I believe; therefore, I work harder: The significance of reflective thinking on effort-making in academic failure in a Confucian-heritage cultural context

Abstract According to research, East Asian students tend to persist after academic failure. However, little research has explored the underlying mechanism of such persistence from the perspective of reflective thinking. Effort-related beliefs may play a key role in the reflection process. This study examined how effort beliefs affect attribution and affect, thereby contributing to students’ persistence in academic failure in the Confucian-heritage cultural context. A sample of 281 Taiwanese 10th graders was assessed concerning their effort beliefs, attribution of academic failure, negative emotions, and effortful behavior. Structural equation modeling was used to analyze the data. The results indicated that those holding different effort beliefs experience different types of attribution and emotions. Improvement-oriented beliefs about effort were found to be associated with a lack of effort and induce participants’ indebtedness towards parents and self, which in turn motivates them to persist after academic failure. Obligation-oriented beliefs about effort trigger two paths, one through a sense of indebtedness that prompts subsequent effort-making and the other directly impacting such effortful actions without feelings of indebtedness. Theoretically, this study uncovered the psychological mechanism of reflective thinking after academic failure in a Confucian society such as Taiwan. Practically, the findings highlighted that constructive reflection after failure may provide students with strong motivation to persist and an opportunity for building character in the process of achieving future academic success.