Motivation to learn

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The motivation to learn specifically deals with the motivational conditions of learning .

In addition to emotional, cognitive and social factors, it is responsible for learning success and describes how a learning process can take place. The motivation to learn also determines which content or skills are learned and how deeply they are processed. If there is a high level of motivation to learn in certain areas, there is a greater degree of engagement with the respective learning material. Good performance can therefore be largely attributed to an increased motivation to learn, which is why motivation to learn is of particular importance in schools and further education.

definition

"Learning motivation is the current willingness of an individual to direct and coordinate their sensory, cognitive and motivational abilities to achieve a learning goal" (Heckhausen 1965)

Conditions and consequences of motivation to learn

According to Krapp, the current motivation to learn is made up of several factors. On the one hand, previous experience and previous development conditions play a major role. These determine the person of the learner and influence his interests and attitudes. Also of importance is the environment in which the learner is and, of course, the learning object that is the focus of the learning process. All these conditions together result in the current motivation to learn. This current motivation to learn, in turn, has consequences. On the one hand, it changes the current learning behavior, on the other hand, there are also short-term (good grades) and longer-term (possibility of a certain degree) consequences.

Basically, it can be said that motivation to learn can only really be implemented meaningfully in connection with certain cognitive abilities. In particular, the interaction of the two factors “want” and “ability” is a prerequisite for successful learning, as these strongly influence each other.

Forms of motivation to learn

In pedagogical and psychological motivation research, four forms of learning motivation play an important role: intrinsic motivation , extrinsic motivation , achievement motivation and interest . It is questionable why people with certain content increasingly do not want to deal with others at all and why, for example, some school subjects are pursued with more joy and commitment than others in school. Different forms of motivation to learn offer different explanations, which are explained below.

Intrinsic and extrinsic motivation

In contrast to motives, learning motivation describes the current state of a person in which he or she is intensively concerned with special learning content. There is a willingness to deal with certain tasks voluntarily and for a limited time. The reasons for the argument can have different causes. If there is intrinsic motivation, the learner acts for the sake of the activity and the act itself brings joy and satisfaction. So a student learns because learning in itself brings joy and satisfaction.

In extrinsic motivation, the action is carried out in order to achieve certain goals or consequences that can be separated from the action. The act itself only serves as a purpose to achieve the goal. So the student learns to get good grades, for example. For a successful learning process, intrinsic motivation seems to be more desirable and sensible, since intrinsically motivated people perform better overall than extrinsically motivated people under otherwise identical conditions. Because if an activity is enjoyable, one deals more with it, which in turn leads to a deeper processing of the learned content and thus makes learning success more likely.

A “mix” of both motivational aspects seems to be particularly favorable: The learner then has goals in mind that motivate him, but at the same time the examination of the material is also enjoyable in itself.

Identification with the goal

R. Koestner et al. have shown in several longitudinal studies that the presence of intrinsic motivation alone is less effective for long-term maintenance of commitment and for success than if there is also an identification with the desired goal.

Achievement motivation

If a person has certain expectations of their learning performance and attaches value to them, it is referred to as achievement motivation. Accordingly, the learning performance depends on the expected value or benefit of the action. In contrast to intrinsic motivation, the content to be learned is in the background, because the focus is on the goal that is to be achieved with it, in line with extrinsic motivation.

There is consequently a standard of quality against which the learner can measure himself. The motivation to learn then arises on the one hand from the hope of success (i.e. reaching the goal) or the fear of not reaching the goal and thus failing.

interest

Interest has a huge impact on a person's motivation to learn. It is responsible for which content is learned more and which content is selected to be processed more precisely and for longer. Here the focus is on the content, because it is responsible for the appearance of interest. In the spirit of intrinsic motivation, the learner deals with the subject matter based on the content and thus enjoys the activity itself without necessarily pursuing certain goals.

Schiefele, Krapp and Prenzel speak of the person-object theory, in which an object has a "feeling-related valence" (association with positive feelings), a "value-related valence" (high subjective meaning) and a "self-intentionality" (i.e. no external one Constraints). Interest does not always have to be a prerequisite, but can also be developed during a learning process. In turn, intrinsic motivation plays a major role in this. In the field of educational motivation research, interest is very important and is therefore of particular importance for learning motivation. So in order to motivate a student to learn more, it is important to arouse interest.

According to Wild, other forms of learning motivation are learning or task orientation, performance orientation and social motivation.

Perspectives on motivation to learn

According to Krapp, there are five significant lines of development in the area of ​​motivation to learn: property theory, learning theory, cognitive, self-determination and interest-themed perspective.

  1. The property theory perspective poses the question of why different performances emerge despite the same learning offer and environment. This seems to be due to cognitive abilities and motivational aspects of the individual such as interests and values ​​etc.
  2. The learning theory perspective deals with the fact that a learner does not achieve the same performance in every area, which can be due to cognitive abilities, motivation or other framework conditions. Since learning motivation is therefore not a static characteristic, but rather shows changes, these changes can of course also be controlled from outside through incentives etc. Thus primarily has behaviorism busy. The criticism of behaviorism caused the cognitive turn in 1950.
  3. The cognitive perspective sees the learner as an active participant in the learning process and assumes that the person acts in a goal-oriented manner and thus the purpose is in the foreground of the action. Although the focus is increasingly on the person, aspects such as interest, will and, above all, self-determination are not taken into account.
  4. This in turn deals with the perspective of self-determination . It assumes that a person's motivation does not only depend on the goals, but above all on a perceived level of self-determination. The more self-determination the person feels, the more the motivation can be assigned to the intrinsic motivation.
  5. In addition to this, the interest- related perspective takes up the question of the content again. Recent considerations refer to interest as a self-determined motivational component of intentional learning.

literature

  • M. Hofer, R. Pekrun, E. Wild: Psychology of learning . In: Andreas Krapp, Bernd Weidenmann (Hrsg.): Educational Psychology: A Textbook . 4th edition. PVU, Weinheim / Beltz 2001, ISBN 3-621-27473-1 , p. 207-270 .
  • Jutta Heckhausen, Heinz Heckhausen (ed.): Motivation and action . 3. Edition. Springer, Heidelberg 2006, ISBN 978-3-540-25461-4 .
  • Andreas Krapp: The construct of interest . In: Andreas Krapp, Manfred Prenzel (Hrsg.): Interest, learning, performance: newer approaches to educational-psychological interest research . Aschendorff, Münster 1992, ISBN 3-402-04596-6 , p. 297-329 .
  • Andreas Krapp: Overview lecture: Interest and intrinsic motivation to learn: An overview of newer research approaches in educational psychology . In: Heinz Mandl (Ed.): Knowledge and Action: Report on the 40th Congress of the DGfP . Hogrefe, Göttingen / Bern / Toronto / Seattle 1997, ISBN 3-8017-1047-5 , pp. 270-277 .
  • Gustav Keller: I don't want to study! : Promoting motivation in the home and school . 1st edition. Verlag Hans Huber, Bern 2001, ISBN 3-456-83535-3 .
  • Lutz von Rosenstiel: Managing motivation: psychological findings very practical . Beltz, Weinheim / Basel / Berlin 2003, ISBN 3-407-36030-4 .
  • Hans Schiefele: Learning motivation and motive learning: Fundamentals of an educational theory of motivation . Ehrenwirth, Munich 1974, ISBN 3-431-01651-0 .
  • Ulrich Schiefele: Motivation and learning with texts . Hogrefe, Göttingen / Bern / Toronto / Seattle 1996, ISBN 3-8017-0800-4 .
  • Klaus-Peter Wild: The importance of corporate learning environments for the long-term development of intrinsic and extrinsic motivational learning orientations . In: Ulrich Schiefele, Klaus-Peter Wild (Hrsg.): Interest and motivation to learn: new studies on development and effects . Waxmann, Münster / New York / Munich / Berlin 2000, ISBN 3-89325-881-7 , pp. 73-93 .

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ R. Koestner, N. Lekes, TA Powers, E. Chicoine (2002) Attaining personal goals: Self concordance plus implementation intentions equals success . Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 83, 213-244. Quoted from: Maja Storch , motto goals, SMART goals and motivation. In: Bernd Birgmeier (Ed.): Coaching knowledge. Because you don't know what you're doing? VS Verlag für Sozialwissenschaften / GWV Fachverlage GmbH, Wiesbaden 2009, pp. 183–205. ISBN 978-3-531-16306-2 Introduction.
  2. ↑ R. Koestner, GF Losier (2002): Distinguishing three ways of being highly motivated: A closer look at introjection, identification, and intrinsic motivation. In EL Deci & RM Ryan (Eds.), Handbook of self-determination research, pp. 101-121. Rochester, NY: University of Rochester Press. Quoted from: Kurt Reusser, Christine Pauli, Monika Waldis: Lesson design and teaching quality. Results of an international and Swiss video study on mathematics lessons , Waxmann Verlag, 2010, ISBN 978-3-8309-7136-8 p. 273 .