Achievement Motivation in Academics Research Paper

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Abstract

Achievement motivation is the desire to excel at effortful activities. Achievement motivation originally was thought of as extending  across many  areas, but  current  views conceive of it as more  specific to situations.  Personal, social, instructional,  familial, and cultural  factors affect achievement motivation, and parents and educators can help students to improve their achievement motivation.

Outline

  1. Introduction
  2. Background
  3. Current Perspectives
  4. Promoting Achievement Motivation

1. Introduction

At the end of her ninth-grade geometry class, Mrs. Lollar passed out the ‘‘Problem of the Week’’ for students  to take home and solve. Two students in the class, Ashley and Marella, each have a B+ average. Because the problem of the week is worth extra credit, doing well on it could raise each of their averages to an A. That evening at home, Ashley looked at the problem for a while, spent a  little  time  on  it,  but  then  quit  without  solving  it. Marella studied the problem and began to work. When her parents  called her to dinner,  she was reluctant  to come because she was working on it. After dinner, she worked on it some more and finally exclaimed, ‘‘Aha—I get it!’’ The next day in class, Marella was one of only three  students   to  have  solved  the  geometric  proof. Ashley got  some  steps  in  the  proof  correct,  but  her solution was far from complete.

Achievement motivation is the desire to excel at effortful activities. In the  opening  scenario,  it seems that Marella was more motivated to achieve in geometry  than  was  Ashley.  Marella  displayed  interest  in solving the  proof,  persisted  at  it,  was excited  when she understood  what to do, and solved it correctly.

Achievement motivation has a long history in psychology and education,  and for good reason. Motivation to achieve is necessary for all but the simplest tasks. Achievement  motivation   helps  students   to  learn  in school,  fuels creative  activities,  and  helps  individuals and societies to attain goals.

Despite the intuitive importance of achievement motivation, researchers disagree on its critical components. The next two sections examine the background of achievement motivation and some current perspectives.

2. Background

It is difficult to pinpoint the historical onset of the study of achievement motivation because the human desire to achieve has been of interest for ages. The scientific study of achievement motivation received impetus from work by Murray, who included  it as one of several human needs   that   contribute   to   personality   development. Murray also devised the  Thematic  Apperception  Test (TAT)  to  study  personality   processes.  The  TAT  is a projective technique in which people view a series of ambiguous pictures (i.e., inkblots) and make up a story or answer questions for each picture.

McClelland and colleagues adapted the TAT to study achievement motivation. People were shown pictures of individuals in ambiguous situations (e.g., a student at a desk holding a pencil and looking into the air) and were asked questions such as the following: ‘‘What is happening?,’’ ‘‘What led up to this situation?,’’ ‘‘What is wanted?,’’ and ‘‘What will happen?’’ Responses were scored and categorized according to strength of achievement motivation. Unfortunately the TAT has some measurement  problems,  and TAT achievement  motivation scores often did  not  relate  well to other  measures  of achievement. Over the years, researchers  have devised other methods for assessing achievement motivation.

Important early work on achievement motivation was done  by Atkinson  and  colleagues. Atkinson  drew  on work by Lewin and others on the level of aspiration or the  goal  that  people  set  in  a  task.  Lewin’s research showed that successes raised and failures lowered the level of aspiration, that people felt more successful when they met the goals they had set for themselves than when they attained  objective standards,  and that the level of aspiration reflected individual and group differences.

Atkinson’s expectancy–value  theory  of achievement motivation states that behavior depends on how much people value a particular  goal and their  expectancy of attaining that goal as a result of performing  in a given fashion. Atkinson postulated that achievement behavior involved a conflict between a motive to approach a task (hope  for success)  and  a motive  to  avoid  it  (fear  of failure). These motives conflict because any achievement task carries with it the possibilities of success and failure. The achievement motivation that results in any situation depends on people’s expectancies of success and failure and their incentive values of success and failure.

The historical research focused on achievement motivation  globally, that  is, motivation  across many situations. But research and everyday observations show that people rarely are motivated to achieve at high levels in every situation.  Rather, students  typically have greater achievement  motivation  in some content  areas than  in others. In the opening scenario, although Marella’s achievement  motivation  was  higher  than  Ashley’s in geometry, Ashley may strive to excel more than Marella in  history.  Given that  the  achievement  motive  differs depending  on the domain (and even depending  on the task within the domain), the validity of general achievement motivation is questionable.

3. Current Perspectives

People who study achievement motivation today believe that it is more situationally  specific and is affected by many  factors:  personal,  social,  instructional,   familial, and cultural (Table I). To understand  why students differ in achievement  motivation,  one must examine the roles of these factors in their lives. Although researchers agree that achievement motivation is complex, they disagree on which factors are the most important.

Personal  factors  reside  within  students.  Some key personal factors are goals, expectations, values, and attributions.  Goals are what one is trying to accomplish. Goals usually are cast in terms of products—Marella and Ashley’s goal was to work the geometry proof—but they also can represent  processes.  Thus,  an academic  goal may be to improve one’s skill in comprehending  scientific texts. Goals contribute  to achievement motivation because people pursuing goals persist and expend effort to succeed. As they work on the tasks, they evaluate their goal processes, and the belief that they are making progress sustains motivation.

Achievement Motivation in Academics Research Paper t1TABLE  I Influences on Achievement Motivation

But goals actually are less important than their properties: specificity, proximity, and difficulty. Goals may be specific (e.g., read 10 pages) or general (e.g., read some pages), proximal (e.g., read 10 pages tonight) or distant (e.g., read 10 pages by next week), and difficult (e.g., read 400 pages) or easier (e.g., read 50 pages). From a motivational  perspective, goals that are specific, proximal, and moderately difficult produce  higher achievement motivation than do goals that are general, distant, and either too difficult or too easy. Thus, motivation is not aided when goals denote general outcomes (because nearly  any  action  will  satisfy them),  are  temporally distant (it is easy to put off until tomorrow  what does not need to be done today), and too difficult or too easy (people are not motivated to attempt the impossible and may procrastinate  completing easy tasks).

Expectations can be of two types. Outcome expectations  refer to the  expected  outcomes  of one’s actions (e.g., ‘‘If I study hard,  I should  make a high grade on the test,’’ ‘‘No matter how hard I study, I probably will fail the test’’). Outcome expectations  motivate students because the belief that  a certain  action  will lead to a given outcome should lead students to pursue or avoid that action, assuming that they value that outcome  or want to avoid it.

A second  type of expectation  involves beliefs about one’s capabilities  to  learn  or  perform  given  actions. Bandura and other researchers termed this ‘‘self-efficacy.’’ Self-efficacious students  believe  that  they  can  study diligently,  whereas  those  lacking  efficacy might  believe that they cannot. Marella’s self-efficacy in geometry  likely  was higher  than  Ashley’s. Self-efficacy is important  because students  who believe that they can learn or perform desired actions are more likely to choose to engage in them, expend effort, and persist.

Self-efficacy and  outcome  expectations   often  are related,  but  they  need  not  be. Students  who  believe that they are capable typically expect to perform well and receive high grades and other  rewards. However, students may believe that diligent studying will lead to good grades  (i.e.,  positive  outcome  expectation)  but also may doubt  their  ability to study  diligently  (i.e., low self-efficacy), in which case they might feel demoralized. Positive outcome expectations  and strong self-efficacy for learning and performing  capably produce high achievement motivation.

The values and/or importance that students ascribe to learning and achievement are central components of motivation. Those who do not value what they are learning are not motivated to improve or perform well. Research shows that  value relates positively to persistence, choice, and performance. Students who value learning choose challenging activities, persist at them, and perform well. Thus, students who value history are apt to study diligently for tests, set goals for their learning, monitor their learning progress, use effective learning strategies, and not be daunted by obstacles. Marella likely valued geometry more than did Ashley.

Attributions are perceived causes of outcomes or the factors that people believe are responsible for their successes and failures. In achievement situations, learners may ask themselves questions such as the following: ‘‘Why did I get an A on my biology test?’’ and ‘‘Why can’t I learn French?’’

Weiner and colleagues formulated an attribution  theory of achievement motivation that contends that each attribution   can  be  classified along  three  dimensions: locus, stability, and controllability. The locus dimension refers to whether the attribution is internal or external to the person. The stability dimension denotes how much the attribution  varies over time. The controllability dimension  involves the  extent  that  the  attribution  is under the individual’s control.

Weiner found that common  attributions  in achievement settings are ability, luck, task difficulty, and effort; however,  there  are many others  (e.g., fatigue, illness, personal dislike, time available, attitude).  Ability is internal, stable, and uncontrollable  (although one’s ability can improve over time); luck is external, unstable, and uncontrollable; task difficulty is external, stable (assuming that the task does not change), and uncontrollable; and effort is internal, unstable (although a general effort factor also seems to exist), and controllable.

Students who attribute academic success to high ability and effort are more likely to expect future success than  are those who attribute  it to task ease and good luck. Students who attribute failure to low ability are less likely to expect future success than are those who attribute  it  to  low effort. The  latter  finding  is especially critical because a low expectation of future success stifles motivation. From the perspective of achievement motivation, it is far better to stress effort than ability because the former has stronger motivational effects. Of course, as skills develop, students do become more able, so the attribution  of success  to  ability  is credible.  Teachers often have difficulty in motivating students who believe that they lack the ability to succeed and that no amount of effort will help them to be successful.

Social factors are those that are inherent  in interactions with others. Peers are a key social group for students.  Peer models are especially influential,  especially those who are similar to observers in important ways, because they convey that tasks are valuable.

Peer group goals are highly valued by students. Thus, students  may want to be liked and approved,  develop social and/or intimate relationships,  learn to cooperate, win  favors,  and  be  sensitive  to  the  needs  of others. Students’ perceptions of their capabilities also are affected by peers through  social comparisons.  Observing similar peers succeeding can raise observers’ self-efficacy.

Peer networks are large groups of peers with whom students  associate.  Students  in  networks  tend  to  be highly similar and, thus, are key models. Students’ motivational  engagement  in school across the school year is predicted  by their network  membership  at the start of the year. Those in more academically inclined networks   demonstrate   higher   academic   motivation than do those in low-motivation networks.

Although students  may select their  peer networks, parents  can play a key role by ‘‘launching’’ their children onto particular trajectories. For example, parents who want their  children  to be academically oriented are likely to involve them in activities and groups that stress academics. Peers with whom children  associate reinforce the emphasis on academics.

Instructional factors include teacher planning and decision making,  grouping  for instruction,  teacher–student interactions  (including  feedback to students),  activities, and  classroom  climate.  Teachers  can  enhance  student

motivation  by planning  interesting  activities that  maximize student involvement in lessons. Teachers who plan only lectures are less apt to promote student motivation. Teachers also can promote motivation by basing instructional decisions not only on how well students are learning but also on how much the material appeals to students.

Three types of grouping  structures  are competitive, cooperative,  and  individualist.  Competitive  situations are those in which the goals of individuals  are linked negatively such that if one attains his or her goal, the chance  that  others  will attain  their  goals diminishes. Cooperative structures  are those in which the goals of the group members are linked positively such that one can attain his or her goal only if others attain their goals. In individualist  situations,  there  is no link among the goals of individuals such that one’s goal attainment  has no  effect on  the  goal  attainment   of others.  From  a motivational perspective, competitive situations highlight differences among students,  and lower achievers may become discouraged if they believe that they have no chance to earn rewards. Cooperative  situations  are better if all students contribute to the project. If only one or two students do most of the work, there is apt to be resentment. In individualist situations, achievement motivation can be developed and sustained when learners focus on their progress or on how much better they are performing now compared with earlier.

Performance feedback provides information on accuracy of work  and  may include  corrective  information (e.g., ‘‘The first part is correct,  but you need to bring down  the  next  number’’). Motivational  feedback  can provide information on progress and competence (e.g., ‘‘You’ve gotten much better at this’’), link student  performance with one or more attributions  (e.g., ‘‘You’ve been working hard’’), and inform students  about  how well they are applying a strategy and how strategy use is improving their work (e.g., ‘‘You got it correct because you followed the proper method’’). Feedback motivates students  when  it informs  them  that  they are making progress and becoming more competent.

Classroom  climate  refers  to  the  atmosphere  of the classroom—its social, psychological, and emotional characteristics. Climate is important  for motivation because classroom interactions  define the climate. Climate often is referred to in terms such as ‘‘warm,’’ ‘‘cold,’’ ‘‘permissive,’’ ‘‘democratic,’’  and ‘‘autocratic.’’ Research shows that a democratic environment—one based on mutual respect and  collaboration—fosters  goal attainment  by learners without their becoming frustrated or aggressive.

There  are many familial factors, but  a key one  is socioeconomic   status,   whose   link   with   students’ academic motivation is well established. Children from lower socioeconomic backgrounds typically display lower motivation and achievement,  and are at greater risk for school failure and dropout, compared with children  from  wealthier  families. But socioeconomic status is only a descriptive term and does not explain why effects occur.  There  also are many people  who grew up  in  impoverished  environments  but  became well educated and successful.

A major contributor  is a family’s capital or resources.

Poor families have less financial resources  to support their children’s learning outside of school than do wealthier families. Socialization in lower class homes often does not match or prepare students for the middle-class orientation  of schools and classrooms. Lower socioeconomic students might not understand  the full benefits of schooling or comprehend  that getting a good education will increase their chances of college acceptance, good jobs, and financial stability. Because of family financial strain, they also might not be able to resist the short-term benefits of working in favor of the long-term benefits of schooling. Such students might have few, if any, educated role models in their environments.  Many enter  school without the needed social, cognitive, and emotional prerequisites to learn successfully.

Families continue  to influence children’s motivation throughout  childhood and adolescence by steering children in given directions. Families that provide rich resources in the home and guide their children into activities that stress motivation and achievement are apt to develop children higher in achievement motivation.

Cultural factors also affect motivation. Cross-cultural research shows that there are differences in how much cultures emphasize education and motivation for learning.  For  example,  children  from Asian cultures often place greater  emphasis  on  effort as a cause of success than  do students  in the  United  States. Some cultures  are  more  socially  oriented,  whereas  others place more emphasis on individual  accomplishments. Although it is hard to make generalizations about cultures  given that  not  all members  of a culture  act alike, it does seem that motivational differences stem in part from influences in cultural background.

4. Promoting  Achievement Motivation

How can parents  and educators  help to improve students’ achievement  motivation  for  academics?  First, they can help students to set challenging but attainable goals. Students must believe that the goals are attainable; they will not be motivated to attempt what they see as impossible. Teachers and parents might need to work with students to ensure that goals are realistic; if students are unaware of the demands of an assignment, they might set an unattainable  goal. Challenging and attainable goals help to build self-efficacy as students perceive that they are making progress.

Second, it is important  for parents  and educators  to stress  the  value  of learning.  Motivation  is  enhanced when learners understand  how they can use what they are learning  and how it will help them  in the future. People  are  not  motivated  to  engage in  ‘‘busy work.’’ Marella and  Ashley’s  teacher  would  do well to point out applications of geometry in daily life.

Third, parents and educators should build students’ perceptions  of their  competence  or self-efficacy. Self efficacy is increased when learners believe that they are developing skills, making progress toward their goals, and performing  better.  Self-efficacy develops through actual performance accomplishments,  vicarious (modeled) experiences, and social persuasion. Teachers and parents  should  ensure  that students  work at tasks on which  they  can  be successful,  observe  similar  peers succeeding, and receive feedback indicating  that they are capable (e.g., ‘‘I know you can do this’’).

Fourth, parents should get involved in children’s learning. Parents can be involved in school by assisting in classrooms and at home. Parents serve as models for learning,  and they can help to establish a productive study environment.  They also can be taught  tutoring skills. The importance of parents as motivational models cannot be overemphasized.

Fifth,  teachers  should  use  peers  effectively to  build motivation. Teachers who group students for collaborative project work must ensure that each student has responsibility for part of the task so that the bulk of the work is not done by one or two students. In using models for comparisons, it is imperative that students  view the models as similar to themselves. Motivation of lower achieving students  might  not  improve  when  these  students  are asked to observe higher achieving students perform.

Finally, parents  and educators  should use feedback to teach and motivate. Feedback typically informs students  whether  they  are  correct  or  incorrect  and what  to  do  to  perform  better.  Feedback  motivates when  it informs  students  about  their  progress—how much better they are performing now than they were previously—and  when  it links  their  performances  to effort, good strategy use, and enhanced ability.

Academic motivation for academics is important not only for schooling but also for the future.  Educators want  students  to  continue  to  be motivated  to  learn once they leave their  classrooms. This is the essence of  ‘‘lifelong learning’’ by  which  citizens  move  their societies forward.

References:

  1. Ames, C. (1984). Competitive,  cooperative,  and individualistic goal structures:  A cognitive–motivational analysis. In R. Ames, &    Ames (Eds.),  Research on motivation in education (Vol.  1,  pp.  177–207).  New  York: Academic Press.
  2. Atkinson, W. (1957).  Motivational  determinants  of risk-taking behavior. Psychological  Review, 64, 359–372.
  3. Bandura, A. (1997). Self-efficacy: The exercise of control. New York: Freeman.
  4. Bradley, R. H., & Corwyn, R. F. (2002). Socioeconomic status and child development. Annual Review of Psychology, 53, 371–399.
  5. McClelland, D., Atkinson, J. W., Clark, R. A., & Lowell, E. L. (1953). The achievement motive. New  York: Appleton– Century–Crofts.
  6. Murray, H. A. (1938). Explorations in personality. New York: Oxford University Press.
  7. Pintrich, P. R., & Schunk, D. H. (2002). Motivation in education: Theory, research, and applications (2nd ).  Upper Saddle River, NJ: Merrill/Prentice Hall.
  8. Steinberg, , Brown, B. B., &  Dornbusch,  S. M. (1996). Beyond the classroom: Why school reform has  failed and what parents need to do. New York: Simon & Schuster.
  9. Weiner, (1992).  Human motivation: Metaphors, theories, and research.  Newbury Park, CA: Sage.

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