This chapter outlines the use and the measurement of motivational concepts and personality aspects in the German National Educational Panel Study. The selection of concepts combines elements that the prevalent motivation and personality theories have in common, thereby promoting research from different theoretical perspectives. The constructs measured are achievement motivation, personal goals, general interest orientations, topic-related interests, self-concept (both general and domain-specific), self-regulation, personality aspects such as the Big Five, and selected social behavior dimensions. These theoretical constructs and their corresponding measurements presented in this chapter were chosen on the basis of their applicability across the complete life course. Within the National Educational Panel Study, this integrated compilation of motivational concepts and personality aspects improves our understanding of educational processes and competence development from infancy to late adulthood.
This paper takes up ongoing discussions on the inequality of educational opportunities and formulates a conceptual model to link separate lines of research. Our particular focus is on combining motivational and structural approaches into a mediation model that explains differences in academic achievement. In the literature, four main mechanisms of social reproduction are discussed. Two main pathways refer to (1) parents' expectations regarding their children's academic success and (2) replicating cultural capital through intra-familial cultural practices. (3) Parents' perception of children's abilities depends on social position and is influential for expectations of success. (4) For all three pathways, we expect effects on students' motivational characteristics, which in turn influence academic achievement. We test our conceptual model by structural equation modelling using longitudinal data from primary school students in Germany. Empirical evidence is in line with the assumptions in the model. Cultural reproduction and expectations of success can be seen as the key components of the model. However, both chains of reproduction are related to each other by parents' perception of child's ability, and their effects are mediated by child's motivational characteristics. BJS Structural and motivational mechanisms of academic achievement 1277British Journal of Sociology 70(4) © London School of Economics and Political Science 2018 particular, which lead to differences in academic achievement and accordingly to different choices of pathways in the educational system. On the other hand, research on motivation in the tradition of expectancy-value-models (e.g., Eccles and Wigfield 2002) concentrates on differences regarding personal dispositions and motivational characteristics that may serve as explanations for differences in educational success. The social embeddedness of actors in the 'motivational tradition' is usually understood as a purely contextual factor. So far, only few attempts have been made to integrate the different approaches into a comprehensive framework. One of these integrating approaches, the so-called 'Wisconsin model of status attainment', was one of the first structurally oriented models that placed social psychological factors at a central point in the theory (cf. Hauser, Sewell and Alwin 1976;Sewell and Hauser 1980;Sewell, Hauser, Springer and Hauser 2004). Sewell and Shah (1968) analysed the effects of significant others, especially parents, on educational aspirations of students, and thereby showed that a child's perception of parents' expectations is an important factor for the child's educational aspiration. Melvin Kohn's work is another example, emphasizing the interrelation of the individual's value orientation with actual working conditions (cf. Kohn 1969;Kohn and Schooler 1969). Both approaches have produced valuable insights into the complex relationship between socio-economic conditions, psychological states and educational success. With this article, we intend to make an attempt at co...
Although the social stratification of educational aspirations is well documented for parents and adolescents, current educational inequality research largely ignores the perspective of children. To learn more about the involvement of children in the emergence and reproduction of social disparities, we examine children's educational aspirations during elementary school. Based on the Wisconsin model, rational choice approaches, and the theory of cultural reproduction, our explorative investigation aims to identify determinants of young students' idealistic and realistic aspirations. We utilize a sample of 4947 third grade students from Starting Cohort 2 of the German National Educational Panel Study (NEPS). The multivariate results indicate that students' aspirations are influenced by their parents' social position and aspirations, whereby the students' self-rated rational choice indicators assert the greatest impact. Keywords Educational aspirations • Elementary school • Rational choice • Theory of cultural reproduction • Wisconsin model Determinanten idealistischer und realistischer Bildungsaspirationen von Kindern im Grundschulalter Zusammenfassung Obwohl die soziale Stratifizierung von Bildungsaspirationen bei Eltern und Jugendlichen gut dokumentiert ist, blendet die gegenwärtige bildungsbezogene Ungleichheitsforschung die Kinderperspektive weitgehend aus. Um mehr über die Beteiligung von Kindern an der Entstehung und Reproduktion sozia
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