We investigated the extent to which perceived structure and personal achievement goals could explain students' effective learning strategies and affect-related experiences in a sample of Greek adolescent students (N =606; 45.4% males; mean age: M =15.05, SD= 1.43). Having controlled for students' social desirability responses, we used multilevel analyses, and found that between-student (i.e., within class) differences in perceived structure related positively to learning strategies and positive affect and negatively to negative affect, with the relations being partially mediated by competence need satisfaction. In addition, we found between-student differences in the relations of mastery-approach, performance-approach, and performanceavoidance goals to the learning-strategy and affect outcomes. Moreover, at the between-class level, perceived structure related positively to learning strategies and positive affect, and negatively to depressive feelings. Finally, an interesting cross-level interaction between perceived structure and performance-avoidance goals for negative affect revealed that well-structured classrooms attenuated the positive, harmful relation between performance-avoidance goals and negative affect. These findings indicate the key role of structure and the endorsement of mastery-approach goals in the classroom.
In this study, we aimed to investigate the different routes through which perceived goal structures, and in turn mastery-approach and performance-approach goals in mathematics, predict subsequent academic performance. Path analyses with a sample of Turkish adolescents (N = 369; 49.1% males; M age = 16.67 years, SD = 1.85) revealed two distinct paths. After controlling for midyear grades, we found perceived mastery goal structures to relate (positively) to mastery-approach goals, which in turn positively predicted end-year grades through challenge seeking. In contrast, perceived performance goal structures related positively to both performanceapproach and performance-avoidance goals with the former directly predicting higher end-year grades, and the latter being related negatively to challenge seeking. These findings imply that there may exist different paths that can predict academic performance.
In this prospective study, we recruited a sample of Belgian adolescents (N = 886) to investigate to what extent perceived teachers' motivating style relates to quality of motivation in the beginning of the school year and, in turn, changes in study effort and procrastination by the end of the school year. After controlling for initial levels of study effort and procrastination and for a shared variance due to classroom membership, we found, through path analysis, perceived autonomy support and structure to relate positively to autonomous motivation, which in turn predicted increased study effort and decreased procrastination at the end of the school year. The findings are discussed from a theoretical and practical standpoint. Most educators would agree that some adolescents may postpone their assigned school work and avoid putting forth effort when doing their homework. Apparently, students' motivation to do their homework can largely explain whether they may behave in this way. While some students may study because they find the learning content enjoyable, interesting, and valuable (i.e. they are autonomously motivated), others may feel rather compelled to do so (i.e. they are controlled motivated). Research conducted under the framework of Self-Determination Theory (SDT; Deci & Ryan, 2000; Ryan & Deci, 2017) has indicated that the more students are autonomously motivated, the more they thrive, as indexed by greater engagement and effort-expenditure, better learning, and higher achievement (e.g. Guay, Ratelle, & Chanal, 2008). It is therefore important to investigate likely antecedents of students' motivation. Towards this end, SDT-based research has shown that students benefit more when they perceive the learning environment as autonomy-supportive (i.e. when teachers consider students' interests and perspective) and well-structured (i.e. when there are clear, consistent, and properly justified guidelines and rules) (
a b s t r a c tResearch on students' motivation has mainly focused on interpersonal differences rather than on the ongoing, intrapersonal dynamics that forge students' everyday life. In this five-month longitudinal (diary) study, we recruited a sample of 179 high school students from Greece (35.8% males; M age = 16.27; SD = 1.02) to investigate through multilevel analyses the ongoing dynamics of students' motivation. We did so by examining the relation between autonomous functioning and aspects of study regulation (namely, study efforts and procrastination) and well-being (namely, subjective vitality and depressive feelings). After controlling for perceived competence, we found week-to-week autonomous functioning to relate positively to study efforts and subjective vitality and negatively to procrastination and depressive feelings. Interestingly, implicit theories of ability -the degree to which one believes that ability is fixed or amenable -were found to moderate the week-to-week relations of autonomous functioning to study efforts and homework procrastination. In particular, autonomous functioning co-varied positively to study efforts and negatively to homework procrastination only among students who believed that ability is malleable. Also, beliefs that ability is fixed predicted poorer grades, lower mean levels of study efforts, and higher homework procrastination. The results underscore the necessity of taking a more dynamic view when studying motivational phenomena and the importance of jointly considering the implicit theory framework and self-determination theory.
In this correlational research, we investigated to what extent achievement goals, in conjunction with need for achievement and fear of failure as well as perceived classroom goal structures, are related to learning strategies among upper elementary school students. After taking into account students' tendency to respond in a socially desirable way, we found, through path analysis, that mastery-approach goals partially mediated the relation of need for achievement and perceived mastery goal structures to learning strategies. These findings are discussed within the hierarchical model framework proposed by Elliot (1999). They suggest that the simultaneous examination of personal and contextual antecedents of achievement goals can enhance our understanding of the processes underlying achievement motivation and its outcomes.
Two motivational theories – the Achievement Goal Theory and Self-Determination Theory – have recently been combined to explain students’ motivation, making it possible to study the “what” and the “why” of learners’ achievement strivings. The present study built on this approach by (a) investigating whether the distinction between autonomous or volitional and controlling or pressuring reasons can be meaningfully applied to the adoption of mastery-avoidance goals, (b) investigating the concurrent and prospectiverelations between mastery-avoidance goals and their underlying reasons and learning strategies when mastery-approach goals and their underlying reasons were also considered, and by (c) incorporating psychological need experiences as an explanatory variable in the relation between achievement motives (i.e., the motive to succeed and motive to avoid failure) and both mastery goals and their underlying reasons. In two Turkish university students samples (N = 226, Mage = 22.36; N = 331, Mage = 19.5), autonomous and controlling reasons appeared applicable to mastery-avoidance goals and regression and path analysis further showed that mastery-avoidance goals and their underlying autonomous reasons fail to predicted learning strategies over and above the pursuit of mastery-approach goals and their underlying reasons. Finally, need experiences were established as mediators between achievement motives and both mastery goals and their underlying reasons.
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