How Students’ Perceptions of Physical Education Teachers’ Teaching Style Relate to Prosocial and Antisocial Behavior Among Chinese High School Students: The Role of Perceived Teacher-Supportive Instructional Climate

Physical education provides an important context for adolescents’ social development because students regularly interact with teachers and peers through cooperation, competition, and shared learning experiences. Although supportive teaching has been associated with a range of positive educational outcomes, limited research has examined how multidimensional teaching style is related to students’ prosocial and antisocial behavior through students’ perceptions of a teacher-supportive instructional climate in Chinese secondary-school PE. This cross-sectional study examined the relationships among students’ perceptions of PE teachers’ teaching style, perceived teacher-supportive instructional climate (PTSIC), and prosocial and antisocial behavior in 710 Chinese high school students. Teaching style was conceptualized as a multidimensional construct comprising autonomy support, structure, and involvement. PTSIC was assessed using the 15-item Sport Climate Questionnaire (SCQ), and prosocial and antisocial behavior were assessed using the Prosocial and Antisocial Behavior in Sport Scale. Confirmatory factor analysis and structural equation modeling were conducted, and indirect associations were examined using bias-corrected bootstrapping with 2000 resamples. Teaching style was positively associated with PTSIC (β = 0.486, p < 0.001). PTSIC was positively associated with prosocial behavior (β = 0.422, p < 0.001) and negatively associated with antisocial behavior (β = −0.175, p < 0.001). Teaching style was negatively associated with antisocial behavior (β = −0.261, p < 0.001), whereas the specified model showed no corresponding direct association with prosocial behavior (β = 0.073, p = 0.157). Positive and negative indirect associations through PTSIC were observed for prosocial behavior (β = 0.205, 95% CI [0.153, 0.264]) and antisocial behavior (β = −0.085, 95% CI [−0.141, −0.035]), respectively. These findings suggest a pattern in which students who perceived more supportive multidimensional teaching also tended to perceive a more teacher-supportive instructional climate and report more favorable social behavior. Given the cross-sectional design and the study’s methodological limitations, we should interpret these findings as preliminary structural associations within the specified model rather than evidence of temporal ordering or causal mediation.