Reevaluating Cost: A Race Reimaged Perspective on the EVT Cost Construct Introduction and Theoretical Framework

• In Event: Is This Worth It? Examining How Students Weigh Competing Motivational Beliefs Through an Expectancy-Value Lens

Abstract

Traditional Expectancy Value Theory (EVT) conceptions define cost as “what is lost or given up or suffered when doing any particular task”. Focusing primarily on costs such as time invested on a class, loss of free time, or the fear of failure, much has been learned about how cost influences the motivation, performance, affect, and academic choices of students. Despite these advancements, traditional cost conceptions and educational motivation research consistently overlooks the impact of race on academic experience. Drawing on DeCuir-Gunby and Schutz’s race-reimaging, the current study builds on the EVT cost construct to qualitatively investigate how racism-related experiences and stressors inform perceptions of cost among a group of Black high school students. Additionally, the unique ways Black students cope with the costs and stress they experience is also interrogated. Through understanding the ways racialized stress may present as a real cost to engagement in school, scholars and educators will be better equipped to address the unique challenges facing Black students. Thus, this study is guided by the following research questions: (1) How do Black adolescent students self-describe the costs and stressors they encounter in and outside of school? (1a) How, if at all, does race function in their conceptualizations of cost and stress? (1b) How do Black students report coping with the costs and stressors they experience inside and outside of school?

Method

The study utilized secondary one-on-one semi-structured student interview data from a larger mixed method study conducted in a New Jersey urban school district. Using a protocol designed to target interviews from Black-identifying students discussing topics relevant to cost, racial stress, and coping, the sample was narrowed down to seven Black students attending predominantly Black high schools (see student demographics in Table 2.1). Student interviews were analyzed using thematic analysis in conjunction with the constant comparison method. The researcher employed a critical-constructivist epistemological framework, which recognizes multiple valid and socially constructed realities and emphasizes the meaning individuals attach to their lived experiences.

Results and Discussion

Four themes were developed from students’ discussions of cost: Anti-Black Public Sentiments and Physical and Structural Violence outside of school, and the Need to Prove Oneself and Inadequate Infrastructure inside of school. Additionally, two themes discussed the ways students coped with the cost they encountered: Avoidant Coping and Liberatory Coping. Exemplar student quotes and theme definitions can be seen in Table 2.2. The study findings suggest a need to move cost conceptions beyond exclusively considering the specific drawbacks of an academic task. Instead, a race-reimaged cost begins to shed light on how broader socio-environmental factors, systemic racial inequality, and the resultant psychological strain attached to this reality informs the motivational experiences of Black students in school. Furthermore, the complex nature of coping through cost as a Black adolescent student brings nuance to the traditional EVT notion that students will cease to persist if a topic is too costly. Further investigation into specific coping profiles and environmental cues that inform students taking on more liberatory versus avoidant coping strategies is recommended.

Authors

• Chino Ekwueme, University of Michigan

• Jamaal Matthews, University of Michigan