Clarifying an Elusive Construct: a Systematic Review of Writing Attitudes

Ekholm, Eric; Zumbrunn, Sharon; DeBusk‐Lane, Morgan

doi:10.1007/s10648-017-9423-5

Cited by 50 publications

(53 citation statements)

References 64 publications

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“…This positive association between attitudes and performance replicates previous studies with school-aged children (Graham et al, 2007, 2017, 2019; Bruning et al, 2013; Yilmaz Soylu et al, 2017). However, as noted by authors of a recent systematic review of writing attitudes, only a handful of studies examined the association of attitudes toward writing with some outcome measure of writing performance (Ekholm et al, 2018). Clearly, more studies addressing this association are needed, with a particular focus on the antecedents of writing attitudes (i.e., which are the main factors underlying children’s positive and/or negative attitudes toward writing?)…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Reasons to Write in Grade 6 and Their Association With Writing Quality

et al. 2019

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Writing is a particularly complex and demanding task that needs to be mastered to assure students’ success at school. In the last decades, the scientific community has been unanimous about the involvement of cognitive and motivational processes in the learning of writing. However, little is still known about some motivation-related processes, such as the reasons why students write. Therefore, this study analyzed the role of motivation in writing in developing writers, by examining the motives to write of 321 sixth graders. We used the Writing Motivation Questionnaire, which is a new instrument tapping the following motivations for writing: curiosity, involvement, grades, competition, social recognition, emotional regulation, and relief from boredom. Findings confirmed the multidimensional nature of motivations to write and supported the validity and reliability of the instrument. Also, results revealed that the strongest motives to write were grades and curiosity, and that curiosity and social recognition were significant predictors of writing quality, above and beyond attitudes and self-efficacy. Together these findings confirm the key role of motivation in writing and provide validity evidence of the Writing Motivation Questionnaire. This seems a useful tool to better understand the motivational processes involved in learning to write. However, despite the increasing research investment in this area, it is still important to carry out further studies that may contribute to the enrichment of the field of writing motivation.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…There are large disparities between conceptualizations of writing attitudes (for a review see Ekholm et al, 2018). Following Graham et al (2007), this study adopts a definition of attitudes toward writing along a continuum from positive to negative emotional responses to writing.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Reasons to Write in Grade 6 and Their Association With Writing Quality

et al. 2019

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“…He reasoned that if motivational beliefs were an important ingredient in better writing, the empirical evidence should support the following four tenets: (1) skilled writers are more motivated than less skilled writers; (2) developing writers become increasingly motivated with age and schooling; (3) individual differences in motivational beliefs predict writing performance; and (4) instruction designed to increase motivational beliefs improves writing performance. Collectively, the available data supported the importance of motivational beliefs to writing, as skilled writers typically held more positive motivational beliefs than less skilled writers (tenet 1), individual differences in motivational beliefs predicted writing performance (tenet 2), and a small number of studies demonstrated that motivational beliefs could be enhanced through instruction (tenet 4; e.g., Ekholm, Zumbrunn, & De‐Busk‐Lane, in press; Graham, Harris, & Santangelo, 2015). However, changes in students writing motivational beliefs were variable over time (increasing, decreasing or remaining static), and findings across studies were not universally consistent.…”

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confidence: 83%

Do writing motivational beliefs predict middle school students' writing performance?

Graham

Daley

Aitken

et al. 2018

Journal Research in Reading

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Individual differences in motivational beliefs, such as writing efficacy and attitudes toward writing in different contexts (academic, recreational, print or digital), are hypothesised to account for variability in writing performance. This study tested this proposition with 185 middle school students (58% were male), examining if writing self‐efficacy and attitudes toward writing made a statistically significant and unique contribution to predicting performance on a norm‐referenced writing measure, after variance related to gender, free/reduced lunch status, student's first language, disability status, reading self‐efficacy and attitudes toward reading were first controlled. Collectively, writing attitudes and self‐efficacy accounted for statistically significant and unique variance in writing scores after the other variables were controlled, providing support for the theoretical proposition that writing motivational beliefs are important ingredients in middle school students' writing.

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“…Three, we controlled for attitude towards writing. Students' motivational beliefs such as attitude towards writing influence how much effort they apply and what actions they initiate (Ekholm et al, 2018;Graham, 2018a), affecting their fluency with handwriting and their writing performance (e.g., Camacho et al, 2021;Graham et al, 2018;Limpo, et al, 2020a). Four, we controlled for variance due to students' language background (i.e., Norwegian was students' first language, second language, or they were bilingual with Norwegian being one of the languages a child spoke).…”

Section: Theoretical Underpinningsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Handwriting fluency and the quality of primary grade students’ writing

et al. 2021

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Until children can produce letters quickly and accurately, it is assumed that handwriting disrupts and limits the quality of their text. This investigation is the largest study to date (2596 girls, 2354 boys) assessing the association between handwriting fluency and writing quality. We tested whether handwriting fluency made a statistically unique contribution to predicting primary grade students’ writing quality on a functional writing task, after variance due to attitude towards writing, students’ language background (L1, L2, bilingual), gender, grade, and nesting due to class and school were first controlled. Handwriting fluency accounted for a statistically significant 7.4% of the variance in the writing quality of primary grade students. In addition, attitude towards writing, language background, grade and gender each uniquely predicted writing quality. Finally, handwriting fluency increased from one grade to the next, girls had faster handwriting than boys, and gender differences increased across grades. An identical pattern of results were observed for writing quality. Directions for future research and writing practices are discussed.

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Clarifying an Elusive Construct: a Systematic Review of Writing Attitudes

Cited by 50 publications

References 64 publications

Reasons to Write in Grade 6 and Their Association With Writing Quality

Reasons to Write in Grade 6 and Their Association With Writing Quality

Do writing motivational beliefs predict middle school students' writing performance?

Handwriting fluency and the quality of primary grade students’ writing

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