Parental Involvement and Children’s Academics: The Roles of Autonomy Support and Parents’ Motivation for Involvement

• In Event: The Quality of Parental Involvement in Children’s Schooling: Considering Measures and Outcomes

Abstract

When parents are more involved in their children’s schooling, children perform better in school. Yet, few studies have considered how parents implement involvement. Specifically, parents can implement involvement in an autonomy supportive or controlling manner. When parents are more autonomy supportive and less controlling, children have greater motivation and school success. Thus, it is important to consider how autonomy supportive parents are when involved and whether and how this makes a difference for children’s academics.

Further, researchers have investigated factors that may be associated with parents becoming involved. For example, when parents get involved in their children’s schooling because it is fun or important, they display greater levels of involvement (Grolnick, 2015). It is plausible that parents’ reasons for becoming involved may also play a role in how parents implement involvement. This study examined relations among parents’ motivation to be involved, parents’ autonomy supportive (versus controlling) implementation of three types of involvement (home, personal, cognitive), and children’s academic motivation, achievement, and school worry.

Participants were 145 fourth- through sixth-grade children (41% male; 49% European American), recruited from the Northeastern United States, and their parents. Parents reported on their reasons for getting involved (Grolnick, 2015) and on children’s grades. Children completed questionnaires about their parent’s autonomy supportive versus controlling involvement, perceived competence (Harter, 1989), self-regulation (Ryan & Connell, 1989), and school-related worry (Weikhorst, 1973).

Structural equation models were used to assess a theoretical model for each type of autonomy supportive involvement (see Figures 1 and 2). All models displayed good fit. Results indicated that the more parents got involved for controlled reasons, the less autonomy supportive was their home and personal involvement. When parents were more autonomy supportive during all types of involvement, children perceived themselves as more competent, engaged in school tasks because they saw them as fun or valuable, and experienced less school worry. Greater levels of autonomy supportive home and cognitive involvement were related to higher grades. There were significant indirect effects of parental controlled motivation for involvement through parental autonomy supportive personal involvement for children’s autonomous self-regulation, β = -.04, 95% CI [-.16, -.02], perceived competence, β = -.07, 95% CI [-.17, -.02], and school-related worry, β = .06, 95% CI [.02, .20]. Additionally, there were significant indirect effects of parental controlled motivation for involvement through parental autonomy supportive home involvement for children’s autonomous self-regulation, β = -.04, 95% CI [-.44,-.01], perceived competence, β = -.07, 95% CI [-.18, -.01], and school-related worry, β = .07, 95% CI [.01, .23]. There were no significant indirect effects for the model containing autonomy supportive cognitive involvement. Models suggested that the more parents reported controlled motivation for involvement, the less autonomy supportive they were in personal and home involvement; in turn, the higher was children’s school worry and the lower were children’s perceived competence and autonomous motivation. The current study emphasizes the importance of how and why parents get involved in children’s schooling. These findings can help support schools and educators in encouraging more facilitative parent involvement within children’s education.

Authors

• Rachel Lerner, Clark University
  Presenting Author

• Wendy S Grolnick, Clark University
  Non-Presenting Author