Abstract
Interest in socioeconomic differences in academic motivation has been longstanding. However, previous research has often treated both low- and high-SES students as homogenous groups. This study aims to address this gap by investigating the developmental trajectory profiles of mathematics motivation during early adolescence, with a focus on variations within and across SES groups. Multigroup latent class growth analysis was used on a sample of 3718 early adolescents in China (initial Mage was 9.40 ± 0.52 years; 48.0% girls) across 2 years from grades 4 through 6. The analysis identified three distinct self-determined mathematics motivation trajectory profiles within each SES group: a good-quality profile (i.e., initially high autonomous but low controlled), a high-quantity profile (i.e., initially high both autonomous and controlled), and a low-quantity profile (i.e., initially low both autonomous and controlled). A greater proportion of low-SES students were observed within the low-quantity profile than within the good-quality profile. The study found that the failure-is-enhancing view was a protective factor against two relatively maladaptive motivational trajectory profiles (i.e., high-quantity profile and low-quantity profile), irrespective of socioeconomic background. These findings emphasize the importance of implementing motivational interventions for early adolescents that consider both structural factors (e.g., socioeconomic backgrounds) and psychological factors (e.g., failure beliefs), to foster students’ academic development.
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Notes
China Statistical Yearbook (2017): http://www.stats.gov.cn/tjsj/ndsj/2017/indexeh.htm.
Researchers pointed out that it is hard for students to differentiate integrated regulation from identified regulation on self-report scales (Vallerand et al., 1992), and students at the early adolescent may not develop integrated regulation (Guay et al., 2010). For this reason, measures of academic motivation in some previous studies did not include this form of motivation (Taylor et al., 2014), which is why the current study did not assess integrated regulation. In addition, to reduce the number of items to which young children have to respond, researcher has created the construct of controlled regulation (Guay et al., 2010), which is the joint construct of introjected and external regulation.
A robustness check was conducted by categorizing low and high SES using the 33rd percentile as a cutoff. It’s acknowledged that using 1 standard deviation above or below the mean may capture students who are relatively more affluent or disadvantaged compared to the mean, so that only results derived from this method were reported in the current study. Findings based on the 33rd percentile can be found in Appendix S4.
The nomenclature for trajectory profiles obtained from the LCGA may be established either by considering the initial levels of the profiles or by focusing on the trajectory pattern. Given that the current study employed multigroup LCGA with a known class variable (i.e., high- vs. low-SES), the current study named the motivational trajectory profiles based on their initial levels (intercepts) of motivational regulations. This approach facilitates a meaningful comparison of trajectory patterns between the two SES groups.
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Acknowledgments
We thank the adolescents, teachers, and parents who gave their time to this study. We are also thankful to the research assistants and lab members who helped carry this research out.
Funding
This work was supported by the STI 2030-Major Projects [project number 2021ZD0200500], the Major Projects of National Social Science Fund of China [project number 16ZDA229], and the Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities [project number 2243300005].
Data Sharing and DeclarationThe datasets generated and/or analyzed during the current study are not publicly available but are available from the corresponding author on reasonable request.
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B.Z. conceived the study, participated in its design, measurement, and coordination, performed the statistical analysis, and drafted the manuscript; C.Q. assisted in the statistical analysis and contributed to the interpretation of the data; Y.W. conceived the study and provided coordination; X.G. contributed to drafting the manuscript; C.L. participated in the study design and data interpretation; L.L. conceived the study, provided funding, and contributed to drafting the manuscript. All authors read and approved the final manuscript.
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Zhao, B., Qi, C., Wu, Y. et al. Differences in the Development of Mathematics Motivation within and across Socioeconomic Status: Do Early Adolescents’ Failure Beliefs Matter?. J. Youth Adolescence (2024). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10964-024-02002-w
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10964-024-02002-w