Abstract
The purpose of this research was to examine the relationship between students’ interests, their use of certain specific learning strategies and causal attributions which they made for their academic achievement. In this manner, we attempted to explore the relationships between some important variables from three different, but connected phases of self-regulated learning: the forethought phase (interests), the performance control phase (learning strategies) and the self-reflective phase (causal attributions).
Results confirmed the presumption that learning strategies could be a potential mediator in the relationship between students’ interests and their academic achievement. Also, results indicate that the causal dimension of controllability could have a partial mediating role between students’ academic achievement and their interests. Generally, our findings indicate a dynamic and cyclical nature of learning process — interest is an integral part of this process and it could be conceptualized as both a consequence and an antecedent of cognitive aspects of learning.
Résumé
Ce travail de recherche se propose comme but d’examiner le rapport entre l’intérêt manifesté par l’étudiant, les stratégies d’apprentissage mises en oeuvre et le principe de causalité d’attributions justifiant selon lui son parcours universitaires. Nos recherches ont porté sur le rapport entre quelques variables d’importance relatives aux trois étapes de l’apprentissage auto-régulé, en l’occurence l’étape de réflexion préliminaire (intérêt), l’étape de mise en oeuvre (stratégie de l’apprentissage) et l’étape de la réflexion proprement dite (causalité d’attributions).
Les résultats de nos recherches confirment le fait que les stratégies d’apprentissage peuvent jouer un rôle de médiateur quant au rapport entre l’intérêt manifesté par l’étudiant et le diplôme obtenu. Par ailleurs, les résultats de nos recherches montrent que la dimension causale de la contrôlabilité de médiateur au niveau du rapport entre le diplôme universitaire acquis et l’intérêt manifesté. D’une manière générale, les résultats que nous avons obtenus révèlent le caractère dynamique et cyclique du processus d’apprentissage — l’intérêt de l’étudiant étant partie intégrante du dit processus et pouvant être envisagé à la fois comme ayant précédé ou suivi l’aspect cognitif de l’apprentissage.
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This research was supported by grant no. 269-1301676-0821 from the Croatian Ministry of Science, Education and Sport. The authors thank the editor and the reviewers for their helpful comments, which greatly improved this manuscript.
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SoriĆ, I., PalekčiĆ, M. The role of students’ interests in self-regulated learning: The relationship between students’ interests, learning strategies and causal attributions. Eur J Psychol Educ 24, 545–565 (2009). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF03178767
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF03178767