The impact of task difficulty expectations on intrinsic motivation

Hom, Harry L.; Maxwell, Frederick R.

doi:10.1007/bf00992962

Cited by 20 publications

(11 citation statements)

References 6 publications

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“…This finding is striking because one might have predicted that telling children something will be hard could lead them to give up. After all, adults perform worse on anagrams if they are labeled "hard" than "easy" (Scasserra, 2008) and 5th and 6th graders are less likely to choose tasks that are labeled "hard" than "easy" (Hom & Maxwell, 1983). However, here we find that, as long as children know the task is achievable, they step up to the challenge when they are told the task is hard.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 57%

How Adults’ Actions, Outcomes, and Testimony Affect Preschoolers’ Persistence

2019

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Across four experiments, we looked at how four and five-year-olds' (n=520) task persistence was affected by observations of adult actions (high or low effort), outcomes (success or failure) and testimony (setting expectations-"This will be hard", pep talks-"You can do this", value statements-"Trying hard is important", and baseline). Across experiments, outcomes had the biggest impact: preschoolers consistently tried harder after seeing the adult succeed than fail. Additionally, adult effort affected children's persistence, but only when the adult succeeded. Finally, children's persistence was highest when the adult both succeeded and practiced what she preached: exerting effort while testifying to its value.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 57%

How Adults’ Actions, Outcomes, and Testimony Affect Preschoolers’ Persistence

2019

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“…For example, one psychological study reported that participants showed higher scores of intrinsic motivation when they attained a difficult goal of assembling helicopter models than when they did not attain that goal or attained an easier goal [Shalley and Oldham, ]. However, other studies have shown that the subjective motivation was significantly lower during the performance of difficult tasks than of easy tasks [Arkes, ; Hom and Maxwell, ]. This inconsistency may be explained by two possible theories.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Neural mechanisms underlying the reward‐related enhancement of motivation when remembering episodic memories with high difficulty

Shigemune

Tsukiura

Nouchi

et al. 2017

Human Brain Mapping

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The motivation to receive rewards enhances episodic memories, and the motivation is modulated by task difficulty. In episodic retrieval, however, functional neuroimaging evidence regarding the motivation that mediates interactions between reward and task difficulty is scarce. The present fMRI study investigated this issue. During encoding performed without fMRI, participants encoded Japanese words using either deep or shallow strategies, which led to variation in difficulty level during subsequent retrieval. During retrieval with fMRI, participants recognized the target words in either high or low monetary reward conditions. In the behavioral results, a reward-related enhancement of memory was found only when the memory retrieval was difficult, and the rewarding effect on subjective motivation was greater in the retrieval of memories with high difficulty than those with low difficulty. The fMRI data showed that reward-related increases in the activation of the substantia nigra/ventral tegmental area (SN/VTA), medial temporal lobe (MTL), dorsomedial prefrontal cortex (dmPFC), and dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (dlPFC) were greater during the retrieval of memories with high difficulty than those with low difficulty. Furthermore, reward-related enhancement of functional connectivity between the SN/VTA and MTL and between the SN/VTA and dmPFC during the retrieval of memories with high difficulty was significantly correlated with reward-related increases of retrieval accuracy and subjective motivation. The reward-related enhancement of episodic retrieval and retrieval-related motivation could be most effective when the level of retrieval difficulty is optimized. Such reward-related enhancement of memory and motivation could be modulated by a network including the reward-related SN/VTA, motivation-related dmPFC, and memory-related MTL. Hum Brain Mapp, 2017. © 2017 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.

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“…Several researchers have found that both boys and girls return to easy tasks significantly more often than to difficult ones (Harter, 1978;Hom & Maxwell, 1983;Hughes, Sullivan, & Mosley, 1985;Story & Sullivan, 1986). Further, girls return to easy tasks even more frequently than boys do, when a choice is required between easy and hard tasks and when performance will be graded or evaluated by their teacher (Harter;Hughes et at., 1985;Story & Sullivan, 1986).…”

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confidence: 95%