Child Youth Care Forum (2011) 40:135149 DOI 10.

1007/s10566-010-9126-2 ORIGINAL PAPER

Parental Autonomy Support and Student Learning Goals: A Preliminary Examination of an Intrinsic Motivation Intervention
John Mark Froiland

Published online: 3 November 2010 Springer Science+Business Media, LLC 2010

Abstract In a seven week quasi-experimental study, parents (n = 15) of elementary school students (n = 15) learned autonomy supportive communication techniques that included helping their children set learning goals for homework assignments. Treatment vs. comparison group (n = 30) ANCOVA analyses revealed that the parents in the treatment group perceived their children as becoming more autonomously motivated relative to the comparison group, F(1, 26) = 7.69, p \ .05. Children in the treatment group reported increased positive affect toward homework relative to the comparison group, F(1,26) = 5.35, p \ .05. Children did not signicantly improve on general measures of self reported academic intrinsic motivation or relative autonomy. These preliminary ndings suggest that autonomy supportive parenting styles may improve parents perceptions of their childrens autonomous motivation and childrens subjective experience of positive affect surrounding homework. In order to draw rmer conclusions about the effects of the intervention, more rigorously controlled studies will be needed in the future. Keywords Parenting style Homework Intrinsic motivation Elementary school students Goal setting

This article is based on a doctoral dissertation completed at Michigan State University by John Mark Froiland under the supervision of Jere Brophy. This article is dedicated in memory of Jere Brophy, who made priceless contributions to the elds of educational psychology, teacher education, developmental psychology, school psychology, and motivational science. J. M. Froiland Department of Counseling, Educational Psychology, and Special Education, Michigan State University, East Lansing, MI, USA J. M. Froiland (&) Department of School Psychology, University of Northern Colorado, McKee Hall 298, Box 131, Greeley, CO 80639, USA e-mail: john.froiland@unco.edu

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Introduction Children who are intrinsically motivated to learn appreciate learning opportunities and nd learning meaningful or relevant to meeting psychological needs such as gaining competence, connecting with others, expressing themselves, seeing the beauty in knowledge or pursuing their interests (Brophy 2008; Ryan and Deci 2000). Motivation to learn entails students seeing learning activities as meaningful and primarily seeking the enhanced knowledge, understanding, or skills that an academic task affords (Brophy 2004). In contrast, a child who is primarily extrinsically motivated may study in order to get good grades, impress others or avoid punishments. Intrinsic motivation is associated with numerous psychological and academic benets such as persistence in the face of difculty, creativity (Grolnick et al. 2002), positive affect, deeper understanding of what is studied (Conti et al. 1995), better grades and standardized achievement scores (Gottfried 1990) and fewer behavioral problems (Battistich et al. 1996). Most children experience a gradual decline in intrinsic motivation as they move from the primary grades to high school (Gottfried et al. 2001; Lepper et al. 2005; Sansone and Morgan 1992), while extrinsic motivation remains stable (Lepper et al. 2005). Since intrinsic motivation is a precious resource, the current study sought to develop a way of enhancing intrinsic motivation to learn in children. Autonomous Motivation to Learn Self-determination theory posits that motivation to learn can be characterized on a continuum from a complete lack of motivation for a learning activity to intrinsic motivation (Ryan and Deci 2000; Vansteenkiste et al. 2006). Although they show more effort than those with no motivation, children who are extrinsically regulated to learn are merely pursuing rewards (e.g., gold stars) and avoiding punishments (e.g., getting chided for a bad grade). Extrinsic regulation is associated with the least psychological health of all the levels of academic self-regulation (Ryan and Connell 1989). Since extrinsically regulated children feel controlled by others or by circumstances, extrinsic regulation is considered a form of controlled motivation (Vansteenkiste et al. 2006). A slightly improved form of controlled motivation is introjected regulation, wherein children study because they feel like they have to in order to avoid guilt, embarrassment or failure. Introjected children appear to be intrinsically motivated because they work hard without prompting but they are often anxious and may engage in maladaptive strategies in response to failure such as denial or self-deprecating remarks (Ryan and Connell 1989; Ryan and Deci 2000). The next higher level of motivation, identied regulation, falls into the category of autonomous motivation, as does intrinsic motivation. Identied regulation involves embracing the personal relevance of a learning activity or topic (Vansteenkiste et al. 2006) and aligns closely with what Brophy (2008) referred to as motivation to learn, which entails nding learning activities meaningful and worthy of purposeful engagement. For instance, a child may freely choose to do his math homework because his parents convinced her that math skills will help her function effectively in society. The highest form of autonomous motivation is intrinsic motivation (Ryan and Connell 1989; Ryan and Deci 2000). Thus, Ryan and Connells frequently used measure of academic self-regulation uses intrinsic motivation as the highest subscale. Intrinsic motivation to learn involves studying, reading, or writing because one nds it inherently enjoyable or interesting (Ryan and Deci 2000). Although both forms of autonomous motivation (identied and intrinsic) are

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associated with numerous psychological and educational benets, intrinsic motivation is the most benecial (Rigby et al. 1992). Autonomy Support and Motivation Self-determination theory posits that autonomy support is the key element for helping to socialize autonomous motivation (Ryan and Deci 2000). Parental autonomy support entails empathic responding to childrens feelings and statements, allowing developmentally appropriate choice and self-expression, and explaining why one would really want to engage in a learning-related behavior (Joussemet et al. 2008). Allowing children to solve problems on their own is an important component of autonomy support (Grolnick and Pomerantz 2009), which entails parents warmly and quietly paying attention to their childs progress as they face a challenging task (Kenny-Benson and Pomerantz 2005). Parental autonomy support is related to higher intrinsic motivation and many other psychological and educational benets associated with autonomous forms of motivation (e.g., Deci et al. 1993; Gottfried et al. 1994; Grolnick et al. 2002). For instance, parental autonomy support for homework is associated with stronger grades, higher standardized tests scores, and higher rates of homework completion (Cooper et al. 2000). Controlling parent communication (or psychological control) is basically the opposite of autonomy support (Kenny-Benson and Pomerantz 2005) and involves pressuring children to comply with demands, using false imperatives (e.g., You must go up and study, this instant!), viewing conversations or events from a parent perspective only, and interrupting children as they attempt to think, explain themselves or solve a problem (Deci et al. 1993; Grolnick and Pomerantz 2009). Besides being related to lower levels of intrinsic motivation (Deci et al. 1993), controlling parent behavior is linked to perfectionism on the part of children, which, in turn, is related to depressive symptoms (Kenny-Benson and Pomerantz 2005). In reviewing the literature involving self-determination theory and parenting, Joussemet et al. (2008) concluded by calling for the development of intervention research that promotes childrens autonomous self-regulation via training parents to be more autonomy supportive and less controlling. Learning Goals and Motivation Learning goals also provide a potential pathway to intrinsic motivation. Children who approach academic activities with learning goals are oriented toward increasing their understanding, knowledge and skill (Brophy 2004; Grant and Dweck 2003). Learning goals entail children seeking to grow in competence (Grant and Dweck 2003), so they are akin to intrinsic goals for learning, which involve engaging in academic activities for the sake of enhancing personal growth or gaining skills that could eventually be used to better the community (Vansteenkiste et al. 2006). Intrinsic goals focus students attention on the learning material (as opposed to performance concerns), thereby promoting deep processing that takes one beyond mere rote learning. In laboratory experiments, students induced toward intrinsic learning goals exhibited deeper levels of conceptual understanding, especially if they were encouraged to take an intrinsic goals orientation in an autonomy supportive way (e.g., You can look at this task as a way of strengthening your understanding, rather than You should; Vansteenkiste et al. 2006). Children with learning goals often experience benets related to intrinsic motivation such as the following: viewing high effort as a strategy for pursuing mastery, voluntarily pursuing challenging tasks, and pouring emotional energy into learning (Grant and Dweck 2003).

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Two non-examples of learning goals are performance-approach and performanceavoidance goals. Children with performance-approach goals (e.g., I want to get 95% or more correct on my homework) aim to acquire a good evaluation and children with performance-avoidance goals (e.g., I dont want to fail the test) are focused on avoiding a negative evaluation (Rawsthorne and Elliot 1999). Children who have performanceavoidance goals experience lower levels of intrinsic motivation (Rawsthorne and Elliot 1999). Kasser and Ryan (1996) found that intrinsic goals that involve helping others or making the world a better place are associated with a greater sense of vitality, positive emotions, and fewer somatic complaints. Reiss (2004) has also provided evidence that the idealistic or altruistic desire to improve society is a universally important intrinsic goal. In the current study, children were taught how to set intrinsic learning goals that entail seeking greater understanding of the subject, gaining skills that may empower them to better help others, or discovering something interesting. Promoting a focus on understanding and discovery could help children develop their intellectual curiosity, which is associated with higher achievement and an enjoyment of deeper thought (Reiss 2009). Given that parental autonomy support and students learning goals are both linked to student motivation, they could complement one another in an intervention because parental autonomy support is likely to promote learning goals (Grolnick 2009; Gurland and Grolnick 2005). Previous Interventions Entailing Autonomy Support or Learning Goals Few eld-based experimental or quasi-experimental intervention studies have sought to improve the intrinsic motivation of elementary school children over the course of weeks or months. Among those that have, the focus has been on improving classroom instruction or the school environment. For instance, the Child Development Project or CDP (Munoz and Vanderhaar 2006) applies self-determination theory by promoting childrens sense of relatedness to the school community and teaching teachers to provide more autonomy support to students. In quasi-experimental studies involving multiple elementary schools, childrens self-reported intrinsic motivation to learn increased more over time in CDP schools relative to control schools and children who participated in the CDP were less likely to engage in delinquent behavior (Battistich et al. 1996). Related to learning goals interventions, Blackwell et al. (2007) conducted a study in which 7th graders randomly assigned to the treatment group were taught to accommodate an incremental theory of intelligence (a personal belief that they grow smarter through exercising their brain in school) over the course of eight 25-min sessions. At post-treatment, the treatment group, relative to the control group, became more inclined to believe that they could grow smarter through effort and were more likely to be noticed by their math teachers as showing increased zeal. Although learning goals were not directly taught, incremental theorists tend to have a learning goals orientation, which predicts more effort and ultimately better grades (Blackwell et al. 2007). Since learning goals mediate the relationship between an incremental theory and effort, a more direct way to promote motivation may be to teach children to intentionally set learning goals. ParentChild Communication About Homework is Important Cooper et al. (2000) found that parent autonomy support for homework predicted positive academic outcomes, whereas more parent homework involvement in general was related to negative outcomes. They concluded that it is autonomy supportive involvement in

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homework that makes the difference, rather than parent involvement of any sort. In other words, some parent communication (i.e., controlling) about homework actually backres by creating excessive pressure (Cooper et al. 2000, 2006). Corno (1996) explained that many parents and elementary school children view homework as a dreaded grind (p. 29), which could create a desire in children to avoid homework or promote rushing to get it done without valuing the learning opportunities. In fact, by the middle of elementary school, most children say that homework is boring (Coutts 2004). Since homework is positively related to childrens academic achievement (Cooper et al. 2006) and is a source of stress for many families, it is important to develop interventions that empower parents to provide autonomy support and help their children build autonomous motivation for doing homework. The Current Investigation This study sought to help children improve their autonomous motivation and homework feelings through teaching parents how to be autonomy supportive and how to teach their children to set learning goals. The intervention targeted fourth and fth graders because the rank-order consistency of academic intrinsic motivation becomes more stable (e.g., children with lower motivation levels are less likely to surpass more motivated peers on measures of motivation) as students approach age 13. In other words, like personality and intelligence, academic intrinsic motivation becomes more stable and trait-like as children enter the teen years (Marcoulides et al. 2008). Thus, academic intrinsic motivation may be more pliable and responsive to interventions prior to adolescence (Marcoulides et al. 2008). Furthermore, the study included parental communication surrounding homework, which is assigned more frequently in fourth and fth grade than in the early elementary school years. The motivational intervention taught parents how to support the autonomy of their children, particularly when talking about learning or homework. Parents also learned how to teach their children to set learning goals related to homework. The intervention in this study is preventive in that parents and children were not selected for treatment based on any identied motivational orientation or motivating style deciency; rather, it was hoped that the intervention would enhance parental communication and child motivation, regardless of their starting points. A social learning model (SLM) of parent training provided a vehicle for teaching parents how to become more autonomy supportive. SLM training/consultation involves effective teaching techniques, such as verbal persuasion, modeling, role-playing and corrective feedback (Brown et al. 2001). SLM training is effective for enhancing the treatment integrity of the trainee more than didactic forms of instruction (Sterling-Turner et al. 2001). Hypotheses The current study adds to the motivational literature by examining the effects of teaching parents how to foster intrinsic motivation to learn in upper elementary students. Intrinsic motivation was targeted through a two-pronged intervention: teaching parents autonomy supportive communication techniques for learning related issues and teaching parents how to support their children in setting intrinsic learning goals for homework. The study was designed to make an initial determination of the motivational interventions potential utility in community settings. The following predictions were examined: (1) the intervention would lead to signicantly enhanced intrinsic and autonomous motivation, as

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measured by the Relative Autonomy Index, the Parent Questionnaire of Child Motivation to Learn, and the Childrens Academic Intrinsic Motivation Inventory; (2) the treatment would lead to signicantly enhanced emotional health surrounding homework, as measured by the Inventory of Homework Feelings; (3) treatment integrity for parental autonomy support and childrens written learning goals would be signicantly related to improvement on childrens outcomes.

Method Participants The participants were fourth and fth-grade children, along with their parents. The families were recruited through three private elementary schools in or near a mid-sized Midwestern city. This metropolitan area is known for relatively high percentages of residents with a bachelors or graduate degree. The vast majority of the students in each school were white. Pre-study talks with administrators about the schools and the families they served indicated that the schools served predominantly middle class families. The treatment group included 15 parents and children (11 boys and 4 girls) and another 15 families (with 11 girls and 4 boys) participated in the comparison group. Eight fourth graders and seven fth graders participated in the treatment group, while six fourth graders and nine fth graders participated in the comparison group. Parent questionnaires in the comparison and treatment groups were completed by mothers, with the exception of one single parent father in the treatment group who completed questionnaires. Within the treatment group, 10 families had a mother, father, and child participate in the motivational training sessions, four families had only a mother and child participate, and one family had only a child and father participate. Children joined the researcher and parents at a table in each familys home and observed the sessions. They also actively participated in the last 5 min of each session when the parents practiced autonomy supportive techniques during parentchild games. Parents were recruited through schools in which teachers sent a yer home with all of the fourth or fth grade children in their classrooms. This yer let parents know of the opportunity to either ll out motivational surveys at the beginning and end of the study or to participate in the sessions, in addition to lling out the surveys. The yer explained that families who only lled out surveys would receive a $5 gift certicate to a local bookstore at the end of the study, while the families that also participated in the sessions would receive a $20 gift certicate to a bookstore. The comparison group consisted of families that returned the yer and indicated that they would be willing to only ll out surveys. The author sent these families the four surveys during the week that the treatment groups sessions began. When the treatment group nished the seven sessions (8 weeks later), the same surveys were sent to the comparison group families again. Procedure A total of seven parent training sessions were conducted, once a week. Each session lasted 30 min in each familys home. Parent training was provided by a researcher with advanced training in psychological consultation and family systems. The intervention taught parents

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to develop an autonomy supportive style and help their children set intrinsic learning goals through clear explanations of concepts (e.g., autonomy support versus control), verbal persuasion (e.g., sharing the benets associated with learning goals), modeling, roleplaying, practice, and feedback. Because many people conate autonomy support with providing unlimited choice, the term inspirational motivational style (IMS) was used as the label for the construct. Parents were provided with a parent booklet, which reiterated the key concepts associated with the IMS and learning goals, while also providing hypothetical examples of parental autonomy support and typical child reactions. Within the booklet, quick reference sheets were highlighted which break the IMS into concrete verbal/ behavioral components and provide reproducible learning goal sheets. In each session, the consultant modeled (playing the role of the parent) components of autonomy support in education-related scenarios. According to the scripts (parents received scripts for role-plays each session), one of the parents started by playing the role of the child, which afforded parents an opportunity to walk in their childs shoes. Before demonstrating an autonomy supportive style in a particular scenario, the consultant modeled (playing the role of the parent) what not to do in an isomorphic situation. Namely, the consultant either used an over-controlling or passive style. In order to provide levity, some role-plays involved acting like either an absurdly laissez-faire or controlling parent (e.g., I see that you did not turn in your homework, drop and do 79 push-ups), which may have eased a sense of performance pressure among parents (Webster-Stratton and Herbert 1993). The consultant introduced each new set of scenarios with a brief explanation of the particular component of autonomy support being featured. After the parent played the role of the child in the rst enactments of a scenario, the parent and consultant then switched scripts, and the parent played the role of the inspirational parent only. If two parents were present, one parent observed the enactments of the rst scenario and became the participant in the second role-play scenario of the session. The following is one abbreviated example of a scenario that involved modeling and role-playing: (1a) Warm listening- the positive model involves a parent warmly and attentively watching and listening as the child describes how her math test went; (1b) Passive contrast- the parent pretends to listen to her child, saying, Uh-huh frequently, while reading the newspaper; (1c) Controlling contrast- as the child is describing her feelings about the test, the parent interrupts and says, Bottom line, what did you score? Various other components of autonomy support were highlighted through scenarios, including the following: empathic statements; autonomy supportive response to a good grade (e.g., Wow, thats great, I noticed how much effort you put into studying; Im interested to hear what youve learned!); resilient and learning oriented response to a bad grade; mastery-oriented feedback; subtly point to the intrinsic value of a disliked homework task; use of a metaphor or parable to reframe the way one views homework. Over the course of seven sessions, parents practiced the 19 IMS techniques listed in the appendix of the parent booklet. During and after the autonomy supportive role-plays, parents received informational feedback and encouragement. During the last 5 min of each session, parents practiced the autonomy supportive motivational style during non-threatening and fun educational games. In order to facilitate generalization, every parent (or couple) received a weekly homework assignment, which required writing out one instance in which they successfully used an autonomy supportive style. The learning goals training began in the second half of the second session. Parents were referred to the parent booklet, which provided examples of learning goals for different

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types of assignments. Each parent received a learning goals sheet with three assignments, but no goals. The parents were asked to create learning goals based on the reminder at the bottom of the learning goals sheet, which said, An inspirational learning goal means you try to understand something more, become better at doing something so that you can help others someday, or discover something interesting. The consultant helped the parents determine if their learning goals satisfactorily followed the prototype, and then the parents practiced teaching the consultant how to set learning goals. At the end of each session, the consultant handed out four blank copies of the learning goals sheets (one for the child to complete each school night). These goals were collected the following week. When any of the goals were performance goals, the consultant gave informational feedback to the parent. Measures Relative Autonomy Index Ryan and Connells (1989) Relative Autonomy Index (RAI) of the Academic Self-Regulation Questionnaire measured childrens growth in autonomous motivation. In accordance with self-determination theory, the RAI rewards more points to more autonomous forms of self-regulation on a progression from extrinsic (e.g., I do my homework because Ill get in trouble if I dont), introjected (e.g., I do my homework because I will feel bad about myself if I dont), identied (e.g., Its important to me to do my homework), and intrinsic regulation (e.g., I enjoy doing my homework). Concurrent validity for the subscales that compose the RAI has been demonstrated and alpha reliability ranges from .62 to .82 (Ryan and Connell 1989). The RAI is a 32 item instrument, which asks children why they do their homework and try to do well in school. Childrens Academic Intrinsic Motivation Inventory Childrens motivation was also followed with the 18 item general scale of the Childrens Academic Intrinsic Motivation Inventory (CAIMI), developed by Gottfried (1986) for fourth through eight graders. Likert items address childrens curiosity, persistence and enjoyment of novel and challenging tasks. The CAIMI is reliable with an alpha coefcient of .83 for the general scale and has been validated in previous studies (e.g., Gottfried 1990). Parent Questionnaire of Child Motivation to Learn The 35-item Parent Questionnaire of Child Motivation to Learn (PQCML) was constructed by the author in order to see whether the intervention would improve parents perception of childrens intrinsic motivation to learn. The Likert items tapped into identied regulation (e.g., My child sees the value in learning), autonomy (My child often chooses to engage in learning tasks beyond school and homework), mastery orientation (e.g., My child prefers easy homework, reversed scored), and affective aspects of intrinsic motivation (e.g., My child says things like, this is a waste of time, reversed scored). The internal consistency (alpha coefcient) for the PQCML was .96. The PQCML demonstrated concurrent validity through positive correlations with the CAIMI and the RAI (see Table 1).

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Child Youth Care Forum (2011) 40:135149 Table 1 Pre-treatment correlations between measures (N = 30) Variables 1. PQCML 2. IHF 3. RAI 4. CAIMI 1 .46* .59** .48** .68** .50** .42* 2 3

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PQCML Parent Questionnaire of Child Motivation to Learn, IHF Inventory of Homework Feelings, RAI Relative Autonomy Index, CAIMI Childrens Academic Intrinsic Inventory * p \ .05; ** p \ .01

Inventory of Homework Feelings In order to assess the effects of the motivational enhancement on students homework emotions, the author constructed 17-item Inventory of Homework Feelings (IHF) was administered to all treatment and control students before and after treatment. The Likert items relate to positive emotions (e.g., I feel good while I work on my homework), as well as anxiety (e.g., I worry that my teacher will nd a lot of mistakes in my homework; My muscles get tight or I get headaches when I do my homework) and childhood depression (e.g., I get tired while I do my homework). The IHF includes both positive and negatively worded items, in order to avoid inducing a response set. The IHF demonstrated strong internal consistency (.90). The IHF was positively correlated with CAIMI and RAI scores (see Table 1). Parent Satisfaction Form for Motivational Consultation Parent satisfaction with the motivational intervention was measured with the 10-item Parent Satisfaction Form for Motivational Consultation, which uses a one-to-ve Likert scale (one indicating strongly disagree to ve representing strongly agree). The survey measures the parents perception of the effectiveness of the intervention, appreciation for the sessions, and perceived consultant expertise and communication style. Treatment Integrity for Parental Autonomy Support In order to gauge the treatment integrity for autonomy support, the consultant collected a weekly parent-generated vignette of how they applied autonomy supportive techniques. Also, the parents recorded the time and day they played a related game with their child, as well as a brief description of how the use of autonomy support went during the game. For each week, a positive example of autonomy support counted as one point, and a completed 10-minute game counted as one point (when the description of how the parents used the autonomy supportive components during the game was absent, only a half point was recorded). Thus, if a parent brought in 6 out of 6 possible autonomy supportive vignettes and played the educational game with their child during 5 out of 6 weeks (each week describing the use of autonomy support during game), their treatment integrity for the autonomy support treatment component was 11/12 or 92%.

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Treatment Integrity for Learning Goals Treatment integrity for learning goals was measured by collecting childrens learning goals sheets weekly. Children received one point for every learning goal (e.g., I will study my spelling words, so that I can become a better writer and people understand what I write), up to 3 learning goals a school night, 4 times a week. No points were given for a performance-approach goal (e.g., I will practice my spelling words so that I get an A on my spelling test), since performance approach goals are likely to neither enhance nor harm childrens intrinsic motivation. One point was taken away for a performance-avoidance goal (e.g., I will do my spelling assignment so that my teacher will not be upset with me or give me a zero), since performance-avoidance goals often undermine intrinsic motivation. Data Analysis The treatment was evaluated in terms of four separate treatment vs. group analyses of covariance (ANCOVAs) for the post-treatment minus pre-treatment difference scores on four instruments. Each analysis controlled for gender and pre-treatment scores on the dependent variable. Furthermore, partial correlations were examined to see if treatment integrity for either parental autonomy support or child learning goals was signicantly associated with outcomes. There was no missing data at the measure level. At the item level per measure: 0.10% of IHF item data was missing; 0.19% of the PQCML; 0.10% of the RAI; and .74% of the CAIMI. Missing data was addressed through regression imputation.

Results Parent Satisfaction and Attrition Total satisfaction scores ranged from 41 to 50 with an average of 46.2 (50 points possible). This suggests the following: parents planned to continue to use both the IMS and the learning goals; parents found the role plays, booklet, and educational games to be helpful; and parents enjoyed the sessions. The attrition rate for the treatment group was 0%. 12 of the 15 families completed 7 sessions in 78 weeks, while 3 of the families completed 6 sessions. Pre-Treatment Comparisons Between Groups A one-way ANOVA indicated that parents in the treatment group perceived their children as having lower autonomous motivation than children in the comparison group; F(1, 28) = 5.22; p \ .05. All other pre-treatment one-way ANOVAs were insignicant, indicating that children in both groups had similar self-perceptions of their motivation and did not differ in feelings about homework. The two groups differed at pre-treatment in terms of selection by gender. An independent samples t-test revealed that there were signicantly more boys in the treatment group than in the comparison group t(28) = -2.8, p \ .01. Thus, parents of boys and parents who perceived their children as having lower motivation to learn were more likely to join the treatment group. Since gender likely

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played a role in parents selecting to participate in the treatment group, pre-treatment to post-treatment analyses controlled for gender. Treatment Effects: Hypotheses One and Two Analyses of covariance (ANCOVAs) were conducted in order to compare the treatment and comparison groups on the post-treatment minus pre-treatment difference scores while controlling for gender and pre-treatment scores on the dependent variables. Gender did not have a signicant effect on any of the outcomes. Conrming hypothesis one from the parents perspective, the group effect was signicant for the PQCML, F(1, 26) = 7.69, p \ .05. Pre-treatment PQCML scores had a signicant effect on treatment gains, F(1,26) = 4.54, p \ .05. Contrary to hypothesis one, there was no signicant effect for group on CAIMI scores, F(1,26) = 1.45, p [ .05, nor was there a signicant effect for group on RAI scores, F(1,26) = 1.76, p [ .05. Hypothesis two was conrmed in that children in the treatment group improved relative to the control group on the IHF, F(1,26) = 5.35, p \ .05. Whereas the effect of gender was non-signicant, the effect of pre-treatment IHF scores was signicant, F(1,26) = 5.73, p \ .05. Effect sizes (Cohens d) in Table 2 indicate that the treatment had a large effect on the PQCML and IHF, whereas it had a moderate effect on the RAI. Hypothesis 3: Treatment Integrity is Correlated with Outcomes Zero-order correlations revealed that treatment integrity for parental autonomy support was positively related with CAIMI (r = .53, p \ .01) and PQCML (r = .59, p \ .01) posttreatment minus pre-treatment scores, but not with IHF or RAI scores. Learning goal treatment integrity scores were only signicantly related to RAI difference scores (r = .39, p \ .05). Partial correlations controlling for learning goals treatment integrity revealed that treatment integrity for parental autonomy support was still signicantly correlated to CAIMI (r = .52, p \ .01) and PQCML(r = .57, p \ .01) post-treatment minus pretreatment scores. On the other hand, partial correlations controlling for parental autonomy
Table 2 Means and standard deviations for treatment and control groups on all measures at pre-treatment and post-treatment, ANCOVA F-test of equal gains (PosttestPretest) hypothesis in the treatment and control groups, and Gain score effect sizes for the treatment group (d1) and the control group (d2) Instrument Treatment group Pretest IHF CAIMI PQCML RAI 52.4 (13.7) 63.4 (9.3) 100.1 (27.2) -21.4 (15.2) Posttest 59.8 (11.7) 65.7 (6.4) 123.3 (24.3) -8.0 (18.4) Comparison group Pretest 52.5 (12.4) 64.4 (9.4) 119.5 (18.1) -20.4 (15.4) Posttest 51.4 (12.9) 64.0 (7.6) 116.3 (20.7) -17.7 (20.3) 5.4* 1.5 7.7* 1.8 .90 .30 .99 .73 -.15 -.08 -.28 .22 F d1 d2

Means are followed by standard deviations in parentheses. These analyses included gender and the respective pre-treatment score on the dependent variable as covariates. IHF Inventory of Homework Feelings, CAIMI Childrens Academic Intrinsic Motivation Inventory, PQCML Parent Questionnaire of Child Motivation to Learn, RAI Relative Autonomy Index. N = 30 (15 in each group). The F test is for the comparison between the treatment and comparison groups on the post-treatment minus pre-treatment difference scores. d1 = Cohens effect size for the difference from pre- to post-treatment for the treatment group. d2 = Cohens effects size for the difference from pre- to post-treatment for the comparison group. * p \ .05

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support treatment integrity revealed a non-signicant relation between learning goals treatment integrity and the RAI difference scores. These ndings indicate that learning goals may not be an essential component of the treatment, whereas treatment integrity for autonomy support may be important for improvement on the CAIMI and PQCML.

Discussion This study provided an initial test of a motivational intervention delivered through the social learning model of parent training. Parents were taught how to implement an autonomy supportive style of communication and how to help their children set learning goals. As predicted in the rst hypothesis, parents in the treatment group, relative to the comparison group, perceived that their children showed marked improvement in signs of intrinsic motivation to learn and autonomy. These preliminary ndings are important since autonomous self-regulation and intrinsic motivation are associated with various indicators of academic and psychological strength. However, the treatment group did not signicantly outgrow the comparison group on the CAIMI or on the RAI, indicating that parents perceptions of childrens motivation was more sensitive to the intervention than childrens perception of their own motivation. As predicted in the second hypothesis, the children in the treatment group made signicant gains on the IHF, which indicates that the children reported experiencing more positive emotions during homework. This is an important extension of Kasser and Ryans (1996) work, since they found intrinsic aspirations to be negatively associated with anxious and somatic complaints among college students. The current study suggests that childrens positive emotions related to homework can be increased through a home-based motivational intervention. Treatment integrity for parental autonomy support was related to improvement on the PQCML and the CAIMI. This suggests that parental autonomy support is a key component in elevating childrens intrinsic motivation to learn. Furthermore, the motivational intervention is only likely to affect childrens perceptions of their academic intrinsic motivation if the autonomy supportive component is implemented with delity. These ndings support those of a study which found that parents who reported encouraging children to focus on intrinsic motives and reported less use of rewards and punishments had children with higher academic intrinsic motivation (Gottfried et al. 1994). When controlling for parental autonomy support treatment integrity, treatment integrity for learning goals was unrelated to improvement on any of the outcomes, indicating that learning goals may be an inert treatment component. Neither form of treatment integrity was related to childrens feelings about homework, but group (treatment vs. comparison) directly predicted improvement in feelings about homework. This indicates that there may have been something about the child participating in the family sessions (e.g., hearing the consultant and parents talk optimistically about learning and homework) that elevated positive emotions related to homework. These results were obtained with a treatment group consisting largely of boys whose parents saw them as originally lower in motivation, whereas the comparison group involved more girls and children whose parents originally felt that they were higher in intrinsic motivation. While it is important for future studies of this motivational intervention to prevent selection effects through employing random assignment, the comparisons made in the current study are somewhat similar to those made in an applied psychology or therapy practice. Mental health professionals serving elementary school

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children often get referrals from teachers or parents who perceive that a child is having more difculty than the average child and a disproportionate amount of such children are boys (e.g., Sciutto et al. 2004). For example, 70% of those referred to school psychologists for any reason are boys (Harris et al. 1987). The goal is often to help the referred children reach similar levels of psychological health as a comparison group that is not perceived to be in need of intervention. Thus, even though the treatment group parents initial motivation to change likely played a role in establishing the treatment effect, the ndings from this study still provide useful information about how this intervention may play out when applied to children who are initially perceived by parents as struggling motivationally. All of the parents completed the two month study, which is striking since reviews of the parent training literature have found that the average reported drop-out rate for parent training is near 30% (Assemany and McIntosh 2002). In a future study, it may be best to utilize wait list controls, so that groups are matched on the perceived need for services. The effects of parental autonomy support on childrens intrinsic motivation may have been partly indirect, via enhanced childrens self-efcacy. People are more motivated to do something when they have strong self-efcacy (i.e., believe that they will be able to reach their goal) and social cognitive theory has found that verbal persuasion promotes selfefcacy (Bandura 2001). Through the increased use of verbal persuasion, parents may have convinced their children that they could nd meaning and purpose in homework and that this was a big part of doing homework well. In other words, by redening success at homework as taking a more positive approach to the process of learning rather than focusing on the attainment of rewards for producing a certain product, children may have felt more self-efcacious about homework. Increased self-efcacy may have further elevated intrinsic motivation. In future studies, investigators may want to examine the role that self-efcacy plays in this intervention. Limitations Random assignment was not employed, which makes it hard to argue that the treatment and control group did not differ in an important way prior to the treatment. Although there were no pre-treatment differences between groups qua childrens ratings of their motivation, parents in the treatment group felt that their children (often boys) were lower in motivation and may have been more willing to learn and apply autonomy supportive communication than the comparison parents would have been. A future larger study of the treatment could overcome the threat of selection effects by using randomized assignment. However, treatment integrity for parental autonomy support was signicantly related to improvement in childrens intrinsic motivation, indicating that specic aspects of the treatment were related to improvements in motivation. Future studies of this intervention would benet from more statistical power with the help of a larger sample. Only large effects could be detected as statistically signicant in the current study. Lochman (2000) pointed out that it is best to rst nd out what works, then in future replicative studies determine how it works and for whom. In future studies, the mediators of the treatment effect may be thoroughly examined by randomly assigning one group to a learning goals only treatment group, another to parental autonomy support only, another to a control, and another to the full treatment. If the whole program is essential, one would expect the greatest gains for those in the full treatment. One would also expect that the two componential groups would show statistically greater gains than the control group. Moreover, any statistically signicant differences between the componential groups might reveal more about the relative effectiveness of each component. Future studies could examine the

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effects of childrens concurrent level of achievement as a moderator, since research suggests that low achievers may benet more from autonomy supportive parental communication than high achievers (Ng et al. 2004). Other potential moderators such as SES, race, and single-parent status can also be examined. Conclusions The intervention was associated with increased autonomous motivation in 4th and 5th graders and treatment acceptability for parents. Higher levels of treatment integrity for parental autonomy support were related to higher levels of childrens intrinsic motivation, suggesting autonomy support may be a key treatment component. The intervention is worthy of further study, since it suggests the potential for empowering parents to foster a precious motivational resource within their children.
Acknowledgments The author would like to thank the late Jere Brophy for repeatedly sharing insight regarding the application of motivational theories. Mark L. Davison provided helpful consultation regarding statistical analyses. Evelyn Oka, Eugene Pernell, Jr., and Mark Reckase also provided helpful comments while serving on the dissertation committee. Appreciation is extended to the schools, parents, and children who supported or participated in this study.

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