Change Talk and Sustain Talk as Mediators and Moderators in School-Based Motivational Interviewing Using the Student Check-Up

Abstract

The Student Check-Up (SCU) is a brief school-based motivational interviewing intervention developed to promote academic-related behavioral changes and to increase accessibility to mental health services. Despite published randomized controlled trials demonstrating SCU’s effectiveness in promoting student self-efficacy in academic efforts, the SCU’s impact on student grade outcome has been inconsistent across studies. This study examines whether student participants' written statements that represent change talk and sustain talk predict differences in post-treatment grade outcomes and whether these effects are moderated by students’ pre-treatment academic achievement. In addition, we examine whether change and sustain talk mediate the relationship between study sites and grade outcomes. A two-level linear regression controlling for pre-treatment grades indicated that as the frequency of change talk increases, students’ post-treatment grades in English Language Arts (ELA) decrease (B = -.62, p =.03 ), suggesting that “the more” is not always “the merrier” when it comes to evoking change talks related to academic goals that require multiple behavioral changes for attainment