Martin V. Covington

Approach and Avoidance Motivation

In this article, we introduce this special issue by establishing a conceptual foundation for the distinction between approach and avoidance motivation. We do so primarily by explicating several reasons why the approach–avoidance distinction should be viewed as fundamental and basic to the study of human behavior. In addition, we compare and contrast the “approach–avoidance” designation with other designations that have been used in the motivational literature to cover the same or similar conceptual ground. Finally, we conclude by briefly overviewing the other contributions to this special issue, specifically highlighting how they make use of the approach–avoidance distinction.

Reactions to Achievement Behavior From a Teacher and Student Perspective: A Developmental Analysis

Participants from first grade through college (N = 168) evaluated the achievement behavior of hypothetical students differing in ability, effort expenditure, and test outcome, both from the perspective of student and teacher. Perceptions of teacher values were consistent over age: Effort and outcome were perceived as highly salient cues for determining degree of teacher rewards and punishment, with student ability level being of little relevance. In contrast, student perspectives indicated a high valuation of ability across all grade levels. Moreover, whereas effort was strongly valued in elementary school, inconsistencies appeared in junior high school such that by high school and college a devaluation of effort occurred. This progressive devaluation was associated with an evolving student belief that low-effort expenditure implies higher ability.

Teaching Strategies that Honor and Motivate Inner-City African-American Students: A School/University Collaboration.

Abstract This paper describes a school/university collaboration resulting in the development of alternative teaching strategies which honored and motivated inner-city African–American middle-school students. The four strategies based on motivation and school failure theories were: non-competitive effort-based grading multiple performance opportunities increased responsibility and choice and validation of cultural differences. An experienced classroom teacher researcher used these strategies in an urban classroom for two years with two different groups of students. Findings indicated that with the use of these alternative teaching strategies the majority of students who appeared initially to lack motivation began to exhibit higher levels of engagement interest and confidence.

The Developmental Course of Achievement Motivation: A Need-Based Approach

Publisher Summary This chapter describes the need-based approach for the developmental course of achievement motivation. This chapter examines the development of achievement motivation from a protracted perspective, overtime, and focuses in particular on the positive, affective elements of motivation—the enjoyment of intellectual discovery; pride in a job well done. To achieve the developmental viewpoint, researchers employ a retrospective methodology in which college students recalled the events and experiences that, in hindsight. The purpose of this chapter is to explore the nature of intrinsic motivation and especially its relationship to the various extrinsic rewards that dominate classroom life, including grades, praise, and gold stars. The present developmental inquiries are nested within a broader set of interlocking questions, all of which were triggered by a puzzling observation that formed the original impetus for this entire undertaking. The chapter concludes that the goal is best served when teachers and students become allies, not adversaries, with teachers acting as mentors and resources for students as they prepare for the future.Publisher Summary This chapter describes the need-based approach for the developmental course of achievement motivation. This chapter examines the development of achievement motivation from a protracted perspective, overtime, and focuses in particular on the positive, affective elements of motivation—the enjoyment of intellectual discovery; pride in a job well done. To achieve the developmental viewpoint, researchers employ a retrospective methodology in which college students recalled the events and experiences that, in hindsight. The purpose of this chapter is to explore the nature of intrinsic motivation and especially its relationship to the various extrinsic rewards that dominate classroom life, including grades, praise, and gold stars. The present developmental inquiries are nested within a broader set of interlocking questions, all of which were triggered by a puzzling observation that formed the original impetus for this entire undertaking. The chapter concludes that the goal is best served when teachers and students become allies, not adversaries, with teachers acting as mentors and resources for students as they prepare for the future.

Achievement dynamics: The interaction of motives, cognitions, and emotions over time

Abstract The history of research on achievement striving has been characterized by the development of several separate lines of inquiry in relative isolation, one from the other. Three themes are most notable: research on need achievement (motivation), formulations of test anxiety (emotion), and the exploration of information-processing (cognitive) factors with special attention given to the organization of effective study skills. In the absence of a unified approach to an understanding of achievement behavior, research has been largely confined to attempts to establish simple one-to-one correspondences between various organizing constructs, say, test anxiety, and the achievement outcomes they are thought to influence. For instance, a veritable flood of studies beginning at the turn of the century has demonstrated the existence of a negative relationship between level of anxiety arousal and performance across a variety of testing and assessment conditions (for a review, see Heinrich & Spielberger, 1982). ...

Anxiety, aspirations, and self-concept in the achievement process: A longitudinal model with latent variables

Recent research suggests that anxiety is not a single, unified reaction to perceived threat, but rather a cluster of interrelated factors whose relationships to performance change as the individual progresses from one test event to another. This study investigated the presumed linkages between traitlike predispositions to perceive threat and achievement performance, as mediated by statelike anxiety arousal on a longitudinal basis (Perceived Threat → Anxiety Arousal → Impaired Performance). College students were administered self-report questionnaire measures during a preenrollment period, after the first two midterms, and following the last two midterms in a general psychology course. Four performance measures and 26 motivational indicators were fitted to a 10-factor latent model using LISREL model-fitting techniques. Path-analytic interpretations of this structural model provided little evidence for the commonly held view that traitlike threat perceptions mediate performance via statelike anxiety reactions. Far more promising, theoretically, are those influences on test performance stemming from the self-attributional, cognitive domain. Overall, the findings support a recent reinterpretation of achievement anxiety as stemming from the disruptive effects of diminished ability perceptions (and hence, impaired personal worth), rather than from the interfering influence of diffused emotional arousalper se.

The Myth of Intensification

we were, where we are, where we need to be. Manuscript submitted for publication. Maehr, M. L., Midgley, C., & Collaborators. (1996). Transforming school cultures. Boulder, CO: Westview/Harper Collins. National Education Summit. (1996, March). Summit and Summit documents. (Available at http://www.summit96.ibm.com) Nicholls, J. G. (1989). The competitive ethos and democratic education. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. Paris, S. G., Lawton, T. A., Turner, J. C., & Roth, J. L. (1991). A developmental perspective on standardized achievement testing. Educational Researcher, 20(5), 12-20. Smith, M. L., & Shepard, L. A. (1989). Flunking grades: A recapitulation. In L. A. Shepard & M. L. Smith (Eds.), Flunking grades: Research policies on retention (pp. 214-236). London: The Falmer Press. Steinberg, L., Brown, B. B., & Dornbusch, S. M. (1996). Beyond the classroom: Why school reform has failed and what parents need to do. New York: Simon & Schuster.

The role of cooperative reward interdependency in success and failure

Abstract The self-worth-related consequences of success and failure for low and high performers under two reward structures (cooperative and competitive) and two reward standards (achievement and improvement) were compared. Participants were 282 middle school children who solved puzzles independently, but side-by-side in same-sex, same-grade pairs. Performance was experimentally manipulated to produce high and low performers in each pair and successful and unsuccessful pairs. Students worked under competitive or cooperative reward conditions. Results indicated that (a) regardless of reward contingencies, success or failure played a critical role in perceptions of individual differences: Failure depressed perceptions of the other students ability in each pair and decreased reward allocations for both low and high performers, and (b) cooperative reward interdependency accentuated perceptions of ability differences.

Programed instruction and creativity

The linking of the terms programed instruction and creativity implies something of a paradox for the most distinctive virtues of the technique of programed instruction appear in some respects inconsistent with, or even antithetical to, the requirements of creativity. We undertake in this paper to show how this apparent paradox may be resolved-to show not only how programed instruction can avoid or minimize its potentially detrimental effects on creativity, but also how programed instruction can itself be directly used as a powerful instrument for the strengthening of creativity. Oddly enough, the potentially detrimental effects

The Developmental Course of Achievement Motivation

Publisher Summary This chapter describes the need-based approach for the developmental course of achievement motivation. This chapter examines the development of achievement motivation from a protracted perspective, overtime, and focuses in particular on the positive, affective elements of motivation—the enjoyment of intellectual discovery; pride in a job well done. To achieve the developmental viewpoint, researchers employ a retrospective methodology in which college students recalled the events and experiences that, in hindsight. The purpose of this chapter is to explore the nature of intrinsic motivation and especially its relationship to the various extrinsic rewards that dominate classroom life, including grades, praise, and gold stars. The present developmental inquiries are nested within a broader set of interlocking questions, all of which were triggered by a puzzling observation that formed the original impetus for this entire undertaking. The chapter concludes that the goal is best served when teachers and students become allies, not adversaries, with teachers acting as mentors and resources for students as they prepare for the future.Publisher Summary This chapter describes the need-based approach for the developmental course of achievement motivation. This chapter examines the development of achievement motivation from a protracted perspective, overtime, and focuses in particular on the positive, affective elements of motivation—the enjoyment of intellectual discovery; pride in a job well done. To achieve the developmental viewpoint, researchers employ a retrospective methodology in which college students recalled the events and experiences that, in hindsight. The purpose of this chapter is to explore the nature of intrinsic motivation and especially its relationship to the various extrinsic rewards that dominate classroom life, including grades, praise, and gold stars. The present developmental inquiries are nested within a broader set of interlocking questions, all of which were triggered by a puzzling observation that formed the original impetus for this entire undertaking. The chapter concludes that the goal is best served when teachers and students become allies, not adversaries, with teachers acting as mentors and resources for students as they prepare for the future.