The Next Generation of Applied Motivation Research: A Utilization-Focused Approach to Motivation Research

• In Event: Practice-Relevant Motivation Research 2.0: Building a New Approach

Abstract

In this presentation, we outline the conceptual underpinnings of a model for collaborating with practitioners and applying motivation research in classroom settings.
We adapt a Utilization-Focused Evaluation approach (Patton, 2011) in order to identify critical elements of practice-relevant research in school settings. We argue that Utilization-Focused Motivation Research (UFMR) is empirical work conducted by trained researchers and professional educators to put theories and generalized principles of motivation to use in the classroom. Traditional approaches to classroom based motivation research might involve examining processes and constructs that are relevant to one’s own research interests from the perspective of a prominent motivation framework, such as Achievement Goal Theory, Expectancy-Value Theory, Attribution Theory, Self-Determination Theory, or Social Cognitive Theory.
The UFMR approach converges with these perspectives by drawing principles, recommendations, and measures from these frameworks to understand and improve educational outcomes. At the same time, UFMR diverges from these approaches in that educator insight is a necessary step in every part of the research process, and that the success of one’s research endeavors is measure by how useful the research outcomes are for to the educators who are involved. Table 1 highlights phases (i.e., Planning, Implementation, Dissemination, and Continuous Improvement) of the UFMR process and the activities involved in each phase (16 Total). Importantly, this approach begins and ends with relationship-building and maintenance among the researcher and local educators, and requires intense collaboration between these two parties to conduct rigorous qualitative and quantitative research in complex school and classroom settings.
UFMR stands to demonstrate the relevance of motivation research by uncovering specific, concrete ways to implement motivation findings in classrooms and lesson plans. The findings generated by a UFMR approach can speak to critical application questions that remain to be answered by motivation researchers, including (a) educators’ perceptions of the usefulness of specific theoretical principals and research-based strategies (b) the contextual and situational factors that render specific theoretical principals and research-based strategies to be more useful, (c) theoretical insights that emerge from a greater emphasis on context-based research, and (d) effective ways of communicating motivation principles and research-based strategies so that educators can effectively implement them in their classrooms.
This approach to motivation research also stands to more directly benefit motivation researchers and their universities. A UFMR approach allows researchers to gain the community support that is necessary to creating and sustaining a meaningful research agenda during periods of reduced state and federal grant funding. Additionally, a UFMR approach provides opportunities to train graduate students in a way that makes them both thinkers and doers, and creates new avenues for the professional growth of in-service teachers. Finally, UFMR departs from the status quo of “one-directional outreach” and moves toward a bidirectional cycle of constant improvement in which both researchers and practitioners develop as they collaboratively address real-world educational challenges in the 21st century.

Author

• Lauren H. Bryant, North Carolina State University