Modeling the Relations Among Students’Epistemological Beliefs, Motivation,Learning Approach, and Achievement

Presenter: Che-Yu LinAdvisor: Ming-Puu ChenDate: 06/15/2009

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Kizilgunes, B., Tekkaya, C. & Sungur, S. (2009). Modeling the relations among students’ epistemological beliefs, motivation, learning approach, and achievement. The Journal of Educational Research, 102(4), 243–255.

Introduction(1/3)• The field of epistemological beliefs has become one of the current

research areas that have drawn the interest of many researchers.• Epistemological beliefs involve learners’ theories about knowing,

the nature of knowledge, and knowledge acquisition.• Paulsen and Feldman (1999) found statistically significant relations

between dimensions of epistemological beliefs and motivational constructs.

• A review of related literature has revealed that student epistemological belief has been linked to a variety of learning outcomes, including academic achievement.

• The main purpose of the present study was to present a working model explaining the relations among epistemological beliefs, learning approaches, achievement motivation, and achievement.

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Introduction(2/3)• Educational research indicates that students’ epistemological

beliefs influence learning approaches and subsequent learning outcomes (Schommer, 1990).

• Tsai (1998) claimed that learners’ scientific epistemological beliefs may shape their metalearning and hence affect their learning approaches.

• Past research has identified two approaches to learning: - meaningful approaches (deep approaches to learning) - rote approaches (surface approaches to learning)

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Epistemological Beliefs and Learning Approach

• Considerable research in education and educational psychology has revealed that motivational variables including goal orientations and self-efficacy are highly related to students’ learning.

• Goal orientation refers to reasons why students engage in a task.• Self-efficacy, which refers to beliefs about capability to learn or

perform effectively, has also been found to be positively related to deep approaches to learning and to more persistence and effort.

• Bandura suggested that students’ motivation, including their self-efficacy, is related to the use of learning strategies that influence academic achievement.

• Sungur (2007) showed that self-efficacy and intrinsic (mastery) goal orientation were positively related to metacognitive strategy use.

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Introduction(3/3)Epistemological Beliefs, Motivation, and Learning Approach

Method(1/2) • Participants were 1,041 sixth-grade elementary school students

(507 girls, 534 boys) with a mean age of 11.5 years (SD = 0.37 years), attending 11 public elementary schools from one large district of Ankara, Turkey.

• Science curricula covered many aspects of biology, chemistry, physics, and geology and were spiraled so that learners were able to build progressively on their understanding of concepts.

• The science lessons extended over four 40-min periods.

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Method(2/2) • We collected four kinds of data from students: - the Classification Concept Things Test (CCT)

A 15-item multiplechoice test, the CCT was developed to assess students’ achievement in the classification concept.

- the Epistemological Beliefs Questionnaire (EBQ) A 26-item Likert-type EBQ was used to assess students’ epistemological

beliefs about the nature of science along four dimensions: source, certainty, development, and justification.

- the Learning Approach Questionnaire (LAQ) The LAQ scale comprised two subscales: learning approach questionnaire–

meaningful (LAQ-M) and the learning approach questionnaire–rote (LAQ-R.

- the Achievement Motivation Questionnaire (AMQ) a 14-item Likert-type instrument comprising three subscales concerning

motivation to learn in the science course: performance-goal orientation, learning-goal orientation, and self-efficacy.

Results(1/4)

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Results(2/4)

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Results(3/4)

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Results(4/4)

Discussion(1/3)

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• One of the findings indicated by path analysis is that epistemological beliefs influence learning approach directly and also indirectly through achievement motivation.

• Learning goal orientation was positively associated with all dimensions of epistemological beliefs except certainty.

• As proposed by self-determination theory (Deci, Vallerand, Pelletier, & Ryan, 1991), students having a sense of control over their learning tend to be more intrinsically motivated.

• Paulsen and Feldman found that students who had the naive belief that knowledge is simple were less likely to

(a) have an intrinsic (learning) goal orientation (b) perceive an internal control over learning (c) feel efficacious about their capacity to learn (d) appreciate the value of learning tasks

Discussion(2/3)• Studying college chemistry majors, Saunders (1998) reported that

students who thought that science is fixed also tended to use rote learning.

• Cavallo et al. (2004) found positive correlations between meaningful learning and learning goals and between rote learning and performance goals.

• Surprisingly, results from the present study showed a negative association between self-efficacy and learning approach.

• The present study’s results suggest that students’ epistemological beliefs, achievement motivations, and choices of learning approaches are important determinants of sixth-grade students’ achievement in classification concepts.

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Discussion(3/3)• The science teachers should select instructional strategies that

encourage students to develop sophisticated epistemological beliefs and meaningful learning approaches.

• The present study has some limitations that researchers should consider in any attempt to generalize the findings.

- the study was limited by its reliance on self-reported data. - we conducted this investigation at public schools located in a large urban

area. - the present study was limited to one classification unit and 1,042 sixth-

grade Turkish students.