Relative Importance of Students' Situated Expectancy and Task Values for Academic Success: A Commonality Analysis

• In Event: Motivation in Education SIG Poster Session: The Role of Students' and Teachers' Competence Beliefs and Value Beliefs

Abstract

Students’ domain-specific expectancy and value beliefs are key predictors of their educational choices and academic success. Eccles’ situated expectancy-value theory suggests that the relative importance of different expectancy and value beliefs as unique or joint predictors of students’ academic success is likely situation-specific. We tested this assumption empirically in a demanding, gatekeeper math course in college across six time points (N = 366). Commonality analyses revealed an increasing overlap between students’ expected success and task values in predicting their academic success. The unique predictive effect of students’ expectancy (but not task values) on their end-of-term exam performance increased over time. A significant shift in the relative importance of students’ expectancies and values occurred shortly after the transition to higher education.

Authors

• Daria Katharina Benden, TU Dortmund University

• Fani Lauermann, TU Dortmund University