Maladaptive achievement patterns: a test of a diathesis-stress analysis of helplessness.

The present study tested the assumptions, derived from a diathesis-stress model, that students' perceptions of autonomy-support in their classroom produce a relatively intrinsic as opposed to extrinsic motivational approach to academic tasks and that this approach, in turn, predicts qualitatively different responses to uncontrollable events. It was further assumed that students' motivational orientation would be more reliable than attributional style or perceptions of competence in predicting achievement patterns, including performance level after failure, use of adaptive attributions, and overall achievement scores. Results supported these predictions and further demonstrated, in longitudinal analyses, that motivational orientation may contribute to the formation of perceptions of competence and attributional style in students.

Children's preference for challenge: the role of perceived competence and control.

This research tested the hypothesis that children's perceptions of academic competence and their personal control over school-related performance affects subsequent intrinsic interest and preference for challenge in an evaluative setting. In a correlational study, children's self-reported perceptions of academic competence and personal control were found to relate positively to their intrinsic interest in schoolwork and preference for challenging school activities. A subset of this sample was exposed to varying levels of a controlling directive, and preference for challenge was assessed behaviorally during a free-choice period in which subjects were unaware that they were being observed. As predicted, the data indicated that when given the evaluative, controlling directive, children who had high perceptions of academic competence and control preferred a greater challenge than did children whose perceptions were low on these measures. No difference between groups in terms of preference for challenge was evident when no controlling directive was presented. These findings are discussed in terms of theories of intrinsic motivation and potential processes that underly these effects.

Use of the maximal-operant principle to motivate children's intrinsic interest.

The present research examined the hypothesis that in contrast to theory and research indicating that tangible reward decreases subsequent interest in enjoyable academic activities, rewards are perceived by adults as effective techniques to maximize long- and short-term subsequent interest for academic tasks of both high and low initial interest level. The results of our first three studies demonstrated that college students and parents view tangible reward as more effective than other less controlling techniques to enhance intrinsic motivation and value rewards more for intrinsically interesting academic behaviors in comparison with others (e.g., prosocial behaviors). Our fourth study supported the hypothesis that adults do not subscribe to the minimal-sufficiency analysis of increasing intrinsic motivation but prefer a maximal-operant principle in which the likelihood of producing long-term interest in academic tasks is assumed to vary positively with the size of a reward. Our fifth and sixth studies investigated illusory correlation as one mechanism that may perpetuate beliefs about the assumed positive relation between tangible reward and intrinsic interest in academic tasks.

Enhancing interest in peer interaction: a developmental analysis.

Using an intrinsic motivation paradigm, the effects of providing different reasons for interacting with a peer were examined in terms of children's subsequent interest in playing with the other child. Children (5 1/2, 7, and 9 years old) were randomly assigned to 1 of 3 conditions and provided with identical information about a child presented on a television monitor (that he was nice and had a new Lego game). In the experimental conditions, children were then asked if they wanted to play with the peer either "because he has a new game" (situational information) or "because he's real nice" (dispositional information). The results indicated that, for the 9-year-olds, the dispositional/intrinsic information enhanced subsequent intrinsic interest in the peer relative to the control condition, while the situational information undermined later interest. In contrast, for the younger age groups, the situational information increased interest in peer interaction for the younger age groups in comparison to the control condition, while the dispositional information did not differ from control. The findings are discussed in terms of potential processes underlying these effects.

Performance and motivational deficits of helplessness: the role of motivational orientations.

The present study examined the hypothesis that the effect of failure feedback in producing learned helplessness would depend on the motivational orientation of a child. Extrinsically motivated children were predicted to exhibit performance decrement following a failure experience, whereas the opposite was predicted for intrinsically motivated children. In addition, success feedback was predicted to enhance subsequent performance only for the intrinsic group. Following success, failure, or no feedback on an activity reflecting spatial skills (an incomplete picture task), subjects' performance on an activity tapping different skills (i.e., anagrams) provided by a second experimenter served as the primary measure of helplessness. Subjects' intrinsic motivation in performing the incomplete picture task, a similar task (embedded figures) and a dissimilar task (dots-to-dots) was also examined. The results supported the predictions on both performance and intrinsic motivation measures. The results are discussed in terms of implications for learned helplessness as well as cognitive evaluation theories.