In my previous blog, I explained how the expectancy-value theory represents three components, expectancy, value, and motivation (Reeve, 2008). This blog focuses on the first component, expectancy, and how self-efficacy ties into this theory. Expectancy is the belief about the skills or abilities to complete a goal (Turner, 2022). This belief reveals itself in the form of self-competence and confidence. This sense of self-competence and confidence is called self-efficacy.
Self Efficacy Explained
Self-efficacy is the perceived certainty of self-competence and self-confidence with the expectation of a positive outcome. Tris shows a positive self-concept as she maneuvers the difficult obstacles she is facing during training.
To better explain self-efficacy, it is better to take a step back and look at an overview of Tri’s character goals and the evolution of her development. Efficacy beliefs are future-focused, meaning Tris believes that she will pass her training and become a valiant member of the Dauntless faction (Turner, 2022). Efficacy competence is a person’s current perception of their situation, which means that Tris must stay focused on her goal, regardless of her current, difficult obstacles.
Self-efficacy is the ability to organize and execute skills and use skills to gain the desired outcomes (Turner, 2022). Unfortunately for Tris, she experiences difficulty in the first few weeks of her training. Her mentors are not helpful and do not allow Tris to organize or personalize her schedule and structure for training. Since she cannot rely on her self-confidence in developing agency, Tris develops her self-competence in computer simulations, running faster than her peers, and better fighting skills. She learns to adapt, leveraging her cognitive strengths, and mitigating her physical weaknesses during training exercises. Over time, Tris gains self-confidence in her abilities after she experiences other sources of self-efficacy.
Evolution of Tris' Self-Efficacy
Sources of self-efficacy include personal history, messages from others, models or vicarious living, and personal feelings (Turner, 2022). Personal history is allowing past successes or failures to influence a person’s current perception of a given situation. Tris does not have much personal history to support herself, since she has never experienced life in Dauntless. She has never trained to fight before, so her personal source of self-efficacy is a current evolving experience. Throughout her training, she gains important sources of self-efficacy as she develops her personal history. Since Tris does not have a personal history as a source of self-efficacy, she must have sources elsewhere…
Sources of Self-Efficacy
...sources like friends and family! As I have mentioned a few times in previous blogs, Tris’ parents and family structure aid her sense of self-efficacy. They support her emotionally. Messages from others are an important source of self-efficacy for Tris. Messages from others are when people provide support or do not provide support for a person’s goals (Turner, 2022). Unfortunately, some of Tris’ peers are extremely unsupportive and tease her about her inability to fight and fit into Dauntless. However, Tris’ mentor, now boyfriend, both serves as a model of success and supports her as she adapts her goal-striving.
Models, aka vicarious living, are the third source of self-efficacy (Turner, 2022). Tris’ resilience is strengthened after she sees how her boyfriend accomplishes certain training routines. She can do it, too! Additionally, Tris finds out that she and her boyfriend share a common character trait. Tris realizes that she can persevere despite her current conditions just like her boyfriend.
Other Sources
Other sources, like a growth mindset, and cognitive hope attribute to Tris’ self-efficacy. A growth mindset is a mindset that a person can improve their intelligence with practice and with help from others (Xu et al., 2020). Tris uses feedback from others and self-reactions to develop her performance accomplishment (Turner, 2022). Tris realizes that she can use her emotions to trick the computer simulation training session, improving her results. Now she is the star student, rising to the top of her class! Out of all the other sources of self-efficacy, performance accomplishment strengthens Tris’ confidence and competence the most, further developing her growth mindset.
Cognitive hope plays a large part in Tris’ sources of self-efficacy. Cognitive hope is the ability to have perceptions of agency and form new pathways for problem-solving (Turner, 2022). The secret to Tris’ performance accomplishments is her ability to create alternative solutions to computer simulation training. As she learns how to use multiple pathways to reach her goal, Tris strengthens her perceptions of the agency. Instead of feeling sorry for herself in her difficult living conditions, she practices cognitive hope to mentally ascend to higher levels of competence and confidence.
Final Thoughts
As I can see, Tris experiences and benefits from multiple sources of self-efficacy. Multifaceted sources contribute to her ability to be adaptable, persistent, and resilient during her goal-striving. Over time, Tris’ positive self-efficacy helps her develop into a new identity, with stronger and more resilient character traits.
References
Images are made possible by the fair dealing exception from the copyright act.
Reeve, J. (2008). Understanding Motivation and Emotion. Hoboken, NJ:
Wiley.
Turner, J. (2022). 2022 E-V, Self-Efficacy [Powerpoint Slides]. Learning and
Cognition, Florida State University.
Xu, K. M., Koorn, P., de Koning, B., Skuballa, I. T., Lin, L., Henderikx, M.,
Marsh, H. W., Sweller, J., & Paas, F. (2021). A growth mindset lowers perceived cognitive load and improves learning: Integrating motivation to cognitive load. Journal of Educational Psychology, 113(6), 1177–1191. https://doi.org/10.1037/edu0000631