2-025 - Motivational and Emotional Predictors of Academic Achievement and Development for Ethnic Minority Students

Session Type: Paper Symposium

Integrative Statement

This symposium presents research on how motivational and emotional variables identified as predictors of achievement in White children influence academic outcomes for less-studied groups of ethnic minority children and adolescents. The symposium presents studies of elementary, middle, and high school students, utilizing varied measures of motivation, emotion and achievement.

The first paper presents a longitudinal study of how low-income minority children’s grit, emotional engagement, stress, and perceptions of teacher support relate to literacy skills in third through fifth grade. Children’s grit and emotional supports related positively and stress negatively to literacy skills. Grit moderated stress’s effects. The second paper presents a longitudinal study of the relations among African American 7th graders’ reading motivation, peer reactions to students’ reading, and reading comprehension. Students’ initial reading motivation predicted growth in reading comprehension, and initial comprehension predicted growth in motivation, suggesting the relations are reciprocal. Girls and higher-income students had higher initial achievement, and boys’ peers were more likely to reject their reading activities. The third paper presents a study of low-income, Latino adolescents’ perceptions of educational support from parents, peers, and teachers. Four perceived support profiles were identified. Students with high and moderate levels of support were more motivated in school currently and expected to attain more education than did students with low support. Those with high support had stronger interest in obtaining jobs requiring college degrees. Together, the papers present converging evidence on the importance of motivational and emotional variables as predictors of academic success in different ethnic minority groups.

Sub Unit

• Education, Schooling

Chairs

• Colleen O'Neal, University of Maryland, College Park

• Allan L Wigfield, University of Maryland

Discussant

• Beth E Kurtz-Costes, Univ of N Carolina-Chapel Hill

Individual Presentations

• Grit and Emotional Supports of Literacy Skills among Low-Income, Minority Elementary School Students - Presenting Author: Lynsey Weston, Univ of Maryland College Park; Ranga Atapattu, University of Maryland; Meghan Green, University of Maryland at College Park; Benjamin Perlow, University of Maryland; Colleen O'Neal, University of Maryland, College Park; Jade Wexler, University of Maryland, College Park

• Relations of African American Early Adolescents’ Reading Motivation and Comprehension Over Time - Presenting Author: Amy N. Ho, University of Maryland, College Park; Allan L Wigfield, University of Maryland

• Supporting College Aspirations among Latino Youth - Presenting Author: Laura K. Maurizi, District of Columbia Office of the State Superintendent of Education, Office of Data, Assessment and Research; Traci M Kennedy, The Children's Hospital of Philadelphia; Rosario Ceballo, University of Michigan Ann Arbor