performance goal orientations detract from academic attainment and suggest
instead that different types of goal orientations may be effective in various
situations. A mastery orientation appears to be effective in sustaining interest
in learning (as a process) whereas an approach goal orientation may be effec-
tive in motivating the attainment of academic outcomes. These findings are
consistent with evidence that successful college students report striving for
positive performance outcomes, such as academic grades, as well as high
quality learning processes (Van Etten, Freebern, & Pressley, 1997). Later we
discuss evidence that students who shift from learning processes to perform-
ance outcomes display superior learning and motivation than students who
rigidly adhere to either learning or performance goals (Zimmerman & Kit-
santas, 1999).
Goals With Progress Feedback and Self-Evaluation
Whether learners pursue learning or performance goals, it is important that
they perceive themselves as making progress toward goal attainment (Locke
& Latham, 2002). However, it is difficult to ascertain progress in achieving
one’s goals when standards of progress are unclear and when signs of prog-
ress are subtle (e.g., during reading comprehension or composing textual ma-
terial). In these circumstances, social feedback from a teacher indicating
learning progress can strengthen learners’ self-efficacy beliefs and motiva-
tion.
Schunk and Swartz (1993a, 1993b) hypothesized that providing learners
with goals and progress feedback would positively affect writing achievement
outcomes and self-regulation beyond the learning setting. An adult modeled
a five-step writing strategy (e.g., choose a topic to write about, pick the main
idea, etc.). After watching a model use the strategy, the children received
guided practice in applying the strategy to writing, and the children had a se-
ries of opportunities to practice applying the strategy by themselves. Process-
goalchildren received instructions at the start of each session that emphasized
learning to use the writing strategy whereas product-goal students received in-
structions emphasizing completing the assigned paragraphs; general goal chil-
dren were merely asked to do their best. A subgroup of children in the process
goal condition received verbal progress feedback from the model periodically
that linked strategy use causally with improved performance (e.g., “You’re do-
ing well because you applied the steps in order”). Process-goal plus feedback
students outperformed product-goal and general-goal students in self-efficacy,
writing achievement, and strategy use when writing paragraphs and displayed
greater transfer to new writing tasks after 6 weeks.
Schunk (1996) subsequently investigated how goals and self-evaluation af-
fect mathematical learning and achievement outcomes. After instruction and
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