Modeling and attributional effects on children's achievement: A self-efficacy analysis.

Children showing low arithmetic achievement received either modeling of division operations or didactic instruction, followed by a practice period.During practice, half of the children in each instructional treatment received effort attribution for success and difficulty.Both instructional treatments enhanced division persistence, accuracy, and perceived efficacy, but cognitive modeling produced greater gains in accuracy.In the context of competency development, effort attribution had no significant effect either on perceived efficacy or on arithmetic performance.Perceived efficacy was an accurate predictor of arithmetic performance across levels of task difficulty and modes of treatment.The treatment combining modeling with effort attribution produced the highest congruence between efficacy judgment and performance. Article:The theory of self-efficacy postulates that different modes of influence change behavior in part by creating and strengthening self-percepts of efficacy (Bandura, 1977, in press).Perceived self-efficacy is concerned with judgments of one's capability to perform given activities.In this view, perceived self-efficacy affects behavioral functioning by influencing people's choice of activities, effort expenditure, and persistence in the face of difficulties.The higher the perceived efficacy, the greater is the sustained involvement in the activities and subsequent achievement.Achievement behavior has been analyzed historically in terms of level of aspiration and outcome expectations.Although these different concepts involve an expectancy element, they differ in important ways from the concept of self-efficacy.Level of aspiration is concerned with the goals people set for themselves (Lewin, 1935;Lewin, Dembo, Festinger, Rotter, Chance, Bandura, Adams, Bandura, Adams, Hardy, & Howells, 1980).Self-efficacy is enhanced by information conveyed through such different treatment modalities as actual performance, modeling, and systematic desensitization.Self-percepts of efficacy predict not only level of behavioral change resulting from different treatments but also variations in coping behavior by persons receiving the same type of treatment and even specific performance attainments by individuals on different tasks.Because self-efficacy is postulated to have motivational effects, it seems especially relevant to children's achievement behavior.Children who have a strong sense of efficacy in a given subject matter would be expected to exhibit strong achievement strivings.In contrast, children who perceive themselves as inefficacious should tend to shun achievement tasks or to engage in them halfheartedly and to give up readily in the face of obstacles.It follows from this theory that experiences designed to raise self-efficacy should also enhance persistence and skillful performance.