Self-Generated Utility Among a Diverse Sample of Adolescent Students: An Analysis of Grade Level and Gender

• In Event: Experiencing Relevance: Clarifying the Definition of a Vital Motivational Concept

Abstract

Purpose
This study tested a self-generated utility value intervention within 7th and 9th grade science classrooms. Extending prior research, we investigated whether the intervention functioned differently for girls and boys in each age group.

Theoretical framework
Interest involves an enduring link between a person and a content domain that includes appreciation for the domain content as valuable (Renninger, 2000). Although value can take different forms (Eccles et al., 1983; Eccles & Wigfield, 2002), utility value refers to whether a task is relevant for achieving personal goals. In this sense, perceived utility is a form of personal relevance, and students who perceive utility value in an academic domain may identify that domain as an interest. Researchers have developed interventions to test this, and one approach asked 9th graders and college students to self-generate descriptions of how their schoolwork was personally useful (Hulleman et al., 2010; Hulleman & Harackiewicz, 2009). This intervention urged students to see how the content of their science classes was useful for their lives beyond the classroom. In these studies the positive effects of the intervention on interest were stronger for students with initially low success expectancies. The current study tested the effects of a similar intervention among 7th as well as 9th graders, and included an analysis of gender.

Method
The participants were 7th (N=192) and 9th (N=123) graders enrolled in science classes in a single school district. During each of the six intervention weeks, students wrote briefly about a topic they were studying in class. Participants in the utility condition wrote about how the topic was relevant or useful to them or to someone they knew. Participants in the control condition instead wrote a summary of the topic (Hulleman & Harackiewicz, 2009). Participants reported their interest and expectancies for success in science before and after the intervention, and completed a variant of the Experience Sampling Method (ESM) during the intervention.

Results
Using multiple regression and controlling for pre-interest, the intervention, initial expectancies success expectancies, gender, and their interactions were used to predict post-interest in science separately for each grade. Among 9th graders, the two-way interaction between utility and success expectancies found in prior research was marginally significant, t(119)=-1.78, p=.08, β=-.11, and qualified by a three-way interaction with gender, t(119)=3.78, p<.01, β=.23. The intervention promoted interest for 9th grade girls with low expectancies, but undermined interest for girls with high expectancies. These effects were not statistically significant among 9th grade boys. The parallel analysis with 7th graders showed that utility and expectancies interacted to predict interest, t(179)=1.94, p=.05, β=.10. The interaction pattern was opposite to that seen among 9th graders and in research with older samples; the utility intervention increased interest among 7th graders with high expectancies for success, and did not interact with gender. Qualitative analysis of students’ essays and ESM data focuses on a possible developmental shift in the type of utility contained in the essays.

Scientific significance
Findings highlight the importance of gender and grade in utility value interventions in science.

Authors

• Amanda Marie Durik, Northern Illinois University

• Jennifer A. Schmidt, Northern Illinois University

• Lee Shumow, Northern Illinois University

• Britta Rodenbeck, Northern Illinois University