Motivation, action, and social cognitive development in informal science education venues: Convergence with the classroom

Studies of adolescent motivation in formal science education (FSE) environments have largely been limited to the administration of generalized expectancy-value (E-V) based questionnaires that attempted to measure motivation towards science without considering the specific context. The E-V basis for motivation can be expanded upon by considering both the antecedents (social cognitive development or SCD) and the consequents (actions) of motivational processes. Adolescents participating in specific informal science education (ISE) venues were assumed to be motivated to engage in science learning activities. In order to describe adolescent motivational processes, this study consisted of four main phases. In Phase I, 3 ISE venues (3 science/technology centers, 4 science-dedicated stores, 2 go-kart races) were selected. In Phase II, a total 137 early adolescents, their accompanying adults, and venue staff members were interviewed and observed. A typological analysis of these data revealed: (a) activities by early adolescents take place within social groups that mirror stages in the development of self-regulated behaviors; (b) adolescents displayed a primary intrinsic motivational process as well as a linked secondary motivational process which was generally an instrumental or consummatory process; (c) evaluations of experiences within the venues contained elements of intrinsic motivational processes as well as instrumental and/or consummatory processes; and (d) adolescents in each venue went through similar types of motivational processes and actions, different venues facilitating different strands in a motivation-action-SCD cycle. In Phase III, the constructions were translated into salient constructs: relatedness-involvement, autonomy-autonomy support, competence- effectance, and situation-specificity. A vignette-based questionnaire developed from these constructs was administered to 45 adolescents in five of the original ISE sites. In Phase IV, areas of convergence with respect to the motivational constructs were sought between the ISE venues and FSE environments where the teachers had developed motivational instructional approaches, using the questionnaire tested in Phase III. The results of the Phase IV administration to 95 adolescents in FSE environments were nearly identical on all six constructs. Further investigations will determine if the constructs represented by this convergence are malleable or general to adolescents regardless of their instructional environment.