Mathematics Achievement: Contributions of Motivation

Long-Term Growth in Students’ Mathematics Achievement: The Unique Contributions of Motivation

For decades, researchers in developmental and educational psychology have been concerned with the determinants of academic achievement. Today, there seems to be agreement that both motivational and strategy variables play an important role in explaining academic achievement (for a review, see Robbins et al., 2004). However, although a large portion of previous research has focused on the relation between these variables and academic achievement assessed at a particular time point, fewer studies have investigated whether motivational and strategy variables predict long-term growth in academic achievement. This is unfortunate because one of the ultimate goals in education is to facilitate sustainable learning (long-term intra individual growth, i.e., change relative to current achievement of the individual), rather than to focus on performance attainment at one point in time. Clearly, systematic investigation of the long-term determinants of growth in academic achievement is imperative. In the present research, using longitudinal data from six annual waves over the adolescent years, we examined a variety of motivational variables and cognitive strategies as predictors of both concurrent level and long-term growth in math achievement.

Past studies have identified various motivational factors that affect academic achievement. The present research focused on three of these factors that are regarded as especially important in motivation theory and research: perceived control, intrinsic motivation, and extrinsic motivation (Eccles & Wigfield, 2002; Pekrun, 2006). Perceived control is conceptualized as subjective appraisal of the causal link between one’s action and outcomes (Perry, Hladkyj, Pekrun, & Pelletier, 2001; Rotter, 1966). That is, perceived control reflects one’s expectancy to obtain a desired outcome through an action. Concepts of perceived control and competence (and related constructs of expectancies) play a prominent role in motivation theories (Bandura, 1977; Eccles & Wigfield, 2002; Marsh & Shavelson, 1985; Pekrun, 1993), and many studies have shown that perceived control and competence in academic domains are positively related to achievement (Marsh, 1990; Meece, Wigfield, & Eccles, 1990). By implication, it is straightforward to expect that perceived control is positively associated with concurrent level of students’ achievement in domains such as mathematics.

Importantly, adolescents’ perceived control has also been shown to relate to their learning. Perceived control is linked to active and effortful commitment to learning (Skinner, Wellborn, & Connell, 1990), persistence when performing difficult and challenging tasks (Cervone & Peake, 1986), and intrinsic engagement (Gottfried, 1990). Together these findings suggest that perceived control should help adolescent students acquire new knowledge, and as such, should positively predict growth in their achievement. Indeed, longitudinal research on students’ academic self-concepts has produced robust evidence that competence-related selfappraisals can influence subsequent academic achievement (e.g., Marsh, 1990; for reviews, see Marsh & Craven, 2006; Valentine, DuBois, & Cooper, 2004). Although (past) self-concept research relied

on lagged analyses that do not consider absolute growth over time, the findings suggest that competence-related appraisals such as perceived control can be a positive predictor of long-term change in students’ academic achievement. Intrinsic motivation is defined as motivation to engage in a task for the sake of interest in the task itself and the inherent pleasure and satisfaction derived from the task, whereas extrinsic motivation is defined as motivation to engage in a task for external reasons (Deci & Ryan, 1985). Extrinsic motivation is heterogeneous in that there are a variety of different external rewards that produce motivated

behavior. In the present research, we focus on extrinsic motivation driven by the desire to get good grades, as this is one of the most prevalent forms of extrinsic motivation in academic settings (Lemos, 1996; Pekrun, 1993).

Intrinsic motivation is associated with various variables supporting learning, such as active and effortful engagement (Ryan & Connell, 1989), persistence in the face of failure (Elliott & Dweck, 1988), and positive emotional learning experiences (Pekrun, Goetz, Titz, & Perry, 2002). Extrinsic motivation, on the other hand, is typically driven by expected short-term benefits of learning and is linked to instrumental learning independent of interest (Grolnick & Ryan, 1987), overuse of dependent help seeking (Butler, 1998), and self-handicapping (Urdan & Midgley, 2001). As such, extrinsic motivation seems suited to benefit immediate, but rather ephemeral, academic achievement, whereas intrinsic motivation seems ideally suited to benefit enduring, long-term learning. Thus, we propose that intrinsic motivation positively predicts growth in academic achievement (and possibly concurrent achievement as well; see also Marsh, Trautwein, Ludtke, Koller, & Baumert, 2005), whereas extrinsic motivation has short-term effects that are manifested in a link to current achievement, but does not promote long-term growth. Although these time-dependent relations (i.e., relations that emerge at a particular point in time) of intrinsic and extrinsic motivation are documented in a few experimental studies (Murayama & Elliot, 2011; Vansteenkiste, Simons, Lens, Soenens, & Matos, 2005), little research has demonstrated such a pattern of effects in the context of long-term growth of academic achievement.

Numerous studies have been conducted to better understand students’ motivation and learning strategies as promoting the academic development of competence and knowledge. Researchers defined motivation as the process whereby goal-directed activity is instigated and sustained (Pintrich & Schunk, 2002). Learning strategies are described as planned sets of coordinated study tactics that are directed by a learning goal and aim to acquire a new skill or gain understanding (Alexander & Murphy, 1998). According to these views, motivation and learning strategies should, by their nature, facilitate long-term learning processes. The present

researches are indeed important for students’ academic growth over the school years.