THE ROLE OF PERSONAL GOALS IN STUDENTS' SELECTION OF LEARNING STRATEGIES (STRATEGY TRAINING)

SUSAN BOBBITT NOLEN, Purdue University

Abstract

This thesis investigates the relationship between personal goal orientation (work avoidance, task- and ego-orientation) and students' reported use and opinions about the utility of various learning and studying strategies. The findings of both investigations support the hypothesis that students select strategies congruent with their current personal goals. In Study 1, eighth-graders studied one of two expository passages of less than 800 words on a science topic. Strong significant positive correlations were found between students' level of both general and task-specific task orientation and their use and utility ratings of strategies likely to lead to understanding of the concepts presented in the material (labeled "deep-processing" strategies). Although task orientation was also associated with positive utility ratings for surface-level strategies, these relationships were not as strong. Conversely, ego orientation was not significantly related to use or general utility ratings for DP strategies, but was more strongly related to SL strategies. For both actual use and utility ratings, DP and SL strategies were strongly correlated, which may partially account for the lack of significant relationships between orientation and recall of the passage. In Study 2, developmental differences were found between eighth-grade, high school and college students in the extent to which they differentiated between DP and SL strategies on the basis of utility. At the college level, task orientation was related to utility ratings for DP but not SL strategies. The reverse pattern was found for ego orientation. These findings are discussed in terms of both effective teaching practices and their implications for future strategy training research.

Degree

Ph.D.

Subject Area

Educational psychology

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