projects

Self-Concept and Academic Motivation

This theme focuses on academic self-concept, self-beliefs, expectancy-value processes, achievement motivation, engagement, and the developmental pathways linking motivation with educational outcomes.

I study academic self-concept and achievement motivation as dynamic developmental systems. This work examines how students understand their own ability, how those beliefs are shaped by comparisons with peers and domains, and how motivation predicts achievement, aspirations, engagement, and educational choices.

This theme includes foundational work on self-concept formation, expectancy-value theory, big-fish-little-pond effects, effort, grit, mindset, and reciprocal relations between motivation and achievement.

Publications in this theme

• 2026 - When Importance Doesn’t Matter: The Importance Paradox in Individually Weighted Models and William James’ Perspective. OSF.
• 2025 - Investigating the effects of class average achievement: attending a high-achieving class is neither beneficial for student achievement nor for academic self-concept. Contemporary Educational Psychology. DOI: 10.1016/j.cedpsych.2025.102441.
• 2026 - Student engagement declines across adolescence: A meta-analysis of longitudinal studies. Review of Education. DOI: 10.1002/rev3.70134.
• 2026 - A Cultural Explanation of Motivation-Achievement Paradox in Math. Educational Researcher. DOI: 10.3102/0013189x251370677.
• 2025 - Implicit measure of growth mindset: reducing social desirability bias and linking to academic performance. Social Psychology of Education. DOI: 10.1007/s11218-025-10125-6.
• 2024 - Cracking chicken-egg conundrums: Juxtaposing contemporaneous and lagged reciprocal effects models of academic self-concept and achievement’s directional ordering. Educational Psychology Review. DOI: 10.1007/s10648-024-09887-w.
• 2024 - Gritty Parenting: The Development and Validation of the Parental Grit Scale. Assessment. DOI: 10.1177/10731911241289242.
• 2024 - Harnessing Artificial Intelligence in Generative Content for enhancing motivation in learning. Learning and Individual Differences. DOI: 10.1016/j.lindif.2024.102547.
• 2023 - Disentangling the long-term compositional effects of school-average achievement and SES: A substantive-methodological synergy. Educational Psychology Review. DOI: 10.1007/s10648-023-09726-4.
• 2023 - Longitudinal reciprocal effects of agentic engagement and autonomy support: Between- and within-person perspectives. Journal of Educational Psychology. DOI: 10.1037/edu0000815.
• 2023 - Peer Spillover and Big-Fish-Little-Pond Effects with SIMS80: Revisiting a Historical Database Through the Lens of a Modern Methodological Perspective. Educational Psychology Review. DOI: 10.1007/s10648-023-09816-3.
• 2023 - The Big-Fish-Little-Pond Effect for reading self-beliefs: A cross-national exploration with PISA 2018. Scientific Studies of Reading. DOI: 10.1080/10888438.2023.2174028.
• 2023 - The Happy-Fish-Little-Pond Effect on enjoyment: Generalizability across multiple domains and countries. Learning and Instruction. DOI: 10.1016/j.learninstruc.2023.101733.
• 2023 - Too Much of a Good Thing Might Be Bad: the Double-Edged Sword of Parental Aspirations and the Adverse Effects of Aspiration-Expectation Gaps. Educational Psychology Review. DOI: 10.1007/s10648-023-09768-8.
• 2022 - A moderated mediation analysis of conscientiousness, time management strategies, effort regulation strategies, and university students’ performance. Learning and Individual Differences. DOI: 10.1016/j.lindif.2022.102228.
• 2022 - Academic self-concept: A key construct for positive psychology. DOI: 10.4324/9781003013778-15.
• 2022 - Mastery-approach goals: A large-scale cross-cultural analysis of antecedents and consequences. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology. DOI: 10.1037/pspp0000436.
• 2022 - The Dimensionality of Reading Self-Concept: Examining Its Stability Using Local Structural Equation Models. Assessment. DOI: 10.1177/10731911211069675.
• 2021 - Ability Stratification Predicts the Size of the Big-Fish-Little-Pond Effect. Educational Researcher. DOI: 10.3102/0013189x20986176.
• 2021 - Academic self-concept formation: A three-faceted model of psychological comparison (3FPC) Processes. Oxford Handbook of Educational Psychology.
• 2021 - High school students’ tenacity and flexibility in goal pursuit linked to life satisfaction and achievement on competencies tests. Journal of Educational Psychology. DOI: 10.1037/edu0000667.
• 2021 - Moderation of the Big-Fish-Little-Pond Effect: Juxtaposition of Evolutionary (Darwinian-Economic) and Achievement Motivation Theory Predictions Based on a Delphi Approach. Educational Psychology Review. DOI: 10.1007/s10648-020-09583-5.
• 2021 - Relations of epistemic beliefs with motivation, achievement, and aspirations in science: Generalizability across 72 societies. Journal of Educational Psychology. DOI: 10.1037/edu0000660.
• 2021 - Revealing dynamic relations between mathematics self-concept and perceived achievement from lesson to lesson: An experience-sampling study. Journal of Educational Psychology. DOI: 10.1037/edu0000716.
• 2021 - The immigrant paradox and math self-concept: An SES-of-origin-country hypothesis. Learning and Instruction. DOI: 10.1016/j.learninstruc.2021.101539.
• 2021 - Which class matters? Juxtaposing multiple class environments as frames-of-reference for academic self-concept formation. Journal of Educational Psychology. DOI: 10.1037/edu0000491.
• 2020 - Academic self-concept formation and peer-group contagion: Development of the big-fish-little-pond effect in primary-school classrooms and peer groups. Journal of Educational Psychology. DOI: 10.1037/edu0000554.
• 2020 - Illusory gender-equality paradox, math self-concept, and frame-of-reference Effect: New integrative explanations for multiple paradoxes. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology. DOI: 10.1037/pspp0000306.
• 2020 - Mindfulness and Its Association With Varied Types of Motivation: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis Using Self-Determination Theory. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin. DOI: 10.1177/0146167219896136.
• 2020 - Psychological Comparison Processes and Self–Concept in Relation to Five Distinct Frame–Of–Reference Effects: Pan–Human Cross–Cultural Generalizability over 68 Countries. European Journal of Personality. DOI: 10.1002/per.2232.
• 2020 - The Role of Sociocultural Factors in Student Achievement Motivation: A Cross-Cultural Review. Adolescent Research Review. DOI: 10.1007/s40894-019-00124-y.
• 2019 - Building Grit: The Longitudinal Pathways between Mindset, Commitment, Grit, and Academic Outcomes. Journal of Youth and Adolescence. DOI: 10.1007/s10964-019-00998-0.
• 2019 - Capturing the multiplicative effect of perseverance and passion: Measurement issues of combining two grit facets. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. DOI: 10.1073/pnas.1820125116.
• 2019 - In-the-Moment Profiles of Expectancies, Task Values, and Costs. Frontiers in Psychology. DOI: 10.3389/fpsyg.2019.01662.
• 2019 - The Meaning of Motivation to Learn in Cross- National Comparisons: A Review of Recent. The SAGE Handbook of Comparative Studies in Education.
• 2019 - The Relations of Science Task Values, Self-Concept of Ability, and STEM Aspirations Among Finnish Students From First to Second Grade. Frontiers in Psychology. DOI: 10.3389/fpsyg.2019.01449.
• 2018 - Academic self-concept formation: A three-faceted model of psychological comparison processes. DOI: 10.1093/oxfordhb/9780199841332.013.37.
• 2018 - An information distortion model of social class differences in math self-concept, intrinsic value, and utility value. Journal of Educational Psychology. DOI: 10.1037/edu0000215.
• 2018 - An integrated model of academic self-concept development: Academic self-concept, grades, test scores, and tracking over 6 years. Developmental Psychology. DOI: 10.1037/dev0000393.
• 2018 - Cross-cultural generalizability of social and dimensional comparison effects on reading, math, and science self-concepts for primary school students using the combined PIRLS and TIMSS data. Learning and Instruction. DOI: 10.1016/j.learninstruc.2018.07.007.
• 2018 - Effects of school-average achievement on individual self-concept and achievement: Unmasking phantom effects masquerading as true compositional effects. Journal of Educational Psychology. DOI: 10.1037/edu0000259.
• 2018 - Gendered pathways toward STEM careers: The incremental roles of work value profiles above academic task values. Frontiers in Psychology. DOI: 10.3389/fpsyg.2018.01111.
• 2018 - Inequity and Excellence in Academic Performance: Evidence From 27 Countries. American Educational Research Journal. DOI: 10.3102/0002831218760213.
• 2018 - Joint trajectories of task value in multiple subject domains: From both variable- and pattern-centered perspectives. Contemporary Educational Psychology. DOI: 10.1016/j.cedpsych.2018.10.004.
• 2018 - The Murky Distinction Between Self-Concept and Self-Efficacy: Beware of Lurking Jingle-Jangle Fallacies. Journal of Educational Psychology. DOI: 10.1037/edu0000281.
• 2017 - Cognitive Defusion Predicts More Approach and Less Avoidance Coping With Stress, Independent of Threat and Self-Efficacy Appraisals. Journal of Personality. DOI: 10.1111/jopy.12279.
• 2017 - Extending expectancy-value theory predictions of achievement and aspirations in science: Dimensional comparison processes and expectancy-by-value interactions. Learning and Instruction. DOI: 10.1016/j.learninstruc.2016.12.007.
• 2017 - How well do parents know their adolescent children? Parent inferences of student self-concepts reflect dimensional comparison processes. Learning and Instruction. DOI: 10.1016/j.learninstruc.2016.09.002.
• 2017 - Long-term positive effects of repeating a year in school: Six-year longitudinal study of self-beliefs, anxiety, social relations, school grades, and test scores. Journal of Educational Psychology. DOI: 10.1037/edu0000144.
• 2016 - Breaking the double-edged sword of effort/trying hard: Developmental equilibrium and longitudinal relations among effort, achievement, and academic self-concept. Developmental Psychology. DOI: 10.1037/dev0000146.
• 2016 - Probing the Unique Contributions of Self-Concept, Task Values, and Their Interactions Using Multiple Value Facets and Multiple Academic Outcomes. AERA Open. DOI: 10.1177/2332858415626884.
• 2016 - The relations among academic motivation, self-concept, aspirations and choices: Integrating expectancy-value and academic self-concept theory. DOI: 10.4226/66/5a9cc030b0ba5.
• 2015 - Achievement, motivation, and educational choices: A longitudinal study of expectancy and value using a multiplicative perspective. Developmental Psychology. DOI: 10.1037/a0039440.
• 2015 - Directionality of the Associations of High School Expectancy-Value, Aspirations, and Attainment: A Longitudinal Study. American Educational Research Journal. DOI: 10.3102/0002831214565786.
• 2015 - Expectancy-value in mathematics, gender and socioeconomic background as predictors of achievement and aspirations: A multi-cohort study. Learning and Individual Differences. DOI: 10.1016/j.lindif.2015.01.008.