Chantal Levesque-Bristol’s research while affiliated with Purdue University West Lafayette and other places

This pre-registered longitudinal study investigated the relations between basic psychological need satisfaction and motivational quality and objective measures of achievement and dropout, to extend principles of self-determination theory in the classroom to modelling of psychological need satisfaction alongside long-term objective academic outcomes. Participants were first-year and fourth-year student teachers in Norway, a demographic known for having high attrition rates. Unexpectedly, we found that autonomous motivation and amotivation were negatively related with achievement, whereas gender (males) and previous grades were positively related with it. Controlled motivation and gender (males) was, conversely, positively related with remaining on the study program. As expected, amotivation was related with dropout. Finally, the effect of autonomous motivation on remaining in education was mediated by basic psychological needs, suggesting that autonomous motivation indirectly reduces dropout through the satisfaction of the basic needs. We discuss the limitations of our study and implications for future research.

Background Large introductory lecture courses are frequently post-secondary students’ first formal interaction with science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) disciplines. Grade outcomes in these courses are often disparate across student populations, which, in turn, has implications for student retention. This study positions such disparities as a manifestation of systemic inequities along the dimensions of sex, race/ethnicity, income, and first-generation status and investigates the extent to which they are similar across peer institutions. Results We examined grade outcomes in a selected set of early STEM courses across six large, public, research-intensive universities in the United States over ten years. In this sample of more than 200,000 STEM course enrollments, we find that course grade benefits increase significantly with the number of systemic advantages students possess at all six institutions. The observed trends in academic outcomes versus advantage are strikingly similar across universities despite the fact that we did not control for differences in grading practices, contexts, and instructor and student populations. The findings are concerning given that these courses are often students’ first post-secondary STEM experiences. Conclusions STEM course grades are typically lower than those in other disciplines; students taking them often pay grade penalties. The systemic advantages some student groups experience are correlated with significant reductions in these grade penalties at all six institutions. The consistency of these findings across institutions and courses supports the claim that inequities in STEM education are a systemic problem, driven by factors that go beyond specific courses or individual institutions. Our work provides a basis for the exploration of contexts where inequities are exacerbated or reduced and can be used to advocate for structural change within STEM education. To cultivate more equitable learning environments, we must reckon with how pervasive structural barriers in STEM courses negatively shape the experiences of marginalized students.

This exploratory study seeks to yield a more complete understanding of preservice teachers’ intentions to enact autonomy support in their future classrooms based on self-determination theory while drawing complementary perspectives from mindset theory. Survey data (N = 237) from preservice teachers at three U.S. Midwestern universities were collected first using well-established measures of intentions to enact autonomy support and its antecedental beliefs and motivations. Structural equation modeling analyses revealed that growth mindset and autonomous orientation shared functional similarities and differences and were associated with intentions to enact autonomy support directly and indirectly through intrinsic motivation for teaching and beliefs about autonomy support. The less studied growth mindset had additive effect. The field journal class assignments (n = 53) from some survey participants were subsequently collected; results complementarily revealed the additional role of growth mindset in intentions to enact autonomy support and control when holding autonomous orientation constant. Finally, the means of all study variables for experienced (n = 99) and novice (n = 138) preservice teachers were compared with 95% confidence intervals. The former had significantly higher autonomous orientation but lower intrinsic motivation. This study is novel in exploring the extent to which growth mindset contributed to intentions to enact autonomy support in a way similar to autonomous orientation yet with additive effect. Major implications for teacher education include placing most emphases in cultivating preservice teachers’ positive beliefs about autonomy support while targeting long-term interventions of promoting autonomous orientation and growth-mindset.

This study examines the relationships among students' perceptions of autonomy, competence, and relatedness, self‐determined motivation, and achievement across two different undergraduate Calculus learning environments at the same institution. Furthermore, it also exposits how learning environments are not culturally or socially neutral by establishing clear evidence that one learning environment offered motivational support and associated achievement gains to specific demographic groups while diminishing motivation and achievement for others. To accomplish this, we applied constructs from Self‐Determination Theory (SDT) within a quasi‐experimental design ( N = 6866), controlling for prior math knowledge, in both Calculus I and Calculus II over seven semesters. We use this information to advance the broad notion of student‐centeredness and identify the role of motivational processes by which undergraduate Calculus learning environments function. We propose using motivational frameworks as a tool for defining and measuring student‐centeredness relative to individual students, or student groups, rather than to students as a monolith.

Aim: The purpose of the study was to investigate whether course transformation teaching strategies using repetitive quizzing and peer-tutor supplemental instruction help enhance students' learning experiences and learning outcomes based on self-determination theory. Background: Undergraduate baccalaureate pharmacology and pathophysiology courses were redesigned as part of a campus-wide course transformation program to promote students' perceptions of learning and academic achievement. Method: Students in the nursing pathopharmacology course participated in the two-time online perception survey (pretest and posttest) and knowledge-based exams. Results: Results revealed that the course transformation implemented to support students' basic psychological needs was significantly associated with both learning outcomes and students' feelings of competence while also decreasing attrition rates. Conclusion: Considering the depth and breadth of pathopharmacology content, the teaching intervention using repetitive quizzing and peer-tutor supplemental instruction may contribute to improving students' understanding of the course content while promoting their competence.

Since 2011, we have engaged in professional development, to foster the creation of autonomy supportive, student-centered, learning environments to enhance students’ learning and success. The IMPACT program has been nationally recognized and featured in the Chronicle of Higher Education in 2018 as one of six innovations poised to change classroom culture and the landscape of higher education. The important innovation, discussed in this chapter, is a focus on human potential and motivation to foster students’ (and instructors’) satisfaction of basic psychological needs. Our work is grounded in self-determination theory (SDT), a theory of human motivation which approaches psychological growth, development, integrity, and wellness from an organismic integration perspective. SDT postulates that humans are naturally curious and strive to connect with people, their environment, with people and their environment by satisfying three basic psychological needs; autonomy, competence, and relatedness. Autonomy supportive instructors meet students’ basic needs by acknowledging and understanding students’ experiences and perspectives. These instructors create engaging and autonomy supportive learning environments which foster students’ learning experiences across many disciplines, including STEM. In fact, the creation of an autonomy supportive environment regardless of the transformation implemented, is the most important and consistent predictor of the motivational and educational outcomes studied.

Although testing is used mainly for assessing student learning, a new teaching strategy called concept-point recovery (CPR) makes testing a learning opportunity for engineering students to review errors and misconceptions. CPR allows students to regain points by reviewing wrong answers and explaining the solution process to the instructor to demonstrate understanding. The aim of this study is to explore students’ perspectives on which aspects of CPR influence their learning experience using self-determination theory (SDT). Four categories were uncovered from the thematic analysis of eleven participants’ interview data: (a) CPR as a tool to gain in-depth understanding; (b) autonomy in a supportive learning environment; (c) a less stressful test-taking environment; and (d) the importance of the instructor’s role. The findings from this study support the literature and suggest that actively engaging engineering students in CPR encouraged them to regulate motivation and strive to learn difficult material.

Background Applied Calculus courses serve hundreds of thousands of undergraduates as quantitative preparation and gatekeepers across diverse fields of study. The current study investigated how motivational factors are associated with students’ learning outcomes in Applied Calculus courses from the perspective of self-determination theory—a sound comprehensive motivation theory that has been supported by considerable research in psychology and education. In order to have a nuanced understanding of students’ motivation and learning in Applied Calculus courses, we used three different types of learning measures to investigate students’ mathematics achievement, including course grades, a standardized knowledge exam, and students’ perceived knowledge transferability. Results We tested the relationships between motivational factors and learning outcomes with a multi-semester sample of 3226 undergraduates from 188 Applied Calculus classrooms. To increase the precision of our analysis, we controlled for three demographic variables that are suggested to be relevant to mathematics achievement: gender, minority group status, and socioeconomic status. With a series of multilevel modeling analyses, the results reveal that: (1) competence satisfaction predicts college students’ mathematics achievement over and above the satisfaction of needs for autonomy and relatedness; and (2) autonomous motivation is a more powerful predictor of college students’ mathematics achievement than controlled motivation and amotivation. These findings are consistent across different types of learning outcomes. Conclusions Self-determination theory provides an effective framework for understanding college students’ motivation and learning in Applied Calculus courses. This study extends self-determination theory in the field of mathematics education and contributes to the dialogue on advancing undergraduate science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) education by providing evidence to understand how motivational factors are associated with students’ learning outcomes in undergraduate mathematics courses.

According to self-determination theory, competence is a basic psychological need that contributes to optimal human functioning and happiness. Classic theories of competence suggest that essential to the conceptualization of competence is the perception of not only “doing well” but also “doing better”, that is, experiencing a sense of stretching one’s limits, gaining new skills and abilities, and improving one’s effectance while interacting with the environment. However, the “doing better” aspect has largely been neglected or undifferentiated from the “doing well” aspect. The goal of the current research is to demonstrate that the “doing better” aspect can be differentiated from the “doing well” aspect. Two sub-studies using American and Chinese samples show preliminary support for the psychometric differentiation (using multidimensional scaling) between these two aspects, and both studies provide consistent support for differential predictive effects of the two aspects on motivation, well-being and growth outcomes. Unexpected findings such as the unique effect of frustrated incremental competence on amotivation are also reported.

Grounded in self-determination theory, the integrative model for learning and motivation examines how student motivational processes link to course outcomes, including perceived knowledge transferability. This investigation sought to evaluate the tenets of the integrative model that link the classroom climate, basic psychological needs satisfaction, and self-regulated motivation to perceived knowledge transferability. Participants included 4385 students (2185 females, 2200 males) enrolled in courses across a variety of disciplines at a large university in the U.S. Midwest. The students completed a cross-sectional survey, and the data analysis process proceeded using factor analytic and structural equation modeling procedures. Results indicate that the data were a good fit for the model, C3(342) = 6691.75, p < .001, RMSEA = .08, SRMR = .05, TLI = .94, CFI = .95. Developing student-centered learning environments is integral to enhancing motivation and perceptions of knowledge transferability through the satisfaction of students’ need for autonomy, competence, and relatedness.