Attitudes Towards Mistakes 1 Developing and Validating the Attitudes Towards Mistakes Inventory ( ATMI ) : A Self-Report Measure

Students’ acceptance and use of formative assessment feedback is expected to be impeded by negative attitudes towards their errors. Instruments to measure attitudes towards errors are currently lacking. The present study was designed to develop and begin to validate a self-report measure encompassing the affective, cognitive, and behavioral aspects of attitudes towards errors. Attitudes Towards Mistakes 2 Developing and Validating the Attitudes Towards Mistakes Inventory (ATMI): A Self-Report Measure Teachers seek to ensure that students accept and use feedback from formative assessments. Otherwise the value of formative assessments is seriously weakened. However, negative attitudes towards mistakes could seriously impede students’ willingness to see the feedback they receive, including rectifying their errors, as opportunities for learning. Surprisingly, there are no theoretical frameworks that focus on how to integrate student mistakes or errors systematically into teaching and assessment. In response to this research gap, Leighton, Chu and Seitz (2013) proposed the Learning Errors and Formative Feedback (LEAFF) model, which outlined the relationships among several categories of variables, designed to facilitate students’ understanding of the value of their mistakes for learning purposes. For example, one hypothesis derived from the LEAFF model is that explicit discussion of student mistakes in class can help students adopt more positive attitudes towards errors and be receptive to formative feedback. One of the challenges for the LEAFF model is the current absence of instruments to measure attitudes towards mistakes in educational contexts. Although self-report measures of attitudes towards mistakes have been developed in the field of medicine (Varjavand, Bachegowda, Gracely, & Novack, 2012), these primarily focus on whether physicians disclose their errors honestly to patients and colleagues. However, the measures used in medicine are not directly relevant in most educational contexts, as they do not focus on how to use mistakes as teaching opportunities. Currently, the closest measure of attitudes towards mistakes in educational contexts is Attitudes Towards Mistakes 3 the Performance Failure Appraisal Inventory (PFAI; Conroy, Willow, & Metzler, 2002). Grounded in a cognitive, motivational, and relational theory of emotions (Lazarus, 1991), the PFAI was designed to measure the following five dimensions associated with experiences of failure: (1) fear of experiencing shame and embarrassment, (2) fear of devaluing one’s self-estimate, (3) fear of having an uncertain future, (4) fear of important others losing interest, and (5) fear of upsetting important others. Although the PFAI focuses on failure and one might argue that failure can result from a series of mistakes, it does not focus directly on measuring attitudes towards mistakes. The LEAFF model emphasizes the potential value of mistakes in helping students use formative feedback to enhance their learning and avoid long-term failures. Thus, the purpose of the present study was to develop and begin to validate a self-report measure called the Attitudes Towards Mistakes Inventory (ATMI), which encompasses emotional, cognitive (beliefs), and behavioral aspects of attitudes. The Measurement Model of the ATMI Finding the most appropriate and operational definition of attitudes is crucial to an accurate measurement of attitudes. However, the term attitude has been defined in various ways from the conventional definition “an attitude is a psychological tendency that is expressed by evaluating a particular entity with some degree of favor or disfavor” (Eagly & Chaiken, 1993) to the operational definition as “a relatively enduring organization of beliefs, feelings, and behavioral tendencies towards socially significant objects, groups, events or symbols” (Hogg, & Vaughan 2005, p. 150). In fact, there is no universally accepted definition of attitude and over 30 definitions have been proposed (Rao, 2004). Many researchers agree that attitude is not a unidimensional concept. Despite decades Attitudes Towards Mistakes 4 of research, one model – the tripartite model of attitudes – has endured (Rosenberg & Hovland, 1960; Breckler, 1984). The tripartite model of attitudes includes the proposal that attitudes are constructs with affective, behavioral and cognitive components. Therefore, in discussions about how to measure attitudes, the common practice is to identify three attitudinal components: affect, behavior and cognition (Rosenberg & Hovland, 1960; Breckler, 1984). The underlying assumption is that persons’ affect, behavior and cognition should be consistent with their attitude towards an object. However, the tripartite model has gone through several modifications over the years (e.g., Cacioppo, Petty, & Green, 1989; Zanna & Rempel, 1988). First, it is now recognized that affect involves more than the simple “approval or disapproval” or evaluation of an object (Fabrigar, MacDonald, & Wegener, 2005); it involves actual emotional states. Second, people often do not behave consistently with their thoughts and feelings, especially when the attitude object is socially significant. Ajzen and Fishbein (1977) were two of the first investigators to report low or non-significant statistical relationships between attitudinal predictors and behavioral criteria. Third, the cognitive component is largely composed of the beliefs people hold about whether an object has desirable or undesirable attributes, leading to the formation of a general evaluation of the object (Marsh & Wallace, 2005). In fact, in Albarracín, Johnson, Zanna and Kumkale’s (2005) matrix of attitude-relevant influences, only affect (feelings), behavior, and beliefs are included. Taking both the traditional tripartite model and its modifications into consideration, the ATMI was developed. The ATMI involves three subscales: affect (feelings), behavior, and cognition (beliefs). In particular, affect (feelings) focuses on a student’s emotional experience Attitudes Towards Mistakes 5 of a mistake; behavior refers to the actions a student might take when a mistake is made during learning; and cognition (beliefs) focuses on the beliefs that a student holds about mistakes. Each of the subscales is described next and the items associated with each subscale are presented in Table 1. Subscale 1: Affect (Feelings) The affective aspect of attitudes towards mistakes refers to the emotional, physiological experience, often “gut reaction,” people experience when they make a mistake. Since individuals normally have negative feelings when they fail to perform as expected, most items in this subscale were developed to measure negative emotional experiences such as fear, embarrassment, frustration, and anger. As shown in Table 1, items 1 through 5, and item 7 measured these negative emotions. Items were also developed to measure positive emotional experiences and these are shown with items 6 and 8. Responses to items 6 and 8 were reversed when conducting psychometric analysis (i.e., reliability test). Subscale 2: Behavior Different from unobservable hypothetical constructs, behaviors serve as a directly observable component in the measurement of attitudes (Jaccard, King, & Pomazal, 1977). In the present study, the behaviors or actions associated with making mistakes take place in an academic setting and can be categorized as ‘mistake-approach’ or ‘mistake-avoidance’ behaviors. For example, after making a mistake on a test, students may initiate specific positive behaviors such as checking the correct response in textbook or discussing their errors with others (e.g., items 1 to 6). These positive actions are regarded as mistake-approach behaviors because students are recognizing and dealing with their mistakes directly. The Attitudes Towards Mistakes 6 mistake-avoidance behaviors include hiding mistakes from others (e.g. items 7 and 14 ) as well as complaining about the fairness of the questions or even blaming others (e.g., items 8 to 10). Subscale 3: Cognition (Beliefs) Fishbein and Ajzen (1975) defined a person’s attitude toward an object as a function of the beliefs about the object; furthermore, these beliefs are not neutral but involve an implicit positive or negative valence. For example, a person’s attitude towards making mistakes may involve the belief that successful students make fewer mistakes during learning than others; this belief involves an implicit negative evaluation of mistakes. When measuring the beliefs that form attitudes, Ajzen and Fishbein (1980) emphasized the need to define the target, action, and context of the beliefs. Thus, all the items in the cognition (beliefs) subscale are framed in an academic context. Further, the items involve overall negative evaluations of mistakes (items 1 to 4, and 6), and one neutral evaluation (item 5). The Hypothesized Relationship between Attitudes and Other Variables The internal structure of the ATMI was of interest in the present study; however, also of interest were the relationships between the ATMI and external variables. In order to validate the ATMI externally, it was necessary to identify the variables that were expected to be hypothetically related to the three aforementioned components – affect, behavior and cognition (beliefs). It was expected that affective subscale would be highly correlated with self-esteem (see Method section) ratings because self-esteem reflects a person’s overall emotional self-evaluation, which includes feelings of worthiness, pride and discouragement (Newman & Newman, 1975). Besides, it has been found that people who are more Attitudes Towards Mistakes 7 unconditionally self-accepting (see Method section) tend to experience less depression, anxiety and reductions of mood in response to emotionally provocative scenarios (Chamberlain & Haaga, 2001). It was also hypothesized that cognition (beliefs) subscale ratings would be correlat