ENHANCING RELEVANCE - EMBEDDED ARCS STRATEGIES VS PURPOSE

The hypothesis of this study assumes that the cognitive effects of mot ivation result primarily from the relevance of what is being learned, that is, whether the ideas being studied are meaningful and whether th ey fulfill the goals of the learner. This study compared the effects o f intrinsic relevance (material fulfilling a purpose or need of the le arner) with embedded, extrinsic relevance-enhancing strategies based o n the ARCS (attention, relevance, confidence, and satisfaction) Model of Instruction on perceived motivation and the learning outcomes of id entification, terminology, comprehension, and drawing. Both intrinsic and extrinsic strategies enhanced the motivation of the college learne rs and their performance on identification, terminology, and comprehen sion questions following instruction. Embedded relevance-enhancing str ategies resulted in greater motivation and performance gains than did intrinsic relevance.