Utility-value interventions improve grades, with the largest gains for first-generation and underrepresented minority students, and can improve STEM persistence years later¶

Claim · All claims
Evidence · 1 study (2 entries) · review r2 · q3–q4
Currency · newest study 2024 · not yet checked against its sources · not reviewed by a person

Subclaims¶

q3 i? In a college intervention study, intervention-group students' grades improved more than controls', with the intervention most successful for first-generation underrepresented students, reducing the achievement gap. → Jacquelynne S. Eccles · Allan Wigfield 2024 q4 i? In a large-scale RCT, a utility-value intervention in a gateway chemistry course improved college students' persistence in STEM fields 2.5 years later, with stronger effects for underrepresented minority students. → Jacquelynne S. Eccles · Allan Wigfield 2024 (2)

Evidence¶

Jacquelynne S. Eccles · Allan Wigfield 2024¶

Jacquelynne S. Eccles · Allan Wigfield. (2024). The Development, Testing, and Refinement of Eccles, Wigfield, and Colleagues' Situated Expectancy-Value Model of Achievement Performance and Choice. Educational Psychology Review. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10648-024-09888-9

q3 · i? · review · r2

The review reports Harackiewicz et al. (2015), a utility-value intervention with college students including first-generation and underrepresented minority students; "Intervention group students' grades improved more than did the control group students", reducing the achievement gap.

"Harackiewicz et al. (2015) implemented a utility value intervention in different groups of college students, including both first-generation and underrepresented minority students. Intervention group students' grades improved more than did the control group students."

Jacquelynne S. Eccles · Allan Wigfield 2024 (2)¶

Jacquelynne S. Eccles · Allan Wigfield. (2024). The Development, Testing, and Refinement of Eccles, Wigfield, and Colleagues' Situated Expectancy-Value Model of Achievement Performance and Choice. Educational Psychology Review. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10648-024-09888-9

q4 · i? · review · r2

The review reports Asher et al. (2023) as a large-scale RCT of a utility-value intervention in a gateway chemistry course; the intervention "improved college students' per- sistence in STEM fields 2.5 years later", with effects stronger for underrepresented minority students.

"implemented in a gateway chemistry course improved college students' per- sistence in STEM fields 2.5 years later, a rather remarkable finding."

Discussion¶

Learner Variables¶

• Race and Ethnicity — moderator: an instructional effect differs by group

Related Claims¶

• Utility-value interventions enhance perceived utility value, engagement, performance, and persistence in introductory college science courses — a broader claim this one bears on
• A general chemistry utility-value and growth mindset intervention showed statistically significant positive outcomes overall but statistically nonsignificant outcomes for underrepresented students — reports the opposite
• Belonging Interventions Improve Outcomes — related
• A brief values-affirmation writing exercise raised African American seventh-graders' grades in two small field experiments, but a large same-district replication found no effect — related
• Neither URM status nor first-generation status moderates the intervention effects on retrieval practice outcomes — related