavior and scholastic performance also examining the potential indirect effect of academic self-efficacy on the association between reward/punishment sensitivity and prosocial behavior/scholastic performance (the theoretical framework diagram is showed in Figure 1).

The specific objectives of this study consist of: a) Examining the effect of youths’ feedback sensitivity (reward/punishment sensitivity) on their academic self-efficacy, prosocial behavior and scholastic performance; b) Examining the effect of youths’ academic self-efficacy on their prosocial behavior and scholastic performance; c) Examining the indirect effect of academic self-efficacy on the association between feedback sensitivity and prosocial behavior/scholastic performance.

Regarding the first objective, according with the Feedback Intervention Theory [8], which supported that student’s personality characteristics play a key role in determining the success of the feedback received by teachers and consequently, the academic aspirations, motivation, success and, in accordance with previous studies [11, 10, 12], which suggested that rewards positively affect students’ positive academic functioning by facilitating the learning processes through several cognitive processes, and that punishment negatively affect the positive academic functioning by disengaging the students’ learning, we hypothesize to find the positive and significant effect of higher reward sensitivity in determining higher academic self-efficacy, prosocial behaviors and scholastic performance; we also hypotesize tha high punishment sensitivity determines lower academic self-efficacy, prosocial behaviors and scholastic performance. However, no studies have been conducted analyzing specifically the effect of feedback sensitivity on prosocial behavior, therefore our hypothesis regarding this latter is in part exploratory. Regarding the second objective, according with the Bandura’s theory [2] about the key role played by self-efficacy beliefs in affecting the persistence and efforts to achieve personal goals by collaborating each other and also by increasing motivations, we hypotesize that higher youths’ academic self-efficacy beliefs determines higher prosocial behaviors and higher scholastic performance. In particular, we hypothesized that students’ academic self-efficacy beliefs positively affect prosocial behavior by increasing the efforts and the cooperation among students to reach their academic goals and that determines high scholastic performance by increasing students’ academic aspirations and motivations.

4) Please formally state your hypotheses.

We now adjust the hypothese to make them more formal (see page 3, line 142; page 4, line 175):

5) You do not follow standards of scientific reporting, when writing up your measures. Readers are not interested in your coding of the research instrument. Please describe your measurement and scales. Inform whether you are using an already verified instrument, or scale.

We agree with this comment and also to follow the reviewer 1 advice, we better describe the measures section:

“2.4. Measures

2.4.1. Youths’ Gender

Participants’ gender was coded 1 for boys and 2 for girls.

2.4.2. Youths’ Age

Participants’ age was measured by averaging the years of age reported by youths.

2.3.3. Parents’ Education

Participants’ mothers and fathers’ average years of education completed.

2.4.4. Youths’ Social Desirability

2.4.5. Youths’ Feedback Sensitivity

2.4.6. Youths’ Academic Self-Efficacy

2.4.7. Youths’ Prosocial Behavior

2.4.8. Youths’ Scholastic Performance

6)Please discuss the correlations in Table 2 in depth. If you just leave them there, with a very descriptive discussion of the results, why include this table at all?

We agree with this advice and we now discuss the significant correlations (page 7, lines 279-291):

“Table 2 shows the correlations among the study variables.

It emerged that reward sensitivity was positively and significantly related with punishment sensitivity and prosocial behavior. These results mean that if a student is more sensitive to positive feedback from the enviroment, it is more likely that this student acts with prosocial behavior by helping and sharing with his peers. This results has been found also for punishment sensitivity and, at the same time, reward sentivity was also positively associated with punishment, suggesting that there is a kind of personality predisposition to be more sensitive to feedback, whether positive or negative. Finally, academic self-efficacy was positively and significantly related with prosocial behavior and scholastic performance, attesting the positive role played by self-efficacy in determining scholastic and social adjustment by acting on students’ academic aspiration and motivation to collaborate each other.”

7)Your Figure 1 does not have a title. The current title is actually a note to appear after the figure.

We now add the title.

8) Please report on your hypotheses in a table. State your statistical results, and indicate whether your hypotheses have been accepted, or rejected. Your Discussion section needs to be re-written. Here we cannot find any references to the previous theoretical or empirical papers in the extant literature, and how they relate to your results. Readers need to be clear on what is your scientific contribution, what are the limitations of the current study, and what are the future research tasks to be conducted.

We now report in the full manuscript “Discussion section”, if the hypotheses were confirmed o disconfirmed (page 8, line 322; page 8, line 283):

“4. Discussion

Round 2

Reviewer 1 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

Dear authors:

Your article shows significant improvement.

Two suggestions:

-write the verb in the infinitive form when it comes to the research objectives (e.g. Examine the effect (...));

- You need to check your references. There are authors mentioned that I haven't found in the references.

Rew

Author Response

Two suggestions:

1) write the verb in the infinitive form when it comes to the research objectives (e.g. Examine the effect (...));

We appreciate this suggestion and we now use the infinite form of the verb in describing the research objectives:

“The specific objectives of this study consist of: a) Examineing the effect of youths’ feedback sensitivity (reward/punishment sensitivity) on their academic self-efficacy, prosocial behavior and scholastic performance; b) Examineing the effect of youths’ academic self-efficacy on their prosocial behavior and scholastic performance; c) Examineing the indirect effect of academic self-efficacy on the association between feedback sensitivity and prosocial behavior/scholastic performance.”

2) You need to check your references. There are authors mentioned that I haven't found in the references.

We appreciate also this suggestion and we now check and correct all the references both in the manuscript and in the references list at the end of the manuscript.

Reviewer 3 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

Greatly improved and enhanced. Rerunning SEM analysis can be difficult and stressful, but it was absolutely necessary. Without taking such a suggestion seriously, the paper would have shown serious flaws in analysis.

Thank you for being cooperative and going above and beyond.

Author Response

Thank you for being cooperative and going above and beyond.

Thank you too for this very useful suggestion which allows to us the improve the quality of the manuscript

Reviewer 4 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

This paper is now publishable with minor technical corrections. E.g. in your revision, you now cite new literature by using Harvard, instead of MDPI style.

Author Response

This paper is now publishable with minor technical corrections. E.g. in your revision, you now cite new literature by using Harvard, instead of MDPI style.

We totally agree with the reviewer and we now change the style of references