{"pk":252,"title":"The Strange Loop of Self-Efficacy and the Value of Focus Groups in Writing Program Assessment","subtitle":null,"abstract":"<span style=\"\">It’s long been presumed that increases in self-efficacy are correlated with other “habits of mind,” including more effective metacognitive strategies that will enable writing skills to transfer to different situations. Similarly, it’s long been understood that high self-efficacy is associated with more productive habits of mind and more positive emotional dispositions towards writing tasks. However, this two-year assessment of College Writing classes&nbsp;</span><span style=\"\">a private, mid-sized, urban four-year university</span><span style=\"\">&nbsp;complicates these assumptions. By supplementing substantial survey data we the analysis of data collected in focus groups, we&nbsp;</span><span style=\"\">found that the development of self-efficacy does not necessarily correlate to the development of more sophisticated epistemological beliefs—beliefs about how learning happens—nor the development of rhetorically-effective “writing dispositions.\" In short, suggesting the value of focus groups in&nbsp;assessment, we&nbsp;</span><span style=\"\">discovered</span><span style=\"\">&nbsp;a</span><span style=\"\">&nbsp;“strange loop” of self-efficacy in which&nbsp;</span><span style=\"\">gains made towards self-efficacy&nbsp;</span><span style=\"\">frequently</span><span style=\"\">&nbsp;have a&nbsp;</span><span style=\"\">unanticipated, complex, and problematic&nbsp;</span><span style=\"\">relation to our desired learning outcomes.</span>","language":"eng","license":{"name":"Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs  4.0","short_name":"CC BY-NC-ND 4.0","text":"Attribution — You must give appropriate credit, provide a link to the license, and indicate if changes were made. You may do so in any reasonable manner, but not in any way that suggests the licensor endorses you or your use.\r\n\r\nNonCommercial — You may not use the material for commercial purposes.\r\n\r\nNoDerivatives — If you remix, transform, or build upon the material, you may not distribute the modified material.\r\n\r\nNo additional restrictions — You may not apply legal terms or technological measures that legally restrict others from doing anything the license permits.","url":"https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0"},"keywords":[{"word":"Self-Efficacy"},{"word":"Focus Group"},{"word":"Assessment"},{"word":"writing"},{"word":"metacognition"},{"word":"Intrinsic motivation"}],"section":"Article","is_remote":true,"remote_url":"https://escholarship.org/uc/item/6vn170k5","frozenauthors":[{"first_name":"Edward","middle_name":"","last_name":"Comstock","name_suffix":"","institution":"American University","department":"Literature"}],"date_submitted":"2023-02-24T01:43:50.536000Z","date_accepted":"2024-07-23T14:58:28.623000Z","date_published":"2024-12-19T13:00:00Z","render_galley":{"label":"Comstock final","type":"pdf","path":"https://journalpub.escholarship.org/jwa/article/252/galley/31067/download/"},"galleys":[{"label":"Comstock final","type":"pdf","path":"https://journalpub.escholarship.org/jwa/article/252/galley/31067/download/"}]}