The role of adaptability in promoting control and reducing failure dynamics: A mediation model

•This study explores adaptability and control as factors reducing failure dynamics.•Adaptability is hypothesized to enhance control; and control to reduce failure dynamics.•Control mediated the relationship between adaptability and failure dynamics.•Adaptability predicted control and control predicted reduced failure dynamics.

The negative impacts of failure and failure dynamics are well established. This study explores adaptability and control as factors reducing failure dynamics. The present study centers on a mediation model in which adaptability is hypothesized to enhance control, and control is hypothesized to reduce failure dynamics (anxiety, performance avoidance, self-handicapping, disengagement). The study focused on longitudinal data of N = 969 Australian high school students. Mediation, using a bootstrapping approach, was tested with structural equation modeling. Findings showed that control significantly mediated the relationship between adaptability and failure dynamics: adaptability positively predicted control and control was associated with reduced failure dynamics. Furthermore, analyses led to the rejection of an alternative mediation model in which adaptability operates as the mediator between control and failure dynamics. These findings offer conceptual and empirical direction for researchers and practitioners seeking to enhance students' control and adaptability and reduce failure dynamics in their academic lives.