Cultivating Competence , Self-Efficacy , and Intrinsic Interest Through Proximal Self-Motivation

The present experiment tested the hypothesis that self-motivation through proximal goal setting serves as an effective mechanism for cultivating competencies, self-percepts of efficacy, and intrinsic interest. Children who exhibited gross deficits and disinterest in mathematical tasks pursued a program of self-directed learning under conditions involving either proximal subgoals, distal goals, or no goals. Results of the multifaceted assessment provide support for the superiority of proximal self-influence. Under proximal subgoals, children progressed rapidly in self-directed learning, achieved substantial mastery of mathematical operations, and developed a sense of personal efficacy and intrinsic interest in arithmetic activities that initially held little attraction for them. Distal goals had no demonstrable effects. In addition to its other benefits, goal proximity fostered veridical self-knowledge of capabilities as reflected in high congruence between judgments of mathematical self-efficacy and subsequent mathematical performance. Perceived self-efficacy was positively related to accuracy of mathematical performance and to intrinsic interest in arithmetic activities.  Much human behavior is directed and sustained over long periods, even though the external inducements for it may be few and far between. Under conditions in which external imperatives are minimal and discontinuous, people must partly serve as agents of their own motivation and action. In social learning theory (Bandura, 1977b, in press), self-directedness operates through a self system that comprises cognitive structures and subfunctions for perceiving, evaluating, motivating, and regulating behavior. An important, cognitively based source of self-motivation relies on the intervening processes of goal setting and self-evaluative re-actions to one's own behavior. This form of self-motivation, which operates largely through internal comparison processes, re-quires personal standards against which to evaluate ongoing performance. By making self-satisfaction conditional on a certain level of performance, individuals create self-inducements to persist in their efforts until their performances match internal standards. Both the anticipated satisfactions for matching attainments and the dissatisfactions with insufficient ones provide incentives for self-directed actions. Personal goals or standards do not automatically activate the evaluative processes that affect the level and course of one's behavior. Certain properties of goals, such as their specificity and level, help to provide clear standards of adequacy (Latham & Yukl, 1975; Locke, 1968; Steers & Porter, 1974). Hence, explicit goals are more likely than vague intentions to engage self-reactive influences in any given activity. Goal proximity, a third property, is especially critical because the more closely referential standards are related to ongoing behavior, the greater the likelihood that self-influences will be activated during the process. Some suggestive evidence exists that the impact of goals on behavior is indeed determined by how far into the future they are projected (Bandura & Simon, 1977;  1977). In the social learning view, adopting proximal subgoals for one's own behavior can have at least three major psychological effects. As already alluded to, such goals have motivational effects. One of the propositions tested in the present experiment is that self-motivation can be best created and sustained by attainable subgoals that lead to larger future ones. Proximal subgoals provide immediate incentives and guides for performance, whereas distal goals are too far re-moved in time to effectively mobilize effort or to direct what one does in the here and now. Focus on the distant future makes it easy to temporize and to slacken efforts in the present. Proximal subgoals can also serve as an important vehicle in the development of self-percepts of efficacy. Competence in dealing with one's environment is not a fixed act or simply knowing what to do. Rather, it involves a generative capability in which component skills must be selected and organized into integrated courses of action to manage changing task demands. Operative competence thus requires flexible orchestration of multiple subskills. Self-efficacy is concerned with judgments about how well one can organize and execute courses of action required to deal with prospective situations containing many ambiguous, unpredictable, and often stressful elements. Self-percepts of efficacy can affect people's choice of activities, how much effort they expend, and how long they will persist in the face of difficulties (Bandura, 1977a; Brown & Inouye, 1978; Schunk, 1981). Without standards against which to measure their performances, people have little basis for judging how they are doing or for gauging their capabilities. Subgoal attainments provide indicants of mastery for enhancing selfefficacy. By contrast, distal goals are too far removed in time to provide sufficiently clear markers of progress along the way to ensure a growing sense of self-efficacy. The processes underlying the development of intrinsic interest may similarly be governed, at least in part, by goal proximity. Most of the activities that people enjoy doing for their own sake originally had little or no interest for them. Young children are not innately interested in singing operatic arias, playing tubas, deriving mathematical equations, writing sonnets, or propelling heavy shotput balls through the air. However, through favorable continued involvement, almost any activity can become imbued with consuming significance. One can posit at least two ways in which proximal goals might contribute to enhancement of interest in activities. When people aim for, and master, desired levels of performance, they experience a sense of satisfaction (Locke, Cartledge, & Knerr, 1970). The satisfactions derived from subgoal attainments can build intrinsic interest. When performances are gauged against lofty, distal goals, the large negative disparities between standards and attainments are likely to attenuate the level of self-satisfaction experienced along the way. Conceptual analyses of intrinsic interest within the framework of both self-efficacy theory (Bandura, 1981) and intrinsic motivation theory (Deci, 1975; Lepper & Greene, 1979) assign perceived competence a mediating role. A sense of personal efficacy in mastering challenges is apt to generate greater interest in the activity than is selfperceived inefficacy in producing competent performances. To the extent that proximal subgoals promote and authenticate a sense of causal agency, they can heighten interest through their effects on perception of personal causation. Investigations of intrinsic interest have been concerned almost exclusively with the effects of extrinsic rewards on interest when it is already highly developed. Although results are somewhat variable, the usual finding is that rewards given regardless of quality of performance tend to reduce interest, whereas rewards for performances signifying competence sustain high interest (Boggiano & Ruble, 1979; Enzle & Ross, 1978; Lepper & Greene, 1979; Ross, 1976). The controversy over the effects of extrinsic rewards on preexisting high interest has led to a neglect of the issue of how intrinsic interest is developed when it is lacking. One of the present study's aims was to test the notion that proximal subgoals enlist the type of sustained involvement in activities that build selfefficacy and interest when they are absent. Children who displayed gross deficits in mathematical skills and strong disinterest in such activities engaged in self-directed learning over a series of sessions. They pursued the self-paced learning under conditions involving either proximal subgoals, distal goals, or bids to work actively without any reference to goals. It was predicted that self-motivation through proximal subgoals would prove most effective in cultivating mathematical competencies, self-percepts of efficacy, and intrinsic interest in mathematical activities. For reasons given earlier, distal goals were not expected to exceed bids to work actively in promoting changes. It was hypothesized further that strength of self-efficacy would predict subsequent accuracy on mathematical tasks and level of intrinsic interest.