Daydreaming Versus Value Enhancement: Situational Impact on Students' Coping With Boredom

• In Event: 16.022 - Boredom at School: Antecedents, Outcomes, and Coping Strategies

Abstract

The present study investigated how university students cope with boredom in real-life situations. Students’ strategies of coping with boredom can be classified considering two dimensions, namely approach- versus avoidance-oriented and cognitively- versus behaviorally-oriented boredom coping strategies (see Nett, Goetz, & Daniels, 2010). Empirical findings indicate that in achievement situations, cognitive-approach coping (e.g., reminding oneself of the importance of the current situation) corresponds to relatively low levels of boredom whereas behavioral-approach (e.g., changing actively the situation), cognitive-avoidance (e.g. daydreaming), and behavioral-avoidance strategies (e.g., quitting the current activity) do not correlate or are positively related to experiences of boredom (Nett, Goetz, & Hall, 2011). However, close to nothing is known about students’ real-life boredom coping and how the current situation and precursors of boredom influence students’ coping behavior.
According to theory and previous results, we hypothesized that (1) approach coping should be negatively related to boredom intensity and that avoidance strategies would be unrelated or positively related to boredom, with cognitive-approach strategies being the most frequently used. We further hypothesized that (2) the current situation (achievement vs. non-achievement) should have a significant impact on students’ coping behavior such that students’ perceived control and value associated with the current situation should be positively related to approach strategies and negatively to avoidance strategies. We additionally explored (3) the impact on different precursors of boredom (cf. Daschmann, Goetz, & Stupnisky, 2011) on students coping behavior within achievement situations.
A total of 66 university students (77.3% female, Mage = 22.17, SDage = 2.94) participated in the study with ambulatory assessment data obtained via Personal Digital Assistants (Csikszentmihalyi & Larson, 1987). Over a period of two weeks, participants responded to seven questionnaires per day (average daily response rate = 87%; time-randomized procedure, signal-contingent sampling; see Hektner, Schmidt, & Csikszentmihalyi, 2007).
The self-report variables were as follows: a) current situation (achievement vs. non-achievement), b) control and value associated with the current situation, c) intensity of boredom, d) coping strategies associated with current boredom experiences (cognitive-approach, behavioral-approach, cognitive-avoidance, behavioral-avoidance), and e) precursors to boredom (monotony, lack of meaning, opportunity costs, overchallenged, underchallenged, lack of involvement, teacher dislike, generalized boredom). In total, participants responded to 5,234 questionnaires (35.4% achievement situations), and the data was analyzed to account for its multilevel structure.
Results included the following. (1) Small effects showed that approach-strategies were negatively related to boredom (r_cognitiv-approach = .25** / r_behavioral-approach = -.12*), and cognitive-avoidance strategies were positively related to boredom (r_cognitive-avoidance = .39**). Although cognitive-avoidance strategies were slightly more common than cognitive-approach strategies, cognitive-approach strategies were the most frequently used strategy in achievement settings, as predicted. (2) A situation effect further showed cognitive-approach strategies to be more commonly used in achievement settings (r = .43**), and behavioral-avoidance strategies to be less common in achievement settings (r = -.24**). The hypothesized effects of perceived control (b_cognitive-approach = .16** / b_cognitive-avoidance = -.17**) and value (b_cognitive-approach = .40** / b_cognitive-avoidance = -.15**) were found for cognitive strategies only. (3) Impacts of precursors of boredom on coping strategies are evaluated. Implications for educational practice and future research are discussed.

Authors

• Ulrike Elisabeth Nett, University of Ulm

• Thomas Goetz, University of Konstanz

• Nathan C. Hall, McGill University