Néhány családi változó összefüggése az elsajátítási motivációval és a tanulás sikerességével óvodás- és iskolás korban

The crucial role the social environment and within it, most importantly, family plays in the development, motivation and, as a result, school success of children has been confirmed by Hungarian and international studies alike. However, little is known of which specific factors of the family environment shape children’s motivation and school success the most. The paper aims to explore the role of the emotional and physical home environment as well as that of parenting in the mastery motivation and school success of preschool and school-age children. Three studies were conducted among preschool children. The relationship of emotional and physical home environment and students’ degree of motivation as perceived by teachers and parents was analyzed on a small sample (n=43). In a large-scale study (n=400), children’s motivation was rated by the emotional reactions and persistence they exhibited in moderately challenging tasks. Moreover, a longitudinal (n=77) study explored the role of the emotional and physical home environment in the change in preschool children’s mastery motivation. Two studies were conducted among school-age children. The study among 4th and 7th graders (n=299) analyzed individually the correlations of parenting practices, children’s motivation, school achievement and specific background variables. The second study, which was conducted among 7th graders (n=296), used structural equation modeling to explore the interrelation of mothers’ parenting practices, children’s mastery motivation and school achievement. The emotional and physical home environment was analyzed with the help of the HOME Inventory, while mastery motivation was assessed with the help of the Dimensions of Mastery Motivation Questionnaire. During the observation, children completed computer-based, playful tasks with various levels of difficulty (FOCUS test). In order to explore parenting practices, children filled out the Parental Bonding Instrument, while parents filled out the Child-Mother Bonding Instrument. In line with the literature, our results both among preschool and school-age children confirm the relevance of analyzing children’s family background in order to gain insight into the factors that impact motivation. We found that the more supportive and stimulating the emotional and physical home environment is, the higher the mastery motivation of preschoolers is. As for school-age children, results show that the more higher the degree of parental care is, and the lower the degree of parental overprotection is, the more motivated children are, and the higher they achieve in school.