Destin Mesmin, Oyserman Daphna
University of Michigan.
J Exp Soc Psychol. 2010 Sep 1;46(5):846-849. doi: 10.1016/j.jesp.2010.04.004.
Most American children expect to attend college but because they do not necessarily spend much time on schoolwork, they may fail to reach their imagined "college-bound" future self. The proposed identity-based motivation model helps explain why this gap occurs: Imagined "college-bound" identities cue school-focused behavior if they are salient and feel relevant to current choice options, not otherwise. Two studies with predominantly low-income and African American middle school students support this prediction. Almost all of the students expect to attend college, but only half describe education-dependent (e.g., law, medicine) adult identities. Having education-dependent rather than education-independent adult identities (e.g., sports, entertainment) predicts better grades over time, controlling for prior grade point average (Study 1). To demonstrate causality, salience of education-dependent versus education-independent adult identities was experimentally manipulated. Children who considered education-dependent adult identities (vs. education-independent ones) were eight times more likely to complete a take-home extra credit assignment (Study 2).
大多数美国孩子都期望上大学，但由于他们不一定在学业上花费太多时间，他们可能无法成为自己想象中的“有望上大学”的未来自我。提出的基于身份的动机模型有助于解释这种差距为何会出现：如果想象中的“有望上大学”的身份很突出且感觉与当前的选择相关，它们就会促使以学校为重点的行为，否则则不会。两项主要针对低收入和非裔美国中学生的研究支持了这一预测。几乎所有学生都期望上大学，但只有一半的学生描述了依赖教育的（如法律、医学）成人身份。随着时间的推移，拥有依赖教育而非独立于教育的成人身份（如体育、娱乐）能预测更好的成绩，同时控制先前的平均绩点（研究1）。为了证明因果关系，对依赖教育与独立于教育的成人身份的突出性进行了实验性操纵。考虑依赖教育的成人身份（与独立于教育的身份相比）的孩子完成带回家的额外学分作业的可能性高出八倍（研究2）。
