Effects of Teacher Enthusiasm and Type of Text on the Motivation and Achievement of Schoolchildren

Alberto Valentín; Pedro M Mateos; Maria Mar González-Tablas; Estrella López

doi:10.3389/fpsyg.2022.842521

Effects of Teacher Enthusiasm and Type of Text on the Motivation and Achievement of Schoolchildren

Front Psychol. 2022 May 30:13:842521. doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2022.842521. eCollection 2022.

Authors

Alberto Valentín¹, Pedro M Mateos¹, Maria Mar González-Tablas¹, Estrella López¹

Affiliation

¹ Faculty of Psychology, University of Salamanca, Salamanca, Spain.

Abstract

This study aims to analyze the effects of teacher enthusiasm and type of text on student motivation and achievement. The participants were 369 elementary school students. We used four videos showing a teacher presenting two texts (narrative or descriptive) in two conditions of enthusiasm (high or neutral). A MANOVA revealed additive effects due to enthusiasm and text type on motivation and achievement, but no interaction. Mediation analyzes indicated that enthusiasm showed direct and indirect effects through motivation only for descriptive text. Therefore, the motivational mediation between teacher enthusiasm and student achievement could be especially important when the text is descriptive.

Keywords: achievement; intrinsic motivation; schoolchildren; teacher enthusiasm; type of text.