Browsing by Subject "Self-determination theory"

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Boys at risk : an exploration of academic engagement in elementary school
(2010-05) Arnold, Jamie Lee; Emmer, Edmund T.; Jones Eaton, Roberta L.; Rochlen, Aaron; Schallert, Diane L.; Suizzo, Marie-Anne
For the last twenty years, there has been growing concern among educators, scholars, and parents about the underachievement and disengagement of boys in school. Self-Determination theory postulates that individuals will be more motivated when their needs for relatedness, competence, and autonomy are satisfied. Boys' relationships with teachers are sometimes conflictual, although relatedness to teachers has been shown to be a salient predictor for academic engagement. Teachers can also serve as a buffer for those students who are at risk of failure or dropping out. Other issues involve masculinity sitting uncomfortably with academic success, the need for self-discipline, and the nature of academic tasks being too sedentary and less hands-on. This study explores the academic engagement of at-risk boys with special attention to the role of teacher-student relationships using self-determination as a theoretical framework. A qualitative method was utilized to illuminate the complex interactions between antecedents and consequences for developing an explanatory scheme for why some boys do well academically and others do not. Ten third through fifth grade boys were interviewed, along with ten of their parents and six teachers. Topics ranged from their likes and dislikes, feelings about their teachers and school in general, and ways in which teachers and parents support and encourage them academically. The boys were observed in multiple settings throughout the school year. The goal was to shed light on the "boy crisis" and to take a nuanced approach when it comes to studying boys. The study was also designed to enhance our understanding of academic engagement as a multidimensional construct encompassing behavior, emotion, and cognition. Academic task characteristics and self-discipline, as well as relatedness to teachers, parents, and peers, emerged as important themes in engaging boys, while the construct of masculinity was not as salient. A proposed model was developed as a psychoeducational tool for providing information about the academic engagement of boys. This model could assist educators and parents in helping boys attain more joy and success in school.
Building students’ mathematics self-efficacy through student-teacher trust
(2012-05) Harvey, Kristin Emilia; Borich, Gary D.; Suizzo, Marie-Anne
A current national priority is improving secondary school mathematics performance. Middle school students’ trust in their mathematics teachers can lead to better relationships and increased feelings of competence, or mathematics self-efficacy, which is consistently linked to achievement. Student trust is based on perceptions of a teacher’s competence, benevolence, openness, reliability, and honesty. To determine the effect of trust in a teacher on student mathematics self-efficacy while accounting for the non-independence due to shared classroom experiences, hierarchical linear modeling will be utilized. Controlling for prior achievement, mathematics self-efficacy is expected to be higher for students who perceive their mathematics teacher meets more of the criteria for trust, with a stronger effect for low-achieving students. The implications of the outcomes of the proposed study suggest the creation of a training program to facilitate trust building between students and teachers. This report also includes an evaluation plan which details the components of the trust building program, a model for the program, and the proposed method to measure the reported outcomes.
Daily health habits : the effects of autonomy, competence, and relatedness
(2016-05) Vasquez, Ariana Christine; Patall, Erika A.; Schallert, Diane; Pituch, Keenan; Awad, Germine; Pasch, Keryn
Are you more likely to take better care of yourself if you have a good day? To help explore this question I designed a daily diary study examining the relationship between psychological need satisfaction predicting health habits and overall well-being. Participants (N =234) took part in several surveys; a baseline session measuring person-level feelings of autonomy, competence, and relatedness, in addition to motivations for working out and eating healthy. Then for 14 continuous days participants took daily surveys, measuring daily levels of needs satisfaction (through self-reporting on activities and social interactions), recording their health habits (diet, exercise, and sleep) and well-being (affect, vitality, symptomology). Daily fluctuations in need satisfaction seek to answers three research questions: 1) Are person-level feelings of need fulfillment (autonomy, competence, relatedness) in one’s life globally and motivation for health behaviors associated with health habits (exercise, diet, sleep)? 2) Do daily experiences of need satisfaction (daily autonomy, competence, relatedness) predict changes in daily health habits (exercise, diet, sleep), even after accounting for person-level feelings of need fulfillment and motivation for health habits? 3) Does person-level need fulfillment and daily experiences of need satisfaction predict changes in daily psychological and physical health? Hierarchical Linear Modeling (HLM) was used for the primary tests. For this dataset, the lower level unit, days, is nested within the higher level unit, persons. Results indicate that daily fluctuations in need satisfaction do matter. Daily autonomy, at both the within- and between-person level, positively and significantly predict exercise behaviors and overall well-being. Daily competence, at both the within- and between-person level, positively and significantly predict fruit and vegetable intake and overall well-being. Daily relatedness, at both the within- and between-person level, positively and significantly predicts overall well-being. Above and beyond a person’s stable person-level indicators of these needs, daily fluctuations in need satisfaction are important for understanding why people engage in health habits, especially exercise. Findings have implications for helping people lead healthier lives, both physically and psychologically.
Determinants influencing college major choice and their relationship to self-determined motivation, achievement, and satisfaction
(2009-12) Walls, Stephen Marc; Svinicki, Marilla D., 1946-
Postsecondary curricula are often the first opportunity where students can and are compelled to make choices regarding their adult professional life and the first opportunity students have to engage in serious and focused exploration of the various career options that might be available to them. While the general impact of a postsecondary education on career experience, including job satisfaction and success, is well documented, the factors influencing postsecondary students' career choice and how those factors impact college outcomes, including motivation towards, satisfaction with, and achievement in their chosen major field, appear to be more obscure and uneven. Self-determination theory (SDT) is a well-established motivational construct in the educational psychology field and the goal of this study is to explore the role that SDT may play in the relationship between determinants influencing a student's choice of major and their satisfaction and achievement outcomes. Using self-reported survey data from students across five disciplines at a large public four-year university, a cluster analysis was performed to determine if students could be grouped meaningfully based on their self-determination and the determinants that influenced their choice of major. Meaningfulness was assessed based primarily on the differences across the clusters on the satisfaction and achievement measures. Students were found to be too similar across the clusters on the achievement measure for meaningful interpretation on that outcome, but there did appear to be an important relationship between the influence of future outcomes and personal experiences in choosing a major and the students' satisfaction with their major. Multiple regression analysis was also employed to assess the degree to which achievement could be predicted by students' satisfaction, self-determined motivation, and determinants influencing choice of major. Self-determined autonomy was an important mediator and moderator of the effects that the determinants influencing choice of major had on satisfaction and achievement. Future directions in the research program, as well as the practical implications of the results, are discussed.
Does motivation moderate the effectiveness of retrieval as a learning intervention
(2013-05) Clark, Daniel Allen; Svinicki, Marilla D., 1946-; Robinson, Daniel H.
The effects of using retrieval as a study method have been found to occur across many contexts, such as in classrooms, with different age groups, and for non-verbal materials (Rohrer & Pashler, 2010). Even though researchers have suggested that this intervention be implemented on a widespread basis, studies to date have not investigated how the important variable of motivation could have an effect on retrieval as a learning intervention. This experiment investigated whether motivational variables would moderate the effect that retrieval has on learning. In this study, retrieval, extrinsic incentives, and intrinsic motivation positively affected performance. Causality orientations did not have an impact on performance or moderate the effect of the incentives. However, none of the included motivational variables moderated the effect of retrieval on learning. These results suggest that retrieval as a learning intervention is equally effective across different motivational conditions.
Evidence-based teaching in social work : an assessment of pedagogical content, instructor awareness, and student motivational characteristics
(2014-08) Tesh, Miki; Pomeroy, Elizabeth Cheney, 1955-; Gilbert, Dorie J.; Shorkey, Clayton T.; Rountree, Michele A.; Eaton, Lynn J.
The objective of this dissertation is to bridge the gap between a body of work referred to in the educational sciences as Evidence-Based Teaching (EBT) and the literature of social work teaching. Despite an extensive body of literature available to guide higher education instructors in optimizing student motivation and learning outcomes, this knowledge base is underutilized in social work. Consequently, social work instructors may not be aware of teaching practices based on this research and are unlikely to be included in the dialogue since the majority of research on EBT investigates student rather than instructor characteristics. As EBT is based on the interaction between instructors and students in the classroom, understanding both perspectives is critical. This research began with a content analysis to uncovered areas of discussion in social work education, and particularly focused on EBT as it relates to social work learning outcomes. Next, a quasi-experimental study explored the utility of a metacognitive approach to increasing social work instructors' self-awareness of their teaching. This newly created metacognitive self-assessment tool holds promise for enhancing teaching practices. A third study explored Self-Determination Theory, Achievement Goal Orientation Theory, and situational motivation characteristics of social work undergraduate majors, compared to business, nursing, and engineering majors. Taken together, these three studies comprise a comprehensive body of work aimed at advancing social work education and engaging social work in the interdisciplinary EBT conversation with implications for strategies to achieve a discourse that is focused on social work faculty/instructor development and learning outcomes.
Examining Latine belonging, motivation, and student organization involvement in higher education
(2022-12-01) Mata, Ryan A.; Suizzo, Marie-Anne
As Latine undergraduate enrollment rates rise within the United States, retention continues to be a key issue affecting the academic achievement of these students. A key mechanism for ensuring student retention has to do with the academic and social experiences of students, which foster institutional commitment, sense of belonging, and academic persistence. In this report, I review the literature on the examination of factors affecting Latine student success, retention, and sense of belonging across a variety of domains. Involvement in student organizations is emphasized as a potential context and experience that facilitates sense of belonging and motivation for academic persistence. Relying on Tinto’s Student Integration Model (Tinto, 1975) and Self-Determination Theory (Ryan & Deci, 2000), I propose a phenomenological study to explore how student organization involvement impacts sense of belonging and motivation to persist academically for Latine students at a large, Hispanic-Serving Institution in the southwest United States.
Examining the effect of advisor-student relationships on academic major decision-making
(2014-08) Leach, Jennifer Kay; Patall, Erika A.
Given extensive research highlighting the benefits of need-supportive practices and need satisfaction, it seems likely that academic advisors who use practices found to be need-supportive in classroom, work, and other contexts, will foster students’ perceived autonomy and competence toward the academic major decision-making process and facilitate longer-term goals of enhancing motivation and satisfaction with their academic coursework. A longitudinal study was conducted in order to examine the stability in perceptions of college students' academic major decision-making experience over time as a function of need-supportive advising. The study also examined the stability in satisfaction and motivation outcomes as a function of need-supportive advising over time. Participants included undecided students who completed an online survey at three time points during either the 2012-2013 or 2013-2014 academic year. The online survey included measures assessing perceptions of advisors' needs-supportive practices, students' autonomous and competent decision-making, satisfaction with and motivation for coursework, and subjective well-being, as well as demographic characteristics. Analyses on several models were performed using Mplus version 6.12. Results suggest need-supportive advising at the beginning of the academic year predicts improved academic satisfaction, academic efficacy, subjective well-being, and value toward coursework toward the end of the academic year particularly when advising sessions satisfy students need for competence throughout the year which, in turn, provides students with increased competence about choosing an academic major. Implications and future directions are discussed.
A self-determination perspective on students’ differentiated experiences of academic motivation and course well-being across courses
(2010-05) Kim, Hyunjin, 1974 Jan. 10-; Schallert, Diane L.; Svinicki, Marilla D.; Weinstein, Claire E.; Beretvas, S. Natasha; Lewis, Karron G.
For many years, researchers and educators have been concerned about achievement scores but seemed less interested in students’ happiness and psychological well-being at school. However, students’ psychological well-being experiences may facilitate students’ adjustment and ultimately lead to academic achievement. It can be assumed that students’ different motivational and well-being experiences in each course would contribute to students’ overall psychological well-being. The purpose of this study was to investigate how and why students experience different levels and kinds of motivation and well-being across courses. As the preliminary and important ground to allow me to address this purpose, I needed to establish first whether students experienced different levels of academic motivation and course well-being across the courses they were taking. A total of 505 students participated in this study and provided information about 1817 courses they were taking. The participants come from a subject pool of one department that attracted students from diverse majors. Multilevel modeling was used to explore different situational (Level 1) and personal experiences (Level 2) of motivation and course well-being across courses and across students. The unconditional model showed variability of perceptions at Levels 1 and 2 indicating that students did vary in their reports across courses and that nevertheless, there were individual differences across students in their aggregate experiences. The conditional model was used to test what course characteristics were associated with motivational and well-being indicators at the situational level. Course characteristics were taken from different constructs: course value, classroom structure, teacher characteristics, classroom goal structure, and a caring classroom climate. Predictors at the personal level included students’ sex and their perceptions of general needs for relatedness, general relatedness need fulfillment in everyday life, and personal growth. Having supported the preliminary hypothesis with the unconditional model that there was variance both within student and between students, I used the conditional model and found that various course characteristics were differently associated with academic motivation and course well-being. Overall, results addressed that teacher characteristics and a caring classroom climate were strongly associated with all the different kinds of motivational and course well-being indicators. Students’ personal characteristics were, also, differently related to these outcomes.
The importance of social relatedness needs in interest development : applying self-determination theory to the four-phase model of interest
(2019-11-21) Miesner, Ella K.; Schallert, Diane L.
Interest is a term often associated with satisfaction and fulfillment in both career and leisure, as well as being a key factor in both formal and informal education. Although abundant literature exists related to the topic of interest, the field has been hampered by a lack of a clear definition of what interest means and the failure to explain how interest develops in an individual. In this paper, I review the use of the four-phase model of interest, proposed by Hidi and Renninger (2006) to describe the stages of interest development. I then propose that the internal force that propels the progression of an individual between stages of interest can be explained using the framework provided by basic needs satisfaction suggested in self-determination theory (SDT). I expand on the relationship between fulfillment of the need for social relatedness in the context of student-teacher interactions and explain how the student-teacher relationship can be effectively utilized to promote interest development. In a conclusion section, I propose pedagogical applications of social relatedness as a vehicle for teachers to help students generate well-developed interests, before suggesting future avenues for research.
To have, or to feel like having : the effect of psychological ownership on consumer well-being
(2018-10-08) Li, Dan, active 21st century; Atkinson, Lucinda; ; Drumwright, Minette; Scheinbaum, Angeline; Pounders, Kate; Raghunathan, Raj
This dissertation is among one of the first to introduce the concept of psychological ownership (Jussila, Tarkiainen, Sarstedt, and Hair, 2015) into consumer well-being research. Previous studies explored how “having” something makes people happy, but they all tend to view “having” as a state of legal ownership over the objects, and neglect the role of psychological ownership. According to self-determination theory, the author suggests that psychological ownership has a stronger impact on happiness than legal ownership, because the routes to psychological ownership satisfy the basic psychological needs including competence, autonomy, and relatedness. Through three experiments, the results show: 1) consumers feel happier when they have a higher psychological ownership over an item, e.g. a book rent form a library, regardless of whether they legally own the item. This effect is mediated by the satisfaction of basic psychological needs; 2) consumers anticipate greater happiness from a product that they customized as a gift either for themselves or for their friends. This effect is mediated by increased psychological ownership towards the gift through customization; 3) experiential framing of marketing messages influence consumers’ psychological ownership positively towards the advertised product, which in turn generates greater anticipated happiness. Theoretically, this dissertation contributes to the literature by providing an enhanced understanding of consumer happiness by uncovering the role of psychological ownership in the buying process. Practically, the study will help marketers make their products/services as a better candidate for the target of psychological ownership through message design and user experience design. The research on psychological ownership in consumer well-being is still in infancy. Future research should examine the effect of psychological ownership on sustainable consumer behaviors including reducing overconsumption, encouraging recycling, and promoting sharing economy as ways to enhance well-being.
Utilization of self-determination theory to improve medical student outcomes
(2021-05-06) Berkovsky, Emmalie Raye; Muenks, Katherine
Medical students often face issues with their mental health and the academic rigor of classes and clerkships while working towards their Doctor of Medicine. To help support student motivation, self-determination theory can be utilized. Self-determination theory principles can help support medical student mental health and academic success. Instructors can also utilize self-determination theory principles to support student motivation. Self-determination theory suggests that autonomy, belonging (or relatedness), and competence are fundamental psychological needs of students. Instructors can design clerkships in ways that can support these needs, leading to improved student outcomes