Educators commonly believe that praising students' intelligence builds their confidence and motivation to learn and that students' inherent intelligence is the major cause of their school achievement. The author's research shows that, on the contrary, praising students' intelligence can be problematic. Praise is intricately connected to how…

This report uses meta-analysis to derive correlations between the variables of teacher immediacy, cognitive learning, and affective learning. A model was constructed such that the perception of teacher immediacy, a behavior, generates an intermediate outcome of affect, a motivation, which in turn increases cognitive learning outcome. The data…

In this paper we draw on our research on interest to explore the questions posed for this special issue. Interest is conceptualized as an affective state that represents students' subjective experience of learning; the state that arises from either situational triggers or a well-developed individual interest. Drawing on the broad research…

To extend research on fundamental motivational orientations into a new domain, we explored the achievement (positive) and avoidance (negative) orientations of formal organization-based mentors and proteges as joint predictors of personal learning experienced by both parties. We also examined the extent of mentoring functions provided by mentors as…

So far scholars have researched beliefs about knowledge, knowing, and learning mainly in the areas of science and mathematics and among secondary school students. In this article, we explore primary school students' metacognitive beliefs about religious education. The article reports on a study involving 656 fifth- and sixth-grade students. We…

This article argues that college students can be motivated to be active participants in their own education if made aware of the direct correlation between college learning and corporate work settings. Students can be shown that through the natural course of college learning, they are acquiring valuable core skills or transferable competencies…

This study examined goals and agency as the 2 core aspects of self in learning among Chinese adolescents. A sample of 259 adolescents aged 12--19 responded to open-ended probes about themselves. Counter to the common view that Chinese themselves are predominantly social, adolescents expressed many more individual than social goals and agency.…

Aims: The aims of this research were to examine the predictions that (a) the kind of evaluation pupils anticipate will influence their initial achievement goals and, as a result, the quality and consequences of task engagement; and (b) initial mastery goals will promote new learning and intrinsic motivation and initial ability goals will promote…

The term "serious games" became popularized in 2002 as a result of an initiative to promote the use of games for education, training, and other purposes. Today, many companies are using games for training and development, often with hefty price tags. For example, the development budget for the U.S. Army recruiting game, "America's…

A study examined teachers' perceptions and students' literacy motivations to assist teachers in bolstering students' self-determination and literacy competence. The theoretical framework was derived from E. L. Deci's self-determination theory which focuses on individuals' opportunities to make choices or decisions about how to behave or think as…

The more adult educators understand about motivation and the forces that affect it, the better their chances of helping adults attain learning objectives. Program planning partly involves applying leverage or extrinsic pressure on the forces for growth and safety inherent in every learning situation to bring about learning and change. (Author)

This review examines the available evidence in support of the argument that serum uric acid (SUA) possesses considerable promise as an indicator of one type of biochemical influence on achievement behavior. The evidence arguing for further research into the role of serum cholesterol in achievement behavior is also examined. (Author/JR)

Tallahassee's New Adventure in Learning project seeks to show that positive thinking can generate important advances in the classroom. (Editor)

Considered what further education provided for students and how students can satisfy their own practical needs through further education. (RK)

Research on learning-to-learn and some proposals made concerning its teaching are reviewed. Focus is on what needs to be achieved to show that learning-to-learn has occurred. Actual achievement is part of the answer, but the measurement of learning ability must occur independently of the assessment of prior knowledge. Intellectual capacities and…