Interest is substantially more stable over time than boredom, whose autoregressive paths are low and decline¶

Claim · All claims
Evidence · 1 study · associational r2 · q3
Currency · newest study 2025 · not yet checked against its sources · not reviewed by a person

Subclaims¶

q3 i? Latent stability coefficients were high for interest (β up to 0.88) and low for boredom (β 0.17–0.53), with boredom stabilities declining over waves. → Katharina Luisa Boehme 2025

Evidence¶

Katharina Luisa Boehme 2025¶

Katharina Luisa Boehme, Thomas Goetz, Markus Feuchter, Franzis Preckel. (2025). Is Boredom the Opposite of Interest? A Longitudinal Reciprocal Effect Study. Educational Psychology Review. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10648-025-09991-5

q3 · i? · associational · r2

Stability paths from the 2-variable latent cross-lagged models. In the combined 4-variable model, interest stabilities were 0.71–0.88, while boredom showed significant stability only from T1 to T2 (β = 0.29 and 0.34); later German boredom paths (β = 0.18, 0.17) did not reach significance. These are stability path coefficients, not effect sizes, so no magnitude code is assigned.

"In the mathematics model, interest displayed a generally much higher level of stability than boredom (boredom: βBO-M[T1] →BO-M[T2] = 0.53, βBO-M[T2] →BO-M[T3] = 0.32, βBO-M[T3] →BO-M[T4] = 0.26; interest: βINT-M[T1] →INT-M[T2] = 0.80, βINT-M[T2] →INT-M[T3] = 0.76, βINT-M[T3] →INT-M[T4] = 0.71)"

Discussion¶

Related Claims¶

• Latent boredom means increased and latent interest means declined from grade 5 to grade 8 in both domains — related
• Epistemic emotions showed no significant carry-over (autoregressive) stability from one course session to the next, except boredom after session type was included. — reports the opposite
• Higher earlier interest is associated with later decreases in boredom across grades 5–8, at every wave in mathematics and all but the last in German — related
• Achievement rank-order stability is high across primary school, with written-language stability (β = 0.62–0.75) exceeding mathematics stability (β = 0.38–0.45) — related
• Mathematics enjoyment decreases and boredom increases from first to third grade, while mean enjoyment stays fairly high and boredom low — related
• TSE and burnout levels are autoregressively stable: current levels predict future levels of the same construct — related