Abstract:
The purpose of the present exploratory study was to examine Latino and Caucasian students’ utility value beliefs, interest value beliefs, expectancy beliefs, academic locus of control beliefs, and perceptions of socializers’ beliefs as predictors of academic behaviors and mathematics performance. Using Eccles et al.’s (1983) expectancy-value theory of achievement motivation to ground the study, six research questions examined: (a) the direct and indirect effects of expectancy and value beliefs as predictors of students’ attention focusing, self-sustained mathematics efforts, persistence and mathematics performance, (b) the direct and indirect effects of cognitive processes on students’ expectancy-value beliefs, and (c) whether differences emerged in the relationships of interest as a result of group membership. Using the 2012 U.S. PISA dataset, the study sample consisted of 781 (n = 781) U.S. Latino high school students and 1,707 (n = 1,707) U.S. Caucasian students. Path analysis results suggest that cognitive processes predicted students’ expectancy and value beliefs, task value beliefs only predicted academic behaviors, while expectancy beliefs predicted both academic behaviors and mathematics performance. Study results have important implications for theory and practice. First, in regards to theory, (a) differences emerged in the functioning of expectancy and value beliefs as interest value was a stronger predictor of effort than utility value and self-efficacy, (b) efficacy beliefs more strongly predicted persistence than value beliefs, and (c) efficacy beliefs predicted mathematics performance. Further, it was found that parental influences had a stronger effect on students’ expectancy-value beliefs than peer influences, while locus of control predicted expectancy-value beliefs at similar rates. Second, study findings have educational implications as results: (a) further highlight the importance of students’ efficacy beliefs in predicting academic behaviors and performance, (b) suggest that utility value and interest value are two different venues through which educators can influence their students’ academic behaviors, and (c) suggests that parental beliefs can influence their children’s expectancy-value beliefs—particularly their utility value beliefs.
