Motivation

One of the most powerful predictors of motivation is the value that students assign to a task. According to the Expectancy-Value Theory (Eccles & Wigfield, 2002), students are more likely to engage in academic activities when they perceive them as valuable. This perceived value is not a single construct but a combination of different beliefs, each of which influences motivation in distinct ways.

• Utility Value
  This refers to the perceived usefulness of the task for achieving personal or academic goals. A student may not enjoy writing an essay, but if they believe it will help them succeed in future studies or a desired career, they are more likely to invest effort. Making the practical relevance of tasks explicit is key to enhancing this form of value.

• Cost Value
  Cost involves students’ perception of what they have to sacrifice to complete a task—this includes time, energy, emotional effort, or the risk of failure. High perceived costs can undermine motivation, even when expectancy and utility are high. Reducing unnecessary workload, clarifying expectations, and fostering a safe learning environment are ways to mitigate the impact of cost.

• Importance (Attainment) Value
  This dimension captures how strongly the task is linked to the student’s self-concept or identity. If doing well in a subject confirms their sense of who they are (e.g., “I’m a good student” or “Math is part of who I am”), they will find the task more motivating. Importance value is deeply tied to students’ personal standards and internal goals.

• Interest Value
  Interest value refers to the intrinsic enjoyment or curiosity a student feels toward the task itself. It is one of the most direct sources of motivation: students are naturally more engaged in activities they find interesting or stimulating. Teachers can support this value by offering some autonomy, incorporating novelty, or connecting the content with students’ real-life experiences.

These different types of value are not mutually exclusive. A student may work hard on a task because it is useful, personally meaningful, and interesting at the same time. Understanding and nurturing these value components helps create learning environments where motivation is more likely to emerge and be sustained.

Goal orientation refers to the underlying purposes students have when they engage in a learning activity. It is not simply about whether they want to succeed, but why they want to succeed and how they define that success. Different goal orientations activate different motivational patterns and lead to different learning behaviors.

Two main types of goal orientation have been widely studied:

• Performance Goals
  Students with performance goals aim to demonstrate their ability in comparison to others. Their focus is on achieving high grades, receiving recognition, or avoiding negative judgments. Success is measured externally, and errors are often perceived as threats to their competence. While performance goals can increase effort in the short term, especially in competitive contexts, they may also lead to anxiety, fear of failure, or superficial learning strategies.

• Mastery Goals
  Students who adopt mastery goals are primarily focused on understanding the content, improving their skills, and mastering the task itself. Their sense of success comes from personal growth and progress rather than from outperforming others. Mastery-oriented students are more likely to persist in the face of difficulty, use deeper learning strategies, and experience greater satisfaction in learning.

Both types of goals can coexist, and students may switch between them depending on the context. However, fostering mastery-oriented goals is generally associated with more adaptive and self-regulated learning. Teachers can support these orientations by emphasizing learning over grades, providing feedback focused on progress, and valuing effort and exploration.

Students' motivation is deeply influenced by the beliefs they hold about their own abilities and the likelihood of success. These self-beliefs shape how they approach challenges, how much effort they invest, and how they respond to failure. Among the most influential constructs in this domain are self-efficacy, expectations of success, and attributional control.

• Self-Efficacy
  Self-efficacy refers to the belief that one is capable of successfully performing a specific task. This concept, introduced by Bandura (1997), is task-specific and situational: a student may feel confident solving equations but insecure when writing essays. High self-efficacy is consistently linked to greater motivation, persistence, and use of effective learning strategies. It encourages students to take on challenges and recover from setbacks.

• Expectations of Success
  Closely related to self-efficacy, expectations of success refer to a student’s general belief about how likely it is that they will succeed in a given academic activity. While self-efficacy focuses on perceived ability to complete a task, expectations of success relate more broadly to perceived likelihood of success. These expectations influence goal setting, engagement, and the choice to persist or give up.

• Attributional Control
  This refers to how students explain the causes of their successes or failures. For example, after receiving a low grade, a student might think, “I didn’t study enough” (an internal, controllable cause) or “The teacher was unfair” (an external, uncontrollable cause). The more students attribute outcomes to internal, controllable factors (like effort or strategy), the more empowered they feel to influence future results. Helping students develop adaptive attributional patterns can strengthen both motivation and resilience.

Together, these self-beliefs provide the motivational foundation for learning. When students believe in their competence, expect to succeed, and feel in control of the causes of their academic outcomes, they are far more likely to engage deeply and persistently in their learning journey.

Emotions are not just reactions to academic experiences; they actively shape how students learn, engage, and persist. Research in educational psychology, particularly from the control-value theory (Pekrun, 2006), has shown that emotions can either support or hinder cognitive performance, motivation, and self-regulation. They arise from how students appraise their control over a task and the value they assign to it.

Below are some of the most relevant academic emotions, with a focus on their typical effects and triggers:

• Enjoyment
  Enjoyment fosters deeper engagement, flexible thinking, and the use of meaningful learning strategies. It is often triggered when students feel competent and find value or interest in the activity.

• Pride
  Pride arises after achieving a meaningful goal, especially when success is attributed to effort or personal ability. It reinforces motivation and future persistence but can also decrease help-seeking if students fear appearing less competent.

• Hope
  Hope combines a positive anticipation of success with the sense that one has the means to achieve it. It sustains effort in uncertain situations and is more likely when students feel moderately challenged but capable.

• Anxiety
  Anxiety can impair working memory and lead to avoidance behaviors. It typically emerges when students value success but feel uncertain or lack confidence in their ability to achieve it.

• Shame
  Shame is a self-conscious emotion triggered by perceived failure, especially when students feel personally responsible. It can lead to withdrawal, hiding strategies, or disengagement.

• Boredom
  Boredom undermines attention, effort, and persistence. It tends to appear when tasks are perceived as meaningless, repetitive, or too easy, and is associated with low value and control appraisals.

• Anger
  Anger may be directed at oneself, others, or the task itself. It disrupts concentration and can provoke oppositional behavior. It often arises when students feel treated unfairly or when their goals are blocked.

Recognizing these emotional dynamics is key to supporting students not only cognitively but also affectively. Emotions are not secondary to learning—they are at the core of it.