and high arousal in the same measure (e.g., the conceptual change studies and
graphing study). These measures do not allow us to distinguish between acti-
vation and valence. In another study, we included separate measures for va-
lence and arousal allowing us to consider whether arousal is an important
predictor of cognitive processing. However, in interpreting these later results,
it is important to keep in mind the theories reviewed do not adequately ac-
count for arousal differences.
Affect and Conceptual Change in Science Understanding
Conceptual change in science is a specific and narrow aspect of science learn-
ing. Nevertheless, consideration of the role of affect for conceptual change in
science understanding may be useful in applying the theories discussed previ-
ously to a specific academic context. That is, considering how affect relates to
conceptual change in science understanding can help us to understand and
evaluate the usefulness of the theories in understanding the role of affect for
cognitive processing in academic contexts.
In our laboratory, we have conducted a number of studies linking motiva-
tion to conceptual change in college students’ understanding of projectile mo-
tion. As part of this work, two studies (Linnenbrink & Pintrich, 2002b) investi-
gated the relation between affect and students’ learning as a result of reading a
passage on Newtonian physics designed to alter their prior misconceptions
about projectile notion. In particular, we asked students to report on their af-
fect while reading the passage and then examined the relation of this affect to
their change in understanding of projectile motion (as indexed by a pre and
post assessment) and the types of strategies that they used while reading the
passage. The affective measures distinguished between positive and negative
valence but included both high and low activation items on each scale.
In terms of conceptual change, there was a significant positive correlation
between positive affect and performance on the post-test exam (r = .22,p<
.05) for study 1; however, further regression analyses with pre-test exam in-
cluded as a control revealed that positive affect was not significantly related
to post-test exam performance (b= .06,p> .05). Furthermore, for study 2,
the correlation between positive affect and post-test exam was not significant
(r = .11,p> .05), nor was there a significant relation once pre-test exam was
included as a control (b= .04,p> .05). This suggests that while positive affect
may be associated with enhanced achievement on the post-test, it is not
linked with increased conceptual change. That is, feeling positively while
reading the physics passage was not associated with a significant change in
understanding of Newtonian physics.
We also examined how positive affect related to adaptive strategy use in
order to gain a broader picture regarding the links between positive affect
68 LINNENBRINK AND PINTRICH