Examining self-efficacy during learning: variability and relations to behavior, performance, and learning

Abstract Self-regulated learning (SRL) theorists propose that learners ’ motivations and cognitive and metacognitive processes interact dynamically during learning, yet researchers typically measure motivational constructs as stable factors. In this study, self-efficacy was assessed frequently to observe its variability during learning and how learners ’ efficacy related to their problem-solving performance and behavior. Students responded to self-efficacy prompts after every fourth problem of an algebra unit completed in an intelligent tutoring system. The software logged students ’ problem-solving behaviors and performance. The results of stability and change, path, and correlational analyses indicate that learners ’ feelings of efficacy varied reliably over the learning task. Their prior performance (i.e., accuracy) predicted subsequent self-efficacy judgments, but this relationship diminished over time as judgments were decreasingly informed by accuracy and increasingly informed by fluency. Controlling for prior achievement and self-efficacy, increases in efficacy during one problem-solving period predicted help-seeking behavior, performance, and learning in the next period. Findings suggest that self-efficacy varies during learning, that students consider multiple aspects of performance to inform their efficacy judgments, and that changes in efficacy influence self-regulated learning processes and outcomes