Perceived error climate and learning engagement in university physical education: the indirect role of adaptive reactions to errors

Objective Errors in physical education (PE) are often publicly observable and involve repeated performance attempts. This study examined the associations among perceived error climate, adaptive reactions to errors, and learning engagement in university PE, including the indirect association through adaptive reactions. Methods A cross-sectional survey was conducted among 682 undergraduate students from three universities in Guangxi, China. Participants completed adapted measures of perceived error climate, adaptive reactions to errors, and PE learning engagement. Confirmatory factor analysis and covariance-based structural equation modeling were used to examine the measurement structures and hypothesized associations. Indirect associations were evaluated using 5,000 bootstrap resamples. Results Perceived error climate was positively associated with adaptive reactions to errors and PE learning engagement, while adaptive reactions were also positively associated with engagement. A significant positive indirect association was observed through adaptive reactions ( β = 0.220, 95% BC CI [0.160, 0.290]). Conclusion The findings extend learning-from-errors research by examining behavioral and emotional engagement as learning-related outcomes associated with perceived error climate and adaptive reactions to errors in university PE. They highlight the relevance of error-related learning experiences to ongoing engagement in an embodied learning context, without establishing causal relationships.