Motivation and Cognition
References:
Schunk, D. (1991). Self-efficacy and academic motivation. Educational Psychologist, 26(3&4), 207-231.
Deci, E., Koestner, R., & Ryan, R. (2001). Extrinsic rewards and intrinsic motivation in education: Reconsidered once again. Review of Educational Research, 71(1), 1-27.
Sets out to review recent meta-analysis and validate findings that extrinsic rewards undermine intrinsic motivation.
Rewards & Motivation
Cameron & Pierce (1994): overall rewards do not increase intrinsic motivation; incentives should be avoided
Reflection: I want to look into this a little further. I can see this as being the case for high performers. Lower performers, especially those with a less permeable ego, might need incentives as an impetus to engage in the practice, rehearsal and retrieval process. Let's not forget that things like reading are HARD. And we don't always want to do the HARD thing...that's called being human, for better or for worse. Yes, ideally, we would want learners to want to learn for the joy of learning. Some students find this joy much, much later - and we need to throw them a bone. Life is hard enough. (~end rant~)
called on the carpet for flawed conclusions (Kohn, 1996; Lepper, et al, 1996; Ryan & Deci, 1996); inappropriate procedures (Deci et al, 2001)
Cognitive Evaluation Theory (CET): underlying intrinsic motivation are the innate psychological needs for competence and self-determination
effects of extrinsic on intrinsic = "function of how these events influence a person's perceptions of competence and self-determination," (Deci et al, 2001, p. 3).
positive correlation of self-determination
Verbal Rewards/Positive Feedback
Explicit positive performance feedback
people may do the act just to hear the praise which may undermine the intrinsic motivation
could lead to controlling interpersonal context
Tangible Rewards: frequently offered to people to induce behaviors in which they wouldn't normally engage. Reflection: this is what I was alluding to above
Task-noncontingent rewards: require doing/completing target activity
task-contingent rewards: do not require engaging, but are given for some other reason. Reflection: I need an example of this. Nothing immediately sprang to mind as I read this description.
Task-contingent rewards: require doing or completing the target activity
Performance-contingent rewards: require performing the activity well to the standard or better. Interpersonal context comes into play here
engagement-contingent rewards: engage in activity but not need to complete it
completion-contingent rewards: requires completion of a targeted task
Method:hierarchical analyses of metadata from 128 experiments
Results
Effects of all Rewards: tangible rewards decrease, verbal rewards increase intrinsic motivation; effects of all rewards across major studies = significant undermining of free choice behavior
Unexpected Rewards and Task Noncontingent Rewards
verbal rewards are often unexpected, so may be why the do not have a negative effect. Reflection: this seems to be a case for intermittent reinforcement
Unexpected = no negative affect on intrinsic motivation
task engagement = no effect
Engagement Contingent & Completion Rewards: (identical fidings) significantly diminished intrinsic motivation. Reflection: This makes sense...why would the learner engage if not getting the reward...
Taskcontingent rewards: undermined intrinsic motivation
Performance-contingent rewards: Reflection: studies didn't include partial rewards based on merit, so how can we be sure this is a true representation of the population?
Overall Reflection:There absolutely is something to be said for intrinsic motivation, but who says that has to be the end all? From a constructivist perspective, yes, I can see intrinsic motivation being the driving force. However, people who are extrinsically motivated (say to earn a living to support their family) can still learn and become successful citizens. And isn't that the goal of learning/education? We want performance and production, right?
When I was a beginning K-12 teacher, I certainly was big on intrinsic motivation is what we want to instill in learners....against everything else. However, with some more life and work experience under my belt, I almost feel I was such a proponent of intrinsic motivation as superior...because I am intrinsically motivated when it comes to school. I love school, and always said I wanted to be a lifelong learner/student (check). However, PLENTY of people with other motivation orientations that might not like school at all, are successful (and by some standards more successful than me). So, I just think we need to re-examine this notion of superiority.
Self-efficacy: an individual's judgments on their capabilities to perform given actions (Schunk, 1991)
evidence it predicts: academic achievments, social skills, smoking cessation, pain tolerance, athletic performance, career choices, assertiveness, coping with feared events, etc.
Antecedents and Consequences
if low self efficacy, may avoid the task
Initial self-efficacy varies as a function of aptitude
Reflection: I would argue this is actually a function of one's meta-cognition and awareness of their aptitude
Perceived control: locus of control, learned helplessness (perceived independence between responses and outcomes)
Bandura (1977): self-efficacy as capacity to control performance in taxing situations. seminole article
Expectations and Values: people make assumptions about the likelihood of attaining goals in given situations; "Self-efficacy theory differs from expectancy-value formulations in its emphasis on students' beliefs concerning their capabilities to learn and effectively employ the skills and knowledge necessary to attain the valued outcomes," (p. 211)
Attributions: perceived causes of outcomes --> assumes that people seek to explain the causes of major events (ability, effort, task difficulty, etc.). Reflection: And some of people seem to vary along the continuum from fatalist to optimistic.
Self-concept: global construct of self-efficacy and other concepts of the self.
Bandura (1986) "general measures of psychological function cannot predict with accuracy what people will do in specific situations," (p. 212) Reflection: This is quite important in criminology/law.
Reflection: The Research Methods section of this article mentioned that most of the self-efficacy studies were done via quantitative methods. While I can understand this, I'm also surprised....it is such a nuanced construct, multilayered and related to other notions of self. I'm surprised that more qualitative approaches have not been favored.