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Expectancy value theory presumes that learners’ motivation is determined by their expectancy beliefs and task values associated with learning tasks. This study examined students’ cost and its relation to expectancy beliefs, other task value components in physical education. Middle school students (N = 593) from 11 schools completed the expectancy-value questionnaire. Qualitative analysis of students’ responses to open-ended questions showed motivational cost originated from curriculum content, instructional conditions/elements, physical discomfort, lack of social support and competence and teacher factors. Chi-square analysis suggests that students’ motivational cost is associated with their hypothetical choices of attending physical education. Motivational cost was found to be negatively associated with other task value components, but not with expectancy beliefs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Motivation to learn is a disposition developed through exposure to learning opportunities. Guided by the expectancy-value theory of Eccles and Wigfield (1995), this study examined the extent to which expectancy belief and task value influenced elementary school students’ physical activity and knowledge learning in physical education (PE). Students (N = 753) from 15 US public schools contributed student-level and class-level data. With a 2-level design, the data were analyzed using hierarchical linear modeling. Physical activity (t = 3.18; p < .01) positively predicted fitness knowledge. Attainment value (i.e. perception of importance) as the only expectancy-value construct, significantly predicted fitness knowledge (t = 3.07; p < .01), when physical activity was held constant. As the physical activity intensity increased, the positive prediction of attainment value to knowledge attenuated and then turned negative (t = –3.10; p < .01). The study indicated that although a physically-active context helps students to make sense of fitness knowledge, a vigorous context shifts their motivation away from cognitive learning, toward physical participation. To resolve the difficulty of attaining learning objectives both physically and cognitively, PE teachers may want to maintain an active learning context with moderate physical intensity. Future research should address the effect of learner motivation on dual or multiple learning outcomes in PE. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: This study reports adolescent expectancy-value motivation, and its relation to fitness knowledge and psychomotor skill learning in physical education. Students (N =854) from 12 middle schools provided data on expectancy-value motivation, fitness knowledge and psychomotor skill learning. Results from dependent t-test and MANOVA indicated that 8th grade students rated task values significantly lower than 6th grade while their expectancy beliefs did not significantly differ. Students gained sizable fitness knowledge (d =0.58, p <0.05) and badminton skill (d =1.40, p <0.05). Multiple regression analyses revealed that expectancy-value motivation did not significantly predict learning in fitness knowledge or psychomotor skills. These findings suggest that expectancy-value motivation might predict engagement and performance, but not necessarily learning achievement in physical education. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

The purpose of this study was to examine individual and situational interests in learning motor skills as associated with gender and skill. Individual and situational interests and motor skill were measured in middle school girls (n = 109) and boys (n = 82). A correlation analysis for the entire sample showed a moderate correlation between skill and individual interest (r = .63) and weak relationships between individual and situational interest (r < .10) and between situational interest and skill (r < .18). A MANOVA analysis revealed a difference between the boys and girls in situational interest at a borderline significance level (p = .05). However, when individual interest, skill, and gender were compared between students with high or low situational interest in a hierarchical log linear model, it was found that both groups did not differ in number of boys and girls (p = .98). But the high situational interest group had more students with high skill (p = .001) and high individual interest (p = .02). The results suggest that discrepancies in acquired skill accounted for the gender difference and that acquired skill is associated with individual interest and high situational interest in learning motor skills. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: Students'' different perceptions of task values influence their learning experience and achievement in physical education. Framed using the subjective task value construct, this study was conducted to determine the extent to which male and female Chinese middle schoolers with different body sizes differed in their perception of the task values. A second goal of the study was to identify the extent to which the task values along with gender and body size predicted students'' performance on knowledge and physical skill tests. Data from a random sample of students (N =860) from eight Chinese middle schools revealed that the boys appreciated intrinsic (p =.001) and utility values (p =02); both boys and girls, however, equally appreciated the attainment value (p =.73). The boys performed better in physical skill tests than the girls (p =.001), whereas the girls scored higher in knowledge tests than the boys (p =.04). Regression analyses revealed that gender is the only predictor for performance on both knowledge and skill tests. Utility value and body size were predictors for skill, not for knowledge. These findings indicate that Chinese middle school boys and girls differed in valuing and achieving in physical education. The findings imply that Chinese boys need to strengthen cognitive learning and girls need to strengthen psychomotor skill development in physical education. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]