Investigating Transactions Among Motives, Emotional Regulation Related to Testing, and Test Emotions

Abstract

The authors examined the relationships among achievement motives, emotional regulation, and emotions. They collected data from 425 college undergraduates (110 men, 315 women) and used several scales, including the Achievement Motives Scales ). Findings suggest that approach-avoidance motives were related to different academic emotions (i.e., pleasant and unpleasant) in the expected directions. Approach-avoidance variables, cognitive-appraisal processes, and during-testing processes explained significant amounts of variance in both test hope and test pride, and several categories of students emerged, including those of high approach-low avoidance, low approachhigh avoidance, moderate approach-high avoidance, high approach-moderate avoidance, and moderate approach-low avoidance. The authors also discuss future research and implications. ) used Atkinson's (1960) original 2 × 2 model of the approach-avoidance motive to examine the quadrapolar transactions between the motive to avoid failure and the motive to approach success. Covington and colleague's use of the median-split method with the approach-avoidance motive resulted in the potential of four groups of students: (a) overstrivers (high approach and high avoidance), who tend to have high hopes for success and excessive fear of failure; (b) success-oriented students (high approach and low avoidance), who tend to have high hopes for success and low concern over the fear of failure; (c) failure-avoiding students (low approach and high avoidance), who tend to use the fear of failure as their reason for achieving; and (d) failure acceptors (low approach and low avoidance), who tend to display an absence of both tendencies. Covington and colleague's work suggested that these different groups of students transact and experience unpleasant emotions differently.This long line of research has clearly suggested that approach-avoidance motives may represent basic human processes and that these processes may be related to anxiety and other unpleasant emotions. Thus, to broaden our understanding of emotional regulation related to testing, we used the approach-avoidance motive to develop a theory regarding how these basic motives relate to emotional regulation related to testing and the emotions experienced during testing. Emotional Regulation During TestingGross (1998) defined emotional regulation as "the processes by which individuals influence which emotions they have, when they have them, and how they experience and express these emotions" (p. 275). As such, emotional regulation within the context of self-regulation involves various processes, such as monitoring, evaluating, and modifying one's emotional experiences (Schutz & Davis, 2000;Schutz & DeCuir, 2002;Thompson, 1994). Students direct these efforts at accomplishing their goals by influencing the types of emotions and the intensity and timing of those emotional experiences. Thus, useful emotional regulation involves flexible, situationally responsive, and performance-enhancing strategies used to move the students tow...

Learning Strategies and Emotional Regulation of Pedagogy Students

“…The metacognitive learning strategies were associated with the emotional regulation total scale and with the age group. These data are relevant to the extent that students, according to the research, when becoming more strategic in their learning and when coping better with their emotions, may also present better academic performance (DeCuir-Gunby et al, 2009;Kesici & Erdogan, 2009;Pekrun et al, 2002Pekrun et al, , 2011Raftery & Bizer, 2009). It should also be mentioned that one of the limitations of this study is related to the fact that it employed only the report of the use of learning strategies and emotional regulation.…”

“…Pekrun et al (2002Pekrun et al ( , 2011 showed that various emotions are related to the essential components of the self-regulation of learning, such as interest, motivation, and learning strategies, among others. DeCuir-Gunby et al (2009) found that low academic productivity of university students seems to be related to the use of emotional regulation strategies that do not favor adaption, for example, not facing up to the situation, rumination or isolation.…”

“…Although there is consensus among researchers that the cognitive and affective aspects are related to learning, they indicate the need for future investigations to be conducted in order to examine in more depth the relationship between these two aspects in the school and academic context (DeCuir-Gunby et al, 2009;Kesici & Erdogan, 2009;Pekrun et al, 2002;Raftery & Bizer, 2009).…”

“…Thus, it becomes essential to comprehend the nature of a wider range of emotions and the ways students control them in the academic and school context. This highlights the need for instruction, allied to the contents, regarding the emotional aspects to be considered by teachers, and that the specifi c teaching strategies that assist in regulating emotions are fostered in the educational context (Cagnin, 2008;Coats & Blanchard-Fields, 2008;DeCuir-Gunby et al, 2009;Ochsner & Gross, 2005).…”

Against the odds: academic underdogs benefit from incremental theories

“…Effectively regulating emotions and expecting success fosters positive outcomes including psychological health, whereas feelings of helplessness are considered psychological risk factors (e.g., Folkman et al 1986). For example, in an academic context, mastery-oriented responses predicted greater self-efficacy and optimistic expectations, whereas helpless responses predicted greater levels of test anxiety and self-blame (DeCuir-Gunby et al 2009). Furthermore, self-efficacy predicts achievement across an array of domains including academics; self-efficacy is a powerful predictor of persistence, emotional reactions, and future academic achievement (e.g., Schunk 1989;Zimmerman 2000).…”