Yale study finds lengthier social-emotional learning boosts student achievement

Social-emotional learning (SEL) programs can improve students’ academic outcomes, according to a new analysis by researchers at the Yale School of Medicine. The study reviewed 40 separate investigations involving more than 33,700 students from first through twelfth grade. It found that participation in SEL programs led to better academic performance across all grade levels and regardless of whether achievement was measured by GPA or standardized test scores.

The report builds on a previous meta-analysis published by Yale in 2023, which examined over 400 studies about the effectiveness of SEL. Christina Cipriano, an associate professor at Yale’s Child Study Center, explained the motivation behind this latest research: “When we put out the initial meta-analysis in 2023, we were getting asked lots of questions around the academic achievement benefits of social-emotional learning,” Cipriano says, “and we really wanted to go deep and to understand, what does the data say specifically about academic achievement outcomes to be expected from social-emotional learning programs?”

According to Cipriano, students who took part in SEL programs saw their academic performance rise by an average of four percentage points. Programs that lasted a full school year resulted in an eight-point increase. The gains varied by subject area: literacy improved by about 6.3 percentage points while math increased by 3.8 points.

Cipriano described how emotional well-being is linked with cognitive development: “The nerd in me is like, that makes sense from a developmental standpoint, because cognition and emotions are inextricably tied in your brain,” she explains. “If you can have a student sitting in a third grade classroom, they could be learning the best possible math curriculum from the best possible teacher. But if that student is feeling anxious or embarrassed or frustrated or nervous, they are not available to learn. They are not able to access the awesomeness of that curriculum.”

She added that SEL provides students with tools for managing their emotions and making decisions: “How to take a deep breath or calm your nerves, all the different positive self-talk — that's what they learn in explicit SEL instruction,” Cipriano says. “That makes them better learners, and that's why we were really excited about this paper and these analyses. It’s demonstrated on a number of different dimensions across the whole body of what we have available in experimental evaluations of social and emotional learning.”

The findings come amid increasing criticism of SEL initiatives from some conservative groups who have also opposed other educational topics such as critical race theory and LGBTQ+ content. The report acknowledges these challenges: SEL programs in schools “are experiencing several mounting challenges to implementation.”

The data analyzed covers research conducted between 2008 and 2020; only about 17 percent included academic achievement metrics at first. Cipriano noted her team’s satisfaction with recent progress: researchers have responded by including more information on academic outcomes since then.

An updated analysis with data through 2023 will be released soon, offering insights into how SEL programs affected students during COVID-19 pandemic disruptions—a period when opportunities for organic social interaction were limited due to quarantine measures.

“Basic relationships and interactions were no longer accidental and could not be left to chance,” Cipriano says, “so there was a need for explicit structures and then instruction to meet students where they are, and make sure that all students have the opportunity to have those healthy forms of development and engagement.”