Effects of informative feedback on the regulation of achievement goals

This proposed study examines whether different levels of informative feedback can change students’ achievement goal orientation. A factorial repeated-measures MANOVA will be conducted to investigate changes in levels of trichotomous goals and reading comprehension scores of community college students over one academic semester. I hypothesize that both scores will be responsive to the level of informative performance feedback. Participants who get more information about their performance and a strategy to solve similar tasks will show significantly greater increases in mastery and performance-approach goals and decreases in performance-avoidance goals. In addition, effects of demographic variables on the goal-regulation outcomes (e.g., sex and ethnicity) will be examined. Implications for future research and educational applications are presented. This report also includes an evaluation plan which details the components of the trust building program, a model for the program, and the proposed method to measure the reported outcomes.