Motivational skills & self-regulation for learning: A trait perspective

We report a series of investigations that focus on the nature of motivational skills and self-regulation for learning as traits, in contrast to consideration of self-regulation as resulting from particular interventions. In this context, we consider how self-report measures of motivational and self-regulation skills relate to other traits, such as ability, personality, interests, academic self-concept, self-ratings of abilities. In addition, we discuss how such trait measures are associated with task-specific self efficacy across tasks of varying complexity-from simple and information processing to complex air traffic controller tasks. Self-regulatory and motivational skills show substantial overlap with other trait measures, as do measures of learning strategies. Motivational and domain-specific self-concepts, along with trait anxiety, appear to be strongly related to task-specific self-efficacy.