WHEN COMBINING INTRINSIC MOTIVATIONS UNDERMINES INTEREST - A TEST OF ACTIVITY ENGAGEMENT THEORY

Three studies with elementary school children demonstrated that combin ing reading with coloring pictures can undermine children's later inte rest in reading, while also reducing their interest in coloring. Under mining is maximized when an activity is identified as secondary during the initial engagement, but other conditions must also be met as spec ified by activity engagement theory (Higgins and Trope, 1990): (a) the multiple input activities must be separately identified and considere d simultaneously as alternatives, (b) the activity identified as prima ry during initial engagement must not be perceived as very attractive, and (c) the responses connected to an identified activity during the initial engagement must be activated subsequently. Conditions for enha ncing interest in an activity are also considered.