Eighth Graders' Academic Help-Seeking: Its Relation To Achievement Goals, Self-Efficacy And Culture Factors

Academic help-seeking has been one of the main research topics in the western researches of education and psychology since 1980s. Though a mount of data showed some of the related phenomena and laws, some contradictions and questions are still left. With the shift of educational foci, academic help-seeking has been prevailing in 1990s. Many scholars increasingly conform that academic help-seeking is a very important self-regulated learning strategy for students' academic achievement and success in future, and that it is a significant capability that students regard others as utility resources. This present study attempts to clarify some of the contradictions and answer some of the questions by studying the relation between motivations, culture factors and academic help-seeking, so as to deepen the knowing of academic help-seeking and provide intervention with psychological basis.The present study adopted some self-designed scales confirmed by confirmatory factors analysis (CFA), and investigated how academic help-seeking was related to achievement goals, self-efficacy and culture factors in math classroom. A sample of 785 Chinese eighth graders were administered a questionnaire during normal class periods. The results showed that: Both academic help-seeking attitude (costs of help-seeking, benefits of help-seeking) and academic help-seeking behavior (instrumental help-seeking, executive help-seeking and avoidance of help-seeking) had significant relationship with the various dimensions of achievement goals, self-efficacy and culture factors. (1) Goals orientation could be divided into learning goals, performance-approach goals and performance-avoidance goals. These three kinds of goal orientation had different effect patterns on academic help-seeking. But only the students with learning goals would ask for instrumental help-seeking. (2) Instrumental help-seeking behavior was positively related to learning goals. (3) Executive help-seeking behavior andavoidance of help-seeking behavior were negatively related to self-efficacy, supporting the vulnerability hypothesis. (4) Costs of help-seeking from both teachers and classmates had significant negative correlations with performance-avoidance goals and sensitivity to others' evaluation. They also had significant negative correlations with self-efficacy. (5) Benefits of help-seeking from both teachers and classmates had significant positive correlations with learning goals, performance-approach goals, self-efficacy and conformity to Chinese help-seeking proverbs. The effects of achievement goals, self-efficacy and culture factors on academic help-seeking behavior were mediated by academic help-seeking attitude. (1) The effects of learning goals, self-efficacy and conformity to Chinese help-seeking proverbs on instrumental help-seeking behavior were mediated by benefits of help-seeking. The effect of self-efficacy on instrumental help-seeking behavior was mediated by costs of help-seeking from teachers. (2) Costs of help-seeking from classmates partially mediated the effects of performance-approach goals, self-efficacy and sensitivity to others' evaluation on executive help-seeking behavior. Benefits of help-seeking also partially mediated the effects of self-efficacy and conformity to Chinese help-seeking proverbs on executive help-seeking behavior. (3) Performance-avoidance goals and self-efficacy explained costs of help-seeking from both teachers and classmates, which in turn explained avoidance of help-seeking behavior. Learning goals and self-efficacy explained benefits of help-seeking, which in turn explained avoidance of help-seeking behavior. (4) There were interactions between performance-approach goals and self-efficacy, gender and conformity to Chinese help-seeking proverbs in the prediction of benefits of help-seeking.Combining with the data of classroom observations and interview, this study discussed the achievement goals, self-efficacy, culture factors, help-seeking attitude and help-seeking behavior and the model of their relation,...