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Measuring Motivation in Educational Settings: A Case for Pragmatic Measurement

Item

Title
Measuring Motivation in Educational Settings: A Case for Pragmatic Measurement
Abstract/Description
A reality of conducting motivation research in educational settings is that there are tensions between technical standards of research and practical constraints of a given situation. Although adherence to standards for high-quality measurement is critical for good-quality data to be collected, measurement also requires substantial resources to ensure quality. In the current chapter, we discuss several examples of real data collected in different educational settings using a pragmatic measurement framework. Based on contemporary measurement perspectives, the pragmatic measurement framework emphasizes building evidence-based arguments to support the use and interpretation of a measure. Example 1 explores college students’ attitudes toward general education classes. Example 2 tracks students’ classroom motivation over several time points. Example 3 assesses experimental differences from an online motivation intervention. Together the three examples cover a range of possible research questions that researchers may encounter. As a whole, this chapter demonstrates that important and meaningful insights can be gained using pragmatic approaches to measurement. Importantly, we discuss the trade-offs that researchers or other measure users must consider when adopting a pragmatic approach to measurement.
Author/creator
Kosovich, Jeff J.
Hulleman, Chris S.
Barron, Kenneth E.
Date
2019
In publication
The Cambridge Handbook of Motivation and Learning
Editor
Renninger, K. Ann
Hidi, Suzanne E.
Series
Cambridge Handbooks in Psychology
Pages
713-738
Publisher
Cambridge University Press
Resource type
en Research/Scholarly Media
Resource status/form
en Published Text
en Manuscript
Scholarship genre
en Empirical
IRE Approach/Concept
Practical Measures
Validity
Open access/full-text available
en Yes
ISBN
978-1-107-17793-2
URL
Official Publisher's Webpage (Cambridge University Press)
Full-Text PDF Shared by Author (ResearchGate)
Citation
Kosovich, J. J., Hulleman, C. S., & Barron, K. E. (2019). Measuring Motivation in Educational Settings: A Case for Pragmatic Measurement. In K. A. Renninger & S. E. Hidi (Eds.), The Cambridge Handbook of Motivation and Learning (pp. 713–738). Cambridge University Press. https://doi.org/10.1017/9781316823279.030
Cited in
Measurement for Improvement
Place
Cambridge
Item sets
Open Access Resource (IRE)
Handbook Chapter 18 Citations

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