Tim Urdan

Santa Clara University | SCU · Department of Psychology

Motivation science has advanced tremendously in the past decade. However, it is now clear that future progress is going to be stalled by the extent of disagreement among motivation scientists to some basic, yet controversial, questions. To help move motivation science toward greater coherence, the editors recruited prominent scholars to debate thei...

Motivation science has advanced tremendously in the past decade. However, it is now clear that future progress is going to be stalled by the extent of disagreement among motivation scientists to some basic, yet controversial, questions. To help move motivation science toward greater coherence, the editors recruited prominent scholars to debate thei...

Background and Context Differences in children’s and adolescents’ initial attitudes about computing and other STEM fields may form during middle school and shape decisions leading to career entry. Early emerging differences in career interest may propagate a lack of diversity in computer science and programming fields. Objective Though middle scho...

One of the major tasks of adolescence is to integrate the different aspects of identity into a coherent sense of self. Prior research has found that under certain circumstances, students who identify as members of groups about which there are negative stereotypes can experience a disassociation between their academic identity (i.e., academic self-c...

Hand-raising is an everyday student behavior during classroom discourse. The present study investigates hand-raising as an observable indicator of behavioral engagement and its relation to student achievement. We examine students’ hand-raising behavior during a videotaped lesson in high school classrooms (N = 266 students). Results from multilevel...

Quickly after its introduction in the early 1980′s, achievement goal theory blossomed into one of the most popular frameworks in motivation research. Over three plus decades, the theory evolved in a number of ways. Some of these developments brought about much-needed conceptual and methodological clarity; but, they also involved a shift away from q...

A strong anti-immigrant and anti-refugee sentiment permeates the political discourse in the United States and many Western European countries. This political discourse, along with policies designed to limit immigration, is likely to influence the academic motivation of students from immigrant groups. In this chapter, we consider how anti-immigrant...

The lack of diversity in computing is a well-known issue. This poster is a work-in-progress report on Curated Pathways to Innovation (CPI), a web-based tool which gathers existing online resources for computer science (CS) engagement and learning to allow students to learn more about CS careers and content, with a particular focus on improving part...

In this article, we review research that has examined the association between race, ethnicity, culture, and student motivation. We begin by describing potential problems regarding how race, ethnicity, and culture are defined in research. Next, we review some of the methods that have been used to examine the associations among race, ethnicity, cultu...

Self-efficacy refers to the beliefs individuals hold about their capabilities to carry out the specific tasks they undertake in their lives (Bandura, 1977). A belief in one’s efficacy typically leads to successful action; a doubt typically leads to failure or inaction. Individuals form their efficacy beliefs by interpreting direct and vicarious exp...

Multiple methods were used to examine the academic motivation and cultural identity of a sample of college undergraduates. The children of immigrant parents (CIPs, n = 52) and the children of non-immigrant parents (non-CIPs, n = 42) completed surveys assessing core cultural identity, valuing of cultural accomplishments, academic self-concept, valui...

The achievement goal framework and theory has emerged as one of the most prominent and heavily researched area within motivation research. Achievement goals refer to the cognitive representations of desired, competence-related outcomes in achievement contexts and have generally been divided into mastery and performance goals. This article begins wi...

The aim of this study was twofold: (a) to examine student perceptions of their parent goals and their achievement goal orientations across adolescence, and (b) to examine how perceived parent goals relate to student achievement goal orientations, and engagement in the classroom (both emotional and behavioral) from early to late adolescence. A set o...

Research examining family influences on student motivation and achievement in school has generally focused on parental influences and has often been limited to one or two variables (e.g., parental expectations or aspirations, parental involvement in schoolwork). In the present study we interviewed high school seniors to examine whether and how fami...

Psychologists and educators have often conceptualized motivation as an individual difference variable, something that some students simply have more of than other students. This view of motivation can underestimate contextual influences. In this article we consider how characteristics of the school and classroom may influence student motivation, as...

Despite decades of research on achievement goals, there is still relatively little known about differences among individuals in their conceptualizations of performance goals and reasons for pursuing them in academic settings. The purpose of the present investigation was to use participants' own words, rather than survey measures or experimental man...

Over the past ten or so years a number of universities have restructured their freshmen engineering cornerstone course to move away from a straight lecture format toward a more engaging, hands-on, real-life approach. While this has often involved a major commitment of funds and faculty time, much can be achieved with a more moderate use of financia...

The introduction of the psychological construct of self-efficacy is widely acknowledged as one of the most important developments in the history of psychology. Today, it is simply not possible to explain phenomena such as human motivation, learning, self-regulation, and accomplishment without discussing the role played by self-efficacy beliefs. In...

Two studies were conducted to examine how students perceive and interpret achievement goal messages in the classroom. The first study, using observational and interview methodologies in four classrooms, found that goals are rarely explicitly discussed by teachers or students in the classroom, and that teachers often provide mixed and contradictory...

The purposes of this study were to examine the predictors and achievement consequences of academic self-handicapping and to explore cultural variations in the pursuit and effects of performance goals and perceived classroom performance goal structures. Data were collected in 2 consecutive academic years from a diverse sample of high school students...

There is agreement that fostering K-12 students’ critical thinking is a worthwhile endeavor. However, many educators would agree that there are students in their class-rooms who are able to think well but often choose not to utilize those skills. Little is known about the critical thinking dispositions of elementary and secondary students. This art...

Despite a recent increase in research on the associations between classroom goal structures, motivation, affect, and achievement, little is known about the effects of changes in the perceived classroom goal structure as students move from one grade level to another. Comparisons of students who perceived an increase, decrease, or no change in the ma...

Without Abstract

Some students put off studying until the last minute, fool around the night before a test, and otherwise reduce effort so that if their subsequent performance is low, these circumstances will be seen as the cause rather than lack of ability. These strategies are called self-handicapping because they often undermine performance. In this paper, we be...

This study extends previous research on the relations among students' personal achievement goals, perceptions of the classroom goal structure, and reports of the use of self-handicapping strategies. Surveys, specific to the math domain, were given to 484 7th-grade students in nine middle schools. Personal performance-avoid goals positively predicte...

There is a large and growing body of research that has examined the motivational, cognitive, affective, and behavioral consequences of holding a particular goal orientation. The purpose of this chapter is to take a closer look at the research and issues regarding the contextual factors that affect the goals students pursue in a given situation or c...

The Patterns of Adaptive Learning Scales (PALS) were designed as measures of achievement goals and other motivational constructs in educational settings. The scales have been developed and refined over time by a group of researchers using goal orientation theory to examine the relation between the learning environment and students’ motivation, affe...

The Patterns of Adaptive Learning Scales (PALS) were designed as measures of achievement goals and other motivational constructs in educational settings. The scales have been developed and refined over time by a group of researchers using goal orientation theory to examine the relation between the learning environment and students’ motivation, affe...

For some adolescents, the beliefs, values, and behavioral expectations at home and at school are in conflict, and negotiating the boundaries between these two contexts is difficult. We administered surveys, including a scale assessing perceptions of home-school dissonance, to an ethnically diverse sample of students (N = 475) in the 5th grade in el...

Achievement goal theory has emerged as a major new direction in motivational research. A distinction is made among conceptually different achievement goal orientations including the goal to develop ability (task goal orientation), the goal to demonstrate ability (ability-approach goal orientation), and the goal to avoid the demonstration of lack of...

Some students purposefully use self-handicapping strategies (e.g., procrastinating, fooling around, getting involved in many activities) so that these circumstances, rather than lack of ability, will be seen as the cause if subsequent performance is low. The aim of the present study was to determine whether we could reliably assess fifth-grade stud...

Students' attitudes and preparation practices regarding standardized tests were studied with students from one elementary school and two middle schools in Atlanta (Georgia). There were 111 fifth graders (35 African American and 76 European American) and 274 eighth graders (204 African American and 70 European American). Students completed a survey...

Examined the relations among 260 8th grade students' achievement goals and the orientation of students' friends toward academic effort and achievement. Four types of students' achievement goals, 2 friendship orientation scales, students' gender, and their GPA from 4 core academic areas were examined. Regression analysis revealed that associating wi...

An achievement goal theory framework was used to examine the relations among goals and a number of other motivational constructs in a sample of middle school students. Participants were 189 eighth graders from a public school in the south. In one session students completed the attitude measures and in another session they completed a mathematics pe...

In a sample of 296 8th-grade middle school students, the authors examined the role of personal achievement goals and feelings of school belonging in mediating the relation between perceptions of the school psychological environment and school-related beliefs, affect, and achievement. Sequential regression analyses indicated that perceiving a task g...

It has been suggested that some students procrastinate, fool around, reduce effort, and use other self-handicapping strategies so that if subsequent performance is low, these circumstances will be seen as the cause. Surveys were given to 112 8th graders. The handicapping items formed a single factor with good internal consistency. Handicapping was...

Subjected the Mathematics Anxiety Scale (MAS) to exploratory factor analysis. Ss included 1,047 undergraduates, high school students, and middle school students (585 girls, 462 boys). Results demonstrate that the MAS provides a reliable assessment of mathematics anxiety, particularly among older students. Two related factors underlay the scale. One...

Recently, attention has been focused on the strategies children use in school to portray themselves as able to others. By procrastinating, allowing others to keep them from studying, deliberately not trying, and using other "self-handicapping" strategies, students can convey that those circumstances, rather than lack of ability, are the reasons for...

Research on academic achievement motivation has increasingly focused on students’ goals. Most of that research has focused on two particular types of achievement goals: task goals and ability goals. In this review, we propose that a more thorough understanding of motivation and achievement in schools can be developed if we examine social goals—defi...

In this article, some of the particular issues relevant to changing middle level schools were examined. Recent research has increasingly examined the educational needs of early adolescent students, and school reforms frequently have been called for Often, these calls for reform have not been accompanied by careful consideration of the many factors,...

Meaningful change is possible only when supported by leadership at the classroom, school, district, and state levels. University of Michigan's Coalition Project was designed to change the motivational culture of a middle school by realigning schoolwide policies and practices with desired changes (emphasis on effort, improvement, and mastery) in the...

As standardized achievement testing has increased in frequency and importance over the past few decades, researchers have begun to examine the validity of test scores more closely. The way that teachers prepare their students for taking these tests, as well as things they do while their students take the tests, influence students' scores and the va...

Dissertation (Ph.D.)--University of Michigan.

In this dissertation I attempt to extend research on motivation within a goal theory framework in three ways. First, I demonstrate the need to consider the interface of social relationships and goals in goal theory research. Second, I make distinctions between three goals that have often been confounded (extrinsic, relative ability, and adult appro...

A primary objective of this study was to examine the relations among students' perceptions of the classroom goal orientation as ability-focused goals and their own goals, as well as the relationships between these two components and other motivational factors such as subject-specific self-efficacy and task value. An additional purpose was to determ...

Describes approaches for solving the problem of students' declining motivation and performance when they move to middle-level schools. Urges educators to examine school policies, practices, and procedures, and to make changes that will make it very clear to students that effort, challenge, improvement, and mastery are the goals of schooling. (16 re...

When designing units for instruction teachers must integrate information from several types of knowledge bases, for instance, information about subject specific pedagogy (pedagogical content knowledge), general pedagogy, the subject-matter (content knowledge), and learners (including their developmental level and prior knowledge). We at the Univers...