ABSTRACT

We explore the effect of students’ perceived task difficulty on the mathematics self-efficacy – performance relationship. Specifically, we expand on previous reciprocal effects studies through including students’ self-efficacy for different levels of task difficulty in an empirical investigation. We examined students’ self-efficacy for easy, medium difficulty, and hard tasks and performance on a national mathematics test in a longitudinal study of 95 Norwegian students from grade 8 to grade 9. We found differential relationships between self-efficacy for different levels of task difficulty and national test performance. In support of the ‘skill development’ model, grade 8 national test performance predicted grade 9 self-efficacy for medium and hard, but not easy, tasks. While mastery experiences are likely to arise more easily on easier tasks, such experiences are likely to matter more on harder tasks. Our findings highlight the importance of supporting students’ engagement with challenging tasks to strengthen both their performance and self-efficacy.

摘要

我们探讨了学生感知任务难度对数学自我效能感-表现关系的影响。具体来说，我们通过在实证调查中包括学生对不同任务难度水平的自我效能感来扩展先前的互惠效应研究。我们在一项对 95 名挪威 8 年级至 9 年级学生的纵向研究中，检查了学生在简单、中等难度和困难任务中的自我效能以及在全国数学考试中的表现。我们发现不同水平的自我效能之间存在差异关系。任务难度和国考成绩。在“技能发展”模型的支持下，8 年级国家考试成绩预测了 9 年级学生对中等和困难但不容易的任务的自我效能。虽然在更简单的任务上可能更容易产生精通体验，这样的经历可能对更艰巨的任务更重要。我们的研究结果强调了支持学生参与具有挑战性的任务以增强他们的表现和自我效能感的重要性。