Motivation and Affect in Education: Understanding the Nature and Influences

2. Chapter 11 Motivation and Affect

3. The Nature of Motivation

4. Motivation • Directs behavior toward particular goals • Leads to increased effort and energy • Increases initiation of, and persistence in, activities • Enhances cognitive processing • Determines what consequences are reinforcing and punishing

5. General Principles • All children and adolescents are motivated in one way or another. • Motivation to do well in school is grounded in a variety of cognitive and sociocultural factors that evolve over time. • Classroom conditions play a major role in students’ motivation to learn and achieve • situated motivation

6. Motivation • Extrinsic motivators • factors external to the individual • factors unrelated to the task • good grades, money, recognition • Intrinsic motivators • factors within the individual • factors inherent in the task • pleasure, developing a valued skill, ethically and morally the right thing to do

7. Basic Human Needs

8. Basic Human Needs • Arousal • basic need for stimulation • Competence and Self-Worth • ability to deal effectively with environment • Self-Determination • sense of autonomy • Relatedness • need to feel socially connected, to secure others’ love and respect

9. Hierarchy of Needs: Maslow Self-actualization Esteem Love and belonging Safety Physiological deficiency needs growth need

10. Cognitive Factors in Motivation

11. Interest • Form of intrinsic motivation • Situational interest • evoked by something in immediate environment • Personal interest • personal preferences • relatively stable over time

12. Expectancies & Values • Expectancy = expectation for success • Influenced by • prior history of success/failure • perceived difficulty of task • availability of resources and support • quality of instruction • necessary effort

13. Expectancies & Values • Value = perceived benefit of task • Influenced by • importance • utility • interest • cost

14. Goals • Achievement goals • mastery • performance • performance-approach • performance-avoidance • Work-avoidance/Doing-just-enough goals • Social goals • Long-term life goals • Career goals

15. Attributions for Success/Failure • Locus • internal versus external • successes = internal causes (smart) • failures = external causes (teacher doesn’t like) • Stability • stable versus unstable • Controllability • controllable versus uncontrollable • consistent failure = stable, uncontrollable, internal factor: low ability

16. Attributions Influence… • Learners’ emotional reactions to success and failure • Expectations for future success and failure • Effort and persistence • Learning strategies and classroom performance

17. Developmental Trends • With age, children distinguish between effort and ability • incremental vs. entity view of intelligence • mastery orientation vs. learned helplessness

18. Teacher Expectations • Remember that teachers make a difference. • Look for strengths in every student. • Consider multiple explanations for low achievement, classroom misbehavior. • Communicate optimism about what students can accomplish. • Objectively assess students’ progress.

19. Teacher Expectations • Attribute successes to high ability and controllable factors. • Attribute successes to effort only if effort is considerable. • Attribute failures to controllable, easily remedied factors. • When students fail despite obvious effort, attribute failures to lack of effective strategies; help them acquire such strategies.

20. Affect and Its Effects

21. Affect • Emotions, general moods that a learner brings to bear on a task • Psychological elements • subjective feelings • Physiological elements • changes in heart rate, perspiration, muscular tension

22. Affect & Motivation • People act in ways they think will help them feel happy and comfortable. • Self-conscious emotions affect self-worth. • Intrinsic motivation is related to pleasure. • Boredom results from lack of stimulation and arousal.

23. Affect & Cognition • Hot cognition • learners associate specific topics with certain emotions • can be evoked by information that conflicts with what learners currently know or believe • cognitive dissonance, disequilibrium

24. Anxiety in the Classroom • Feelings of uneasiness and apprehension concerning a situation with an uncertain outcome • state anxiety (temporary) • trait anxiety (chronic) • Facilitating vs. debilitating anxiety • improves vs. hinders performance

25. Sources of Anxiety • Physically threatening situations • Situations that threaten self-worth • Physical appearance • A new situation • Judgment or evaluation by others • Frustrating subject matter • Excessive classroom demands • Classroom tests • The future

26. Diversity in Motivation & Affect • Cultural and ethnic differences • all children have basic needs in common; how they satisfy those needs may vary • need for affiliation may vary, as may the amount of encouragement for academic achievement • stereotype threat may be present

27. Diversity in Motivation & Affect • Gender differences • girls are more concerned with doing well • girls are more likely to have high need for affiliation • girls express emotions more openly, except anger • girls are more anxious about classroom performance

28. Diversity in Motivation & Affect • SES • lower-income students have more stress • may have less effective strategies, self-regulation skills • Students with special needs • greatest diversity in motivation • may have difficulty meeting needs for relatedness

29. The Big Picture

30. The Big Picture • Motivation energizes, directs, and sustains behavior. • Several basic needs seem to drive much of human behavior. • Many forms of motivation have both cognitive and sociocultural elements. • The emotions and general moods that learners bring to bear on a task—collectively known as affect—are closely intertwined with motivation.