The Role of Metamotivational Monitoring in Motivation Regulation

This article builds on existing models of motivation regulation in order to examine how students identify and address motivational deficits (e.g., not enough motivation or not the right type of motivation). Integrating perspectives from the achievement motivation, metacognition, and emotion regulation literatures, we propose that metamotivational processes play an essential role in students' monitoring of their motivational states. By emphasizing the ways in which students monitor not only the quantity but also the quality of their motivation, our model extends existing perspectives. We identify different components of motivation that are likely to be the target of monitoring (e.g., self-efficacy, intrinsic value), specify the metamotivational feelings (e.g., hopelessness, boredom) that signal problems with each component, and discuss how strategies are selected to address these problems. Our framework generates new questions about how students monitor (and control) their task-specific motivation.