Theoretical Background

Among the several factors associated to students’ achievement at school, the individual characteristics are considered as critical ones. Their source can be home, family, culture and community and they can be categorized in attitudes and dispositions, physical influences and attributes, preschool experiences and other background elements  (Hattie, 2009). The present work will focus on the association between learning growth and attitudes and dispositions, more specifically, academic self-efficacy, interest in mathematics, and perceived competence about mathematics.The academic self-efficacy is based on the general construct of self-efficacy, defined as “the belief in one’s capability to organize and execute courses of action required to produce desired attainments” (Bandura, 1986, p.391). Since the concept is sensitive to different contexts it must be specifically anchored to the domain or object of interest (Bandura, 1997), that is, in school contexts it needs to be focused to scholar tasks and be subject-specific as well.

The perceived ability or competence at school differs from self-efficacy, since it does not link the own perception with a potential success given certain abilities (Friedel, Cortina, Turner & Midgley, 2007). Interest refers to the importance, usefulness given to a school subject and it relation to positive emotions as well (Krapp, 1992).

There is evidence in support of the existence association between these students’ motivational variables and learning growth (e.g. Hattie, 2009; Greene et al, 1999; Pajares & Graham, 1999; Singh et al, 2002; Zimmerman, 1995). Nevertheless, there are some considerations that this work is intended to overcome. On one hand, the measures of achievement used have not been always standardized (e.g. Pajares & Graham, 1999) and on the other hand, covariables that impact achievement as well are not always available, such as teaching quality or socioeconomic status).

Research question

How are students' motivation characteristics associated with learning growth in mathematics in 7^th graders when controlling for teaching quality and socioeconomic status?

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