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Implementing a new instructional design framework in an animated pedagogical agent: Does an animated pedagogical agent enhance student motivation and learning gains?
Pikaar, Yara (2013) Implementing a new instructional design framework in an animated pedagogical agent: Does an animated pedagogical agent enhance student motivation and learning gains?
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Abstract: | This study investigated whether an animated pedagogical agent (APA) affected student motivation and learning in a simulation on a science topic. The APA focused on students' perceptions of task-relevance and self-efficacy beliefs. For the construction of the APA a motivational design model was newly developed. This model combined expectancy-value theory (Eccles & Wigfield, 2002), self-efficacy theory (Bandura, 1977) and the ARCS Model (Keller, 1987;2010). In an experiment with 68 high school students, an APA condition was compared with a no-APA control condition. Gender was evenly distributed over conditions. For initial motivation, a gender difference was found with girls scoring lower than boys. After completing two-thirds of the training, students in the control condition gave significantly higher appraisals for self-efficacy than students in the APA condition. In addition, girls expressed higher perceptions of task-relevance than boys effect of gender on task and condition. After training, an interaction effect showed that the self-efficacy of girls had increased most in the APA condition while self-efficacy of boys increased most in the control condition. For task-relevance a main effect of condition was found, in favor of the control condition. For knowledge gains there were main effects for condition and gender. The control condition yielded more learning gains than the APA condition, and girls learned more than boys. The discussion explains the outcomes with reference to gender differences in initial motivation, the possibility of gender-sensitive motivational strategies and the gender-specific visual presentation of the APA (i.e., a girl). In addition, the question is raised how to draw students' attention to their perceptions of task-relevance and self-efficacy beliefs during training without disturbing their learning focus. |
Item Type: | Essay (Master) |
Faculty: | BMS: Behavioural, Management and Social Sciences |
Subject: | 81 education, teaching |
Programme: | Educational Science and Technology MSc (60023) |
Link to this item: | https://purl.utwente.nl/essays/64299 |
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