TY - JOUR

T1 - Study harder? the relationship of achievement goals to attitudes and self-reported use of desirable difficulties in self-regulated learning

AU - Weissgerber, Sophia C.

AU - Reinhard, Marc André

AU - Schindler, Simon

PY - 2016/5/1

Y1 - 2016/5/1

N2 - We examined whether achievement goal motivations differentially relate to students' attitudes and self-reported use of desirable difficulties in personal learning. We argue that different achievement goals correspond with different levels of mental engagement, inclination to elaborate on learning content, and invested effort. We hypothesized that cognitively effortful and long-term oriented learning strategies will be preferred by students with higher intrinsic motivation for deeper processing and less avoidance of necessary effort, and by those aiming for long-term skill acquisition rather than performance objectives. In line with these new predictions, students with higher mastery goal orientation reported positive attitudes and more application of desirable difficulties. By contrast, students with avoidance goal motivations were less favorable and indicated less usage; performance approach goals were unrelated. When considering all achievement motivations simultaneously as predictors, as expected, only mastery goals remained significant. This new finding was robust despite testing against an alternative, conceptually related construct: regardless of controlling for intrinsic cognitive motivation (need for cognition), mastery goal orientation still predicted attitudes and self-reported use of desirable difficulties. Implications for (self-regulated) learning processes are discussed.

AB - We examined whether achievement goal motivations differentially relate to students' attitudes and self-reported use of desirable difficulties in personal learning. We argue that different achievement goals correspond with different levels of mental engagement, inclination to elaborate on learning content, and invested effort. We hypothesized that cognitively effortful and long-term oriented learning strategies will be preferred by students with higher intrinsic motivation for deeper processing and less avoidance of necessary effort, and by those aiming for long-term skill acquisition rather than performance objectives. In line with these new predictions, students with higher mastery goal orientation reported positive attitudes and more application of desirable difficulties. By contrast, students with avoidance goal motivations were less favorable and indicated less usage; performance approach goals were unrelated. When considering all achievement motivations simultaneously as predictors, as expected, only mastery goals remained significant. This new finding was robust despite testing against an alternative, conceptually related construct: regardless of controlling for intrinsic cognitive motivation (need for cognition), mastery goal orientation still predicted attitudes and self-reported use of desirable difficulties. Implications for (self-regulated) learning processes are discussed.

KW - Achievement motivation

KW - Desirable difficulties

KW - Mastery goals

KW - Need for cognition

KW - Self-regulated learning

KW - Psychology

UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=84975797344&partnerID=8YFLogxK

M3 - Journal articles

AN - SCOPUS:84975797344

VL - 24

SP - 42

EP - 60

JO - Journal of Psychological and Educational Research

JF - Journal of Psychological and Educational Research

SN - 2247-1537

IS - 1

ER -