Sources of academic and self-regulatory eYcacy beliefs of entering middle school students

The purpose of this study was to examine the inXuence of Bandura’s (1997) hypothesized sources of self-eYcacy on the academic and self-regulatory eYcacy beliefs of entering middle school students (ND 263) and to explore whether these sources diVer as a function of gender, reading ability, and race/ethnicity. For the full sample, mastery experience, vicarious experience, social persuasions, and physiological state independently predicted academic and self-regulatory self-eYcacy, with mastery experience proving the strongest predictor. Mastery experience and social persuasions predicted girls’ academic and self-regulatory self-eYcacy, whereas mastery and vicarious experiences predicted these self-beliefs for boys. African American students’ mastery experiences and social persuasions predicted their academic selfeYcacy. Mastery experience did not predict the self-eYcacy beliefs of low-achieving students. Findings support and reWne the theoretical tenets of Bandura’s social cognitive theory. © 2005 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.