Motivation (1) EDU 330: Educational Psychology Daniel Moos

Overview Today: The Behavioral View of Motivation The Social Cognitive View of Motivation Other Cognitive Views of Motivation Next Class Expectancy X Value Theory The Humanistic View of Motivation The Role of Self-Perceptions in Motivation

The Behavioral View of Motivation Students are motivated to complete a task by the desire to obtain an externally provided reinforcer (extrinsic reinforcement) Limitations of the Behavioral View  Temporary changes (in absence of reward)  Materialistic View  Undermining Effect with Intrinsic motivation

The Social Cognitive View of Motivation Two factors that influence motivation:  The models to which people are exposed  The strength of one’s self-efficacy for a particular task The Power of Persuasive Models  Students who observe an admired model receive reinforcement may be motivated to exhibit the same behavior because they expect to receive the same reinforcement (vicarious reinforcement)

NeedDefinitionClassroom Application/Example Competence Autonomy Relatedness Independence and ability to alter the environment The feeling of being connected to others in one’s environment Feedback (“Your problem-solving skills are improving. Good work!”) Teacher asks for student input on rules, encourages students to set & monitor goals Teacher spends time with her students before & after school, helping them w/ homework, etc Self-determination theory: Process of deciding how to act on one’s environment (Ryan & Deci, 2000) Ability to function effectively in the environment Other Cognitive Views of Motivation

Beliefs about the Nature of Cognitive Ability  Entity Theorists – Believe that intelligence is like a thing, or entity, that has fixed characteristics  Incremental Theorists – Believe that intelligence can be gradually improved by adding to and refining thinking skills  Developmental trajectory

Attributions: Explanations that people tend to make to explain success or failure Internal External ControllableUncontrollable LuckEffort Difficulty of Test Choice of Study Environments Other Cognitive Views of Motivation

Attribution Theory: Introduction (II) How do individuals typically attribute their success and/or failure? – Interpret successes and failures in a manner that is most likely to maintain positive self-image Internal External ControllableUncontrollable LuckEffort Difficulty of Test Choice of Study Environments SuccessFailureSuccess/Failure

Attribution Theory: Introduction (III) AttributionLocusStabilityControllability Inherited ability internal stable uncontrollable Personalityinternalstableuncontrollable Effortinternalunstablecontrollable uncontrollableTask Difficultyexternalstable Luckexternalunstableuncontrollable

Attribution Theory: Case Study

Attribution Theory: Strategies (1)“I am competent” AND “I worked hard” NOT beneficial to completely attribute to ability (2) Students most likely to persist after failing if they attribute failure to a lack of appropriate effort (3) Scaffold student’s understanding of effort (a)Students often confuse spending time doing ineffective activities with effort (b)Students often have incorrect conceptions of their understanding (metacognition) (4) Should assessment include evaluations of effort?