Learning Goals and Strategies in the Self-regulation of Learning

In order to self-regulate their learning, students need to use different strategies to plan, monitor, and evaluate their learning activities (meta-cognitive strategies), as well as to control their motivation and emotion (volitional strategies). Students’ effectiveness in their self-regulated learning process also varies depending on the academic environment and students’ personal goal orientations. In this study, the author analyzed the interactions between these cognitive, volitional, and motivational variables in late adolescence. To achieve this goal, the author proposed a model by means of SEM (Structural Equation Modeling). The investigation was developed with 268 4th-grade secondary school students, from public and private schools, in a northwestern city in Spain. Analysis of the proposed model showed the following results: the perception of a classroom learning goal structure relates significantly to a personal learning goal orientation, and the latter relates positively to the use of meta-cognitive strategies, the use of volitional strategies has a mediating effect between a learning goal orientation and the use of meta-cognitive strategies. Results are discussed in detail in the document.