Self-efficacy in academic settings relates to more task-specific beliefs (e.g., knowing the letters in one’s own name), whereas self-concept refers more generally to beliefs about one’s competence and ability (e.g., expecting to be able to learn how to read). Students’ perceptions of their own competence in relation to academic achievement have been conceptualized in different ways-with self-efficacy and self-concept being the two most widely studied constructs (Pajares & Schunk, 2001). We take care to recognize that “learning” with in the lines of this definition, does not only involve formal instruction, but also includes developmentally-relevant literacy experiences that children have outside of the school context. Along these lines, we adopted Ainley’s ( 2006) definition of “interest”: “Interest is conceptualized as an affective state that represents students’ subjective experience of learning the state that arises from either situational triggers or a well-developed individual interest” (Ainley, 2006, p. 392). We focus on students’ enjoyment of literacy activities in school and at home because we are concerned with the feelings that students bring with them into learning situations-feelings that we assume will exert an influence on their performance. In our approach, interest is conceptualized as an affective state and centers on students’ subjective experience of literacy situations. The findings from our study, with its particular time window, illustrate the dynamic interplay between motivation and skill.
To the best of our knowledge, our study is the first to use a latent-variable longitudinal cross-lagged analysis to investigate the associations between interest, self-concept and skill in the first year of formal schooling.
In addition, most previous research in this field has relied on cross-sectional designs (e.g., Chapman, Tunmer & Prochnow, 2000 Morgan & Fuchs, 2007). However, we know less about how early these mechanisms come into play, because few studies have investigated the associations between motivation and reading performance in young readers. Previous studies have documented bidirectional associations between motivational beliefs and reading performance in middle- and secondary-school readers (Conradi, Jang & McKenna, 2014 Petscher, 2010 Schiefele, Schaffner, Möller & Wigfield, 2012). The state of the art in motivation research suggests that reading skills, literacy interest and reader self-concept develop in an interrelated way. Thus, both literacy interest and reader self-concept are considered important for students’ learning and for the development of reading skills. Students who see themselves as good readers will anticipate success in academic situations and often perform better at academic tasks than students who exhibit poor self-belief and hence anticipate failure (Murphy & Alexander, 2000 Zimmerman, 2000). In the final part of the article, we address the potential theoretical progress attainable through the use of cross-lagged designs in this field.Ĭhildren who are driven by interest are likely to devote more time and effort to reading tasks and often feel more competent as readers (Ecalle, Magnan & Gibert, 2006). We also found bidirectional relationships between reading skills and self-concept and between the motivational components of literacy interest and reader self-concept. Cross-lagged analysis showed strong stability in reading skills and medium stability in literacy interest and reader self-concept over the first school year. To examine relationships between early reading skills, literacy interest and reader self-concept, we tested 1141 children twice during their first year of formal reading instruction in school. However, there is less research about cross-lagged relationships between motivational factors and reading skills in beginning readers. A growing body of research has also reported associations between motivational factors and reading in early phases of reading development.
Previous studies have documented robust relationships between emergent literacy and later reading performance.
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