What do students say about their motivational goals?: Towards a more complex and dynamic perspective on student motivation

Cross-Cultural Validation of the Inventory of School Motivation (ISM) in the Asian Setting: Hong Kong and the Philippines

Students' achievement goals in school have received increasing research attention because they have been shown to be important in predicting important outcomes. As such, there has been a growing interest in measuring and comparing them across different cultural groups. However, these comparisons cannot be made until validity evidence has been attained to support the use of an instrument in the new cultural setting. In this study, we investigated the cross-cultural applicability of the Inventory of School Motivation (ISM, McInerney et al. American Educational Research Journal 34:207-236, 1997) in the Hong Kong Chinese and Philippine contexts using both within-network and between-network approaches to construct validation. The ISM measures four types of achievement goals: mastery, performance, social, and extrinsic goals. 1,406 high school students from Hong Kong (n = 697) and the Philippines (n = 709) participated. Results of the within-network test showed that the ISM had good internal consistency reliability and the confirmatory factor analysis provided support for the hypothesized four-factor model. Multigroup confirmatory factor analyses supported invariance of factor loadings across the two samples. The between-network test also indicated that these achievement goals correlated systematically with different aspects of students' self-concepts. These findings support the applicability of the ISM among Hong Kong Chinese and Filipino students.

Getting Along with Teachers and Parents: The Yields of Good Relationships for Students' Achievement Motivation and Self-Esteem

The aim of the present study was to better understand the combined and unique effects of teacher–student and parent–child relationships in students' achievement motivation and self-esteem. Participants were 3450 high school students administered items assessing their interpersonal relationships, academic motivation and engagement, academic self-concept, and general self-esteem. Preliminary correlations showed that both teacher–student and parent–child relationships are significantly associated with achievement motivation and general self-esteem. Importantly, however, when using appropriate structural equation models to control for shared variance amongst predictors, findings showed that although teachers and parents are clearly influential, after controlling for gender, age, and the presence of both interpersonal relationships in the one model, teacher effects are stronger than parent effects, particularly in the academic domain.

Cross-Cultural Validation of the Five-Factor Structure of Social Goals

The aim of the present study was to test the cross-cultural validity of the five-factor structure of social goals that Dowson and McInerney proposed. Using both between-network and within-network approaches to construct validation, 1,147 Filipino high school students participated in the study. Confirmatory factor analysis indicated that the five-factor model provided the best fit to the data compared with a series of alternative models. In addition, the five types of social goals also showed meaningful relationships to theoretically relevant constructs. Taken together, this study supports the applicability of the five-factor structure of social goals among Filipino respondents.

Persönliche Ziele und Schule-Freizeit-Konflikte bei Jugendlichen

Zusammenfassung. In einer idiografisch-nomothetischen Erhebung wurden die persönlichen Ziele von 348 Schüler/-innen aus 16 zehnten Gymnasialklassen erhoben, die jeweils einen kürzlich erlebten Konflikt zwischen einer schulischen und einer Freizeittätigkeit schilderten. Die Schüler gaben auch Auskunft über den Zusammenhang zwischen den in dem Konflikt beschriebenen Optionen und ihren Zielen und über die erlebte motivationale Interferenz bei der Ausführung der gewählten Handlung. Die beiden Optionen hingen deutlich mit schulischen und Freizeitzielen zusammen. Die Entscheidung für eine Option ließ sich mit hoher Genauigkeit klassifizieren auf der Basis der Mittel-Ziel-Zusammenhänge für die Handlung und für die Alternative. Bei Schülern/innen, die sich für die schulische Option entschieden hatten, hingen die Wichtigkeit der Ziele und die Mittel-Ziel-Verbindung für die Alternative mit der motivationalen Interferenz während der ausgeübten (Lern-)Handlung zusammen, nicht jedoch bei der Ausübung der Freizeithandlung.

Profiles of Motivation for Reading Among African American and Caucasian Students

Previous research has investigated motivations for reading by examining positive, or affirming, motivations including intrinsic motivation and self-efficacy. Related to them, we examined two negative, or undermining, motivations consisting of avoidance and perceived difficulty. We proposed that the motivations of intrinsic motivation and avoidance are relatively independent, and thus, can be combined to form meaningful profiles consisting of: avid, ambivalent, apathetic, and averse readers. With Grade 5 students we found that these motivations were relatively independent for both Caucasian and African American students. The two motivations uniquely explained a significant proportion of variance in reading comprehension and other cognitive reading variables. Although intrinsic motivation was stronger for Caucasians, avoidance was stronger for African Americans. The profile of the African American students contained higher proportions of averse and ambivalent readers than the Caucasian profile. The profile of avid readers showed higher reading achievement than the other profiles.

Dental students' motivation and the context of learning

This qualitative study shows dental students' motives for choosing the dental education and how the motives influence their motivation at the first semester of study. Further the study demonstrates the relevance of the context of learning. This issue is of importance when planning a curriculum for the dental education. The material consists of interviews with eight dental students. The results show that dental students were focused on their future professional role, its practical dimensions and their future working conditions. Their motivation for choosing the dental education was found to influence their motivation for studying and their experience of the relevance of the first semester. The dental students who had co-education with the medical students at the first year of study missed a dental context and courses with clinically relevant contents. In conclusion, our data signify the importance of the context of learning. It is recommended that a future curriculum for the dental school should be designed in a way where basic science subjects are taught with both theoretically as well as practically oriented subjects and in a context which is meaningful for the students.

Self-efficacy from the perspective of adolescents with LD and their specialist teachers

This study used qualitative methodology to investigate the self-efficacy beliefs of early adolescents with learning disabilities (LD). We conducted a series of focus group interviews with 28 Grade 8 and 9 students with LD and individual interviews with 7 specialist LD teachers. Content analyses of the student and teacher data resulted in 2 a priori and 3 inductive themes: self-efficacy, calibration and levels of self-efficacy, students' self-awareness, attributions for failure, and problems and solutions. The students viewed themselves as low in self-efficacy and generally accurate in the calibration of their efficacy and performance, whereas the teachers viewed the students as overconfident about academic tasks. In contrast to the teachers, the students viewed verbal persuasion as a valued source of self-efficacy. Students attributed their failures to lack of effort, whereas their teachers attributed student failure to uncontrollable deficits. Problems and solutions related to student motivation were discussed from student and teacher perspectives.

Exploring the Complex and Dynamic Nature of Sustained Motivation

Abstract. This paper addresses the issue of sustained motivation over time, in relation to real-life activities requiring complex skills in multiple contexts of participation. It reports an empirical study that explores how high achieving athletes and musicians appraise salient aspects of person and context as affordances and constraints, and how these appraisals shape motivation over time. Longitudinal and retrospective qualitative data were gathered about the life trajectories of 30 adolescent and adult participants, including details of their development in sport and music, people who had influenced them, their beliefs and hopes, difficulties and life events encountered and how these had been dealt with. Three major findings emerged. First, sustained motivation is inextricably linked to both person and context. Second, it is mediated by individuals' ongoing appraisal process of personal and contextual aspects of their current situation, which are interpreted as affordances or constraints. Third, the nature and extent of participation is constantly revised as a result of ongoing changes in personal and contextual circumstances over time.

Self in learning: Chinese adolescents' goals and sense of agency

This study examined goals and agency as the 2 core aspects of self in learning among Chinese adolescents. A sample of 259 adolescents aged 12-19 responded to open-ended probes about themselves. Counter to the common view that Chinese selves are predominantly social, adolescents expressed many more individual than social goals and agency. Moreover, older adolescents showed overall more goals and agency than younger adolescents. However, their specific goals did not differ by age. Regarding agency, older adolescents articulated more of the so-called "learning virtues." Yet their social agency did not differ by age. We interpret these findings as in reference to the Confucian learning tradition, the existing research on goals and agency, and self in culture from a domain-specific perspective.

Die Entwicklung von Zielorientierungen im Fach Mathematik von der 3. bis 5. Jahrgangsstufe

Zusammenfassung. In der vorliegenden Arbeit werden bezogen auf das Fach Mathematik die Zielprofile von Schülern der dritten bis fünften Jahrgangsstufe mit Hilfe von Mixed-Rasch-Modellen ermittelt und deren längsschnittliche Entwicklung über die drei Schuljahre analysiert. Die Mixed-Rasch-Analyse ergab zwei inhaltlich interpretierbare Klassen: eine primär lern- und eine primär leistungszielorientierte. Eine Gruppe von Schülern mit multiplen Zielen wurde nicht gefunden, auch der von Nicholls (1984) postulierte Verlauf in Richtung einer zunehmenden Leistungszielorientierung zeichnete sich nicht ab. Insgesamt ist am Ende der Grundschule bzw. zu Beginn der Sekundarstufe für die Mehrheit der Schüler ein instabiles Zielprofil zu konstatieren. Die Befunde werden vor dem Hintergrund der Forschung zu multiplen Zielen und Zielprofilen diskutiert.