Self-Efficacy: "People's judgements of their capabilities to organize and execute courses of action required to attain designated types of performances (Bandura '86) (Schunk, 1991)
Predicts Outcomes
academic achievement
social skills
smoking cessation
pain management
career choices
recovery from heart attack
sales performance
Related Constructs
Perceived control: self-efficacy + outcome expectations
Expectations/values: behavior as a joint function of outcome expectation and the extent to which they value outcomes
Attributions: perceived causes of outcomes
Self-concept: self-perceptions formed by experiences, reinforcements, and evaluations
From the Research (Best Practices}
Goal setting: initial sense of self-efficacy affects motivation; goals must be proximal, specific, and rigorous
Information processing: A higher sense of efficacy leads to higher student performance in learning
Models: Teachers and peers ability to do something affects the learners self-efficacy (vicarious effects)
Attributional feedback: Students respond better to feedback about prior achievement than they do about potential achievement.
Rewards: Rewards that were performance-contingent were more beneficial than those that were participatory
Reward Effects on Intrinsic Motivation
(Deci, Koestner, and Ryan, 2001)
Cognitive Evaluation Theory: rewards can undermine intrinsic motivation
Positive verbal feedback: can enhance intrinsic motivation in college students (even more so than in school-age children), as long as the interpersonal context is not controlling.
Tangible and expected rewards: undermine intrinsic motivation because they are controlling... people work on a task and expect to get (or not get) a reward
Tangible and unexpected rewards: do not have as big an undermining effect on intrinsic motivation because people are not controlled by the reward (because they do not know it exists)
Dull tasks: Rewards do not undermine intrinsic motivation for "dull" tasks because there is little intrinsic motivation in the first place; they also do not enhance intrinsic motivation
If people continually tell me that I am good at my job, and I receive a raise, my self-concept will increase too.
If I attribute everything that happens to me to someone or something else, that is learned helplessness and will negatively affect self-efficacy.
If I am given an "impossible" task to complete and not given the proper resources, I have little perceived control, and my outcome expectations and self-efficacy will decrease.
If I believe I cannot complete a task, and I do not care about that task at all, it will likely negatively affect my self-efficacy.