Catch and hold: instructional interventions and their differential impact on student interest, attention, and autonomous motivation

In this study, we investigated how various teaching behaviors influence student interest as a situational variable. Specifically, we studied how behaviors related to catch interest (i.e., ephemeral aspects of the learning environment such as instructor humor, nonverbal immediacy, intellectual stimulation) and hold interest (i.e., features of the environment that empower students to reach their personal goals including content relevance and meaningfulness) predicted students’ sustained attention and autonomous motivation. As anticipated, results of a structural regression model indicated that catch interest was linked to students’ sustained attention in class. Conversely, hold interest was related to students’ autonomous motivation. Our results suggest that if teachers want to ensure they maximize student motivation inside the classroom and beyond, they might consider diversifying their teaching behaviors to target both the catch and hold aspects of students’ situational interest.