Exploring three motivation-related constructs: achievement values, goal orientation and interest - Wigfield & Cambria - 2010 - Article

Social cognitive models state that the beliefs, achievement values, goals and interests of an individual have a big influence on someone’s’ motivation and achievements. This article reviews achievement values, goal orientation and interest of students as major constructs. Previous research has often looked into one of these constructs, but it is thought that it is also important to look at the constructs together to understand the development of motivation in children.

The three constructs

1. Achievement values: there are several definitions of the word value. Some say it is just a belief, others think it is a motivational force. Achievement motivation has mostly been looked at from an expectancy-value perspective. This perspective was first described by Atkinson and stated that achievement behaviours are determined by achievement motives, expectancies for success (how likely are you to succeed on a certain task?) and incentive values (how attracted are you to succeeding on a certain task?). More recent expectancy-value models differ somewhat from the original theory. They still link performance to an individual’s task value beliefs, but in a broader way. This means it isn’t limited to a certain task, but to the psychological, cultural and social domain in a broader sense. Eccles et al. hypothesized that expectancies and values are influenced by task-specific beliefs. This could, for example, be how you perceive your own competence related to a specific task. These perceptions are influenced by what we think other people expect from us and how they perceive us.

   According to Eccles et al., there are four components of achievement task values: attainment value or importance (wanting to do well on a specific task), intrinsic of interest value (are you enjoying the task?), utility value or usefulness of the task (will you need this task in the future?) and costs (what are you giving up to perform the task?). Costs are especially important in making choices. Another expectancy-value theory was developed by Pekrun, the control-value theory. He separated three kinds of expectancy beliefs: situation-outcome expectancies (will the situation produce an outcome?), action-outcome expectancies (beliefs on the consequences of one’s own actions) and action-control expectancies (beliefs in your ability to succeed in a certain task). Pekrun also separated intrinsic values of outcome from extrinsic values. Intrinsic values cover one’s enjoyment of succeeding in a task, extrinsic values are more instrumental.

   According to Pekrun, motivation starts with the appraisal of the value of a given outcome. If the appraisal is positive, an individual starts to form situation-outcome expectancies, action-outcome expectancies and action-control expectancies. Motivation is formed through an interplay between these constructs. Some research on self-concept has focused on the relations between self-concept and the importance that someone attaches to different activities and their interest in these activities. It is thought that competence in valued areas has the biggest correlation with self-esteem, and not competence in general.

2. Goal orientation: earlier research has separated three goal orientations that students can have toward their learning processes. The first orientation is also known as mastery goal orientation and states that children focus themselves on learning new skills. The second orientation is performance or ego orientation, in which the child focuses on ways to maximize positive evaluations and minimize negative evaluations of their competence. The third orientation is avoidant goal orientation, which includes the perception that a child doesn’t want to engage in academic activities. Within goal orientations, approach and avoid components are differentiated. Performance-approach goals consists of the desire of students to demonstrate their competence. Performance-avoidance goals consists of the desire to avoid looking incompetent. Ford et al. used the approach and avoidance dichotomy in their Motivational System Theory. This theory examined how personal goals, beliefs and context influences one’s personal goals. According to Ford, values can also drive goal selection and the effort that is put in one goal. However, values can also be used in terms of an evaluation of success and failures for an individual.

3. Interests: according to some researchers, interest is a key motivational force in education. The term interest can be explained as a relation between a specific activity and an individual, which includes affective and cognitive components. Environmental factors also can heighten or diminish interest. Interest can be separated into personal interest and situational interest. A personal interest is relatively stable, while a situational interest is an emotional state that has been aroused by specific task features. Another distinction made between different valences or affects is feeling-related valances and object-related valances. Feeling-related valances are feelings associated with an object or situation itself. On the other hand, value-related valances, refer to attributing personal significance or importance to an object.

Measuring the three constructs

1. Achievement task values: there are several measures for achievement task values. The most direct one is to ask children how much they value different academic subjects and non-academic activities. To measure students’ motivational beliefs and use of self-regulated learning strategies, the Motivated Strategies for Learning Questionnaire (MSLQ) can be used. Another way of measuring task value is asking a student to nominate other students who they admire the most and who they would want to be like. This gives direct indications of a students’ achievement values.

2. Goal orientation: one of the first measures of goal orientation was a questionnaire on the assessment of task orientation, ego orientation and work avoidance. Another measurement on goal orientation is the Pattern of Adapted Learning Scale (PALS) to assess motivation and perceptions of classroom goal structure. More recently, the Achievement Goal Questionnaire was developed to assess mastery and performance approach and avoidance goals. Goals achievement was herby defined as an aim focusing on the competence.

3. Interest: one of the measures available for interest is the Study Interest Questionnaire (SIQ). This questionnaire assesses, amongst others, academic interests of college students. Both affective value as intrinsic values are part of this scale.

An important note for choosing the measurement for either achievement task values, goal orientation or interest is that these constructions and thereby their measurements show great overlap. Factor analysis might be needed to examine their empirical distinction.

The constructs over time

1. Achievement task values: research has shown that young children already are able to make a distinction between their beliefs in what they are good at and what they value. Young children differentiate in two components, namely interest and utility. As children get older, these components are replaced by attainment value, interest and utility value. Studies have generally found an age-related decline in how children are valuing certain academic tasks and their achievement and effort.

2. Goal orientation: research is suggesting that young children are more mastery-oriented. During the years, the orientation switches to more performance-oriented. Two factors seem to be of an important influence in this development: a personal factor (beliefs about one’s intelligence and abilities) and a contextual factor (different kinds of instructional contexts). Within the personal factor, children can have two beliefs. The first belief, the entity view, makes children think that their abilities are fixed and are therefore more likely to hold performance goals. However, children holding the incremental view think that efforts will make them improve their abilities and usually have mastery goals. It was found that mastery-orientated children engage in mastery behaviour, even though they might not be sure they have what it takes. Performance-oriented children on the other hand only show mastery behaviour if they are sure that they have the right abilities for the task. At school, performance goals are increasingly emphasized with age.

3. Interest: earlier research has found that children in general have universal interests at first, which will become more specific with age. This differentiation in interests might be explained by the fact that with age, children are becoming more aware of what their own strengths and weaknesses are and adjust their interests accordingly. Developmental theories of interests can focus on age groups or on situational and individual interest. When focussing on age groups, it is thought that between the ages 3-8, interests are more gender-specific. Between ages 9-13 the social group becomes more important, leading to interests that are consistent with ones’ social class. Aged 13-14, children start to see themselves in a more abstract concept. This means that they will develop interests in line with their personal identity. When focussing not on age, another four phase model is introduced. Within this model, the first phase consists of situational interests which are elicit by a particular event. The second phase is maintained situational interest, in which a child continues the experience. This phase is usually elicit by instructional conditions. The third phase is called emerging individual interests. This stage occurs when a person is actively looking for an activity in line with their interests. The final phase, well-developed individual interest, the link between the task, affect, values, goals and beliefs is getting stronger.

When looking at education, it has been found that the interest in different school areas declines over the years. This coincides with a decreased attitude toward school, task-value belief and intrinsic motivation. This might be explained by increasing interests in other domains. For some children the decreased attitude toward school becomes problematic. These children can develop a sense of apathy on learning or participating in (school related) activities. Explanations of the development of apathy are generally social, cultural or psychological. For example, if children see their future negatively, they are not likely to engage in social or school activities. It has been thought that competence beliefs and values play an important role in the development of apathy. When a child performs poorly at school, it might start to devaluate the importance of school, in order to keep up their self-esteem.

Besides apathy, another negative form of motivation is work avoidance. Children who are likely to have a work avoidant strategy are also more likely to develop apathy towards school.

Relations to achievement outcomes

It has been known that an expectancy for success and achievement value will predict an achievement outcome. Expectancies are therefore very important for someone to make a choice about whether or not maintaining a specific task. Utility value is another important factor. With age, the costs of participating in an activity also becomes of more importance. When an activity is perceived as having too great a cost, students are less likely to participate.

As noticed before, children that have mastery-orientated goals are more likely to effectively engage in learning and feel an intrinsic motivation to learn. This is way it has been thought that schools should encourage mastery goals orientations, instead of performance goals. Performance goals do have a function. Studies have found that performance-approach goals predict college degrees positively later on in life, and that performance-avoidant goals predict a negative effect. School achievement is also positively related to interest, which is associated with deep-level learning.

Relations between the constructs

Studies on the relations between the different constructs have provided a few major findings. The first finding was that task-values, ability beliefs and goal orientation are empirically distinct. Secondly, task values and self-efficacy are positively related to self-reported self-regulation and cognitive strategy use. It is also negatively related to anxiety. Thirdly, mastery goals and task values relate positively in several domains, including academics. Finally, it was found that performance goals are negatively related to intrinsic and extrinsic values. Over time, it was found that students who are mastery-orientated develop more positive values, self-efficacy and self-regulation. These variables were negatively affected by extrinsic values.

In college students, the need for achievement predicted all but performance-avoidance goals, and fear of failure predicted all but master-approach goals. Also interest and being able to choose courses in line with personal interests have a positive effect on the achievements.

Future research

As studies have shown, the constructs of achievement values, goal orientations and interest have many similarities, but they also have their differences. Comparing studies is complicated, because there isn’t one universal definition of these constructs. Future research should therefore focus on looking deeper into the similarities and differences between these constructs and adjust the available measurements or create new ones. When this is established, it is easier to make theoretical predication concerning the relations between these different constructs. This development will make way for an integration of the three constructs in how this develops over time. Two questions that should be answered are firstly is some constructs, or aspects of the constructs, are more prominent at different developmental phases. The second question is how relations across the constructs may change with age.