Changing academic task persistence through a self-instructional attribution training program

CONTEMPORARY

EDUCATIONAL

PSYCHOLOGY

9, 84-94 (1984)

Changing Academic Task Persistence Self-instructional Attribution Training

through a Program

ROBERT H. REIHER AND MYRON H. DEMBO University

of Southern

California

The purpose of this investigation was to determine whether a self-instructional method of attribution training could effectively alter both academic task persistence and effort attributions for success and failure. Ninety children with loweffort attributions were identified and randomly assigned to three groups. The two experimental groups (experiential and formal presentation) were given training with two slightly different self-instructional procedure and compared to a control group receiving no such training. The results revealed that both experimental groups receiving the self-instructional attribution training evidenced significant differences from the control group in both academic task persistence and effort attribution.

Numerous investigations have found individual differences in the causal attributions of students with a history of success or failure (BarTal & Frieze, 1977; Kukla, 1972; Wiener & Kukla, 1970). For example, success-oriented students view success and failure as dependent to a large degree on ability and effort. Failure-oriented students have a tendency to attribute success as dependent to a large degree on factors such as teacher bias, luck, and task difficulty rather than effort, and tend to blame their failure on lack of ability. Furthermore, individuals who attribute achievement to effort are likely to work harder or longer than individuals who attribute achievement outcomes to ability (Weiner, Heckhausen, Meyer, & Cook, 1972). This means that students who tend to perceive lack of ability as the cause of their failures generally expect to repeat their failures because ability is a stable attribute and effort is not ascribed an important role in achievement. A number of researchers have developed “reattribution” training programs attempting to change students’ maladaptive causal perceptions of success and failure to improve their academic performance (Andrews & Debus, 1978; Chapin & Dyck, 1976; Dweck, 1975). For the most part, these programs have emphasized systematic token and social reinforceRequests for reprints should be sent to Dr. Myron H. Dembo, 600 Phillips Hall, PO Box 77963, Los Angeles, CA 90007. 84 0361-476X/84 $3.00 Copyright Q 1984 by Academic Press, Inc. All rights of reproduction in any form reserved.

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ments to train children to increase their effort as determined by some measure of task persistence. Recently, more attention has been focused on behavior change through self-instructional cognitive interventions (Henker, Whalen, & Hinshaw, 1980; Mahoney, 1974; Meichenbaum, 1977). These procedures use a person’s inner speech as a means of guiding behavior. The premise is that cognitions influence behavior; therefore, by changing cognitions, behavior can be changed. Diener and Dweck (1978) found differences in both the pattern of performance and in the nature of verbalizations emitted by failure-oriented and successoriented children following failure. They advocated an approach to reattribution training which places more emphasis on the nature and role of self-verbalization. The present study attempted to evaluate such a procedure . Meichenbaum (1977) has applied a cognitive behavior modification program to a variety of clinical and educational settings. His approach was adapted for use in the present investigation. Meichenbaum emphasizes three critical phases of the cognitive behavior modification process. The first is the self-observation phase. He believes that the subject must become an observer of his or her own behavior to initiate substantial change. This process involves monitoring with increased sensitivity the subject’s thoughts, feelings, and physiological reactions. The self-observation process facilitates the development of a new set of cognitive structures (e.g., effort attributions) which allows the subject to view his behavior differently. Phase two of the change process is designated the substitution phase. This phase is designed to initiate new adaptive attributions (e.g., effort) that would interfere with and replace the maladaptive ones (e.g., ability). The awareness skills which the subject develops in the initial self-observation phases act as a cueing system to initiate the production of substitute adaptive causal attributions in the substitution phase. The third phase is cognitive restructuring where the subject develops a relatively permanent set of adaptive cognitions to replace those which have been maladaptive. Meichenbaum (1977) claims that cognitive behavior modifiers often fail to pay sufficient attention to the credibility of their particular change strategy during the self-observation phase (See Frank, 1972, for a discussion of the role that credibility and expectation play in influencing change in both medical and psychological therapies). This phase of training is designed to provide the subject with some type of conceptual framework for understanding responses to events. Thus, the logic of any training regimen becomes more comprehensible to an individual because of the conceptualization provided by the trainer. The need to focus on credibility may be even more important in academic settings because, unlike therapeutic situations, the individual often enters behavior change programs without the motivation to change.

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The present study was designed to implement an effective reattribution training program to alter attributions for academic achievement. The methodology placed emphasis on a self-instructional technique. In addition, the dimension of credibility or rationale for the self-instructional procedure also was considered. It was hypothesized that subjects receiving the self-instructional training would show increased achievement motivation as measured by task persistence with concomitant changes in attributions for effort as compared with subjects receiving no self-instructional training. A second hypothesis predicted that an experiential group receiving enhanced credibility or rationale training would show more substantial change than the formal presentation group which received no such training. METHOD Subjects A group of 90 students (49 males and 41 females) in the seventh and eighth grades was selected for this study. The students were between the chronological ages of 12 years 8 months and 15 years 11 months. All students were selected from a total school population of 789 students at a junior high school in a school district near Los Angeles, California. The socioeconomic and ethnic makeup of the school population was lower middle class with approximately 92% of the students Caucasian.

Sample Selection Previous research has indicated that failure-oriented students do not have a tendency to ascribe effort as a reason for their success or failure. Therefore, an attempt was made to identify students meeting this criterion. The Intellectual Achievement Responsibility Scale (IAR; Crandall, Katkovsky, & Crandall, 1965) was given to 500 students in the junior high school for the initial selection of the student sample. The IAR was designed to determine the degree to which students believe that the intellectual failures and successes they encountered were a result of their own educational behavior versus the behavior of important others in their environment. The I+ score represented the number of positive items for which the subject took responsibility; the I- score represented the number of negative items (i.e., failure experiences) for which the subject took responsibility. The internal alternatives can be further categorized into those which attributed the outcome to effort. Thus, the I + score can be subdivided into I + (effort) and I + (ability); the I - score can also be divided into I- (effort) and I- (ability). A IO-item subset (five positive and five negative items) for effort identified the student’s attributions for failure to lack of effort (see Diener & Dweck, 1978). The 34-item IAR was administered in written form to classes of approximately 25 to 35 students. To control for problems in reading and motivation, an accompanying tape was presented with the written form. Each item on the written form was presented orally on the tape. The item was read aloud with a IO-set time period for the student response. This instrument was administered approximately 2 weeks prior to the experimental training. Students were rank ordered on the effort attribution subset of items from the IAR. Ninety students with the lowest effort attributions were selected for participation in the study.

Procedure The students were randomly assigned to two experimental and one control group. One researcher conducted the sessions for all groups. All students were told that the researcher

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was from the neighborhood high school and had been given release time to prepare them for the future proficiency exams. All training and testing procedures were emphasized as being vital to adequate preparation for these exams. Upon completion of each phase of the experiment, the student completed a “check out” document. The student was informed that it would be mandatory to complete the entire procedure to receive program certification and that all materials would be mailed home to parents with a record of their achievement. The training was conducted over a period of 5 consecutive school days. Each of the groups was given 40-min sessions at approximately the same time each day. The training for the two experimental groups was divided into three stages to facilitate the change process paradigm and to provide the necessary framework to test the credibility dimension. The two experimental groups received the same treatment except for slightly different procedures during the first stage of the program. The objective of the first stage was to provide a conceptual framework for the training process. To prepare the students for self-monitoring and self-instructional techniques, the concept of a thought-response interaction was introduced. The formal presentation group received information through a one session lecture-discussion format covering autogenic training, self-hypnosis, and psychocybernetics (Coe & Buckner, 1975). These procedures are essentially self-suggestive techniques which emphasize the person’s use of imaginal abilities and the power of his or her own thoughts. The point was made that a person’s internal dialogue can influence behavior. .Examples of inappropriate self-statements in academic situations were used to emphasize this relationship. The second experimental group received a more experiential procedure through the use of an activity to provide a more personal experience during their session. The galvanic skin response unit was one method used for this demonstration. A second method was the ideomotor pendulum (Brown, 1974; Cheek & LeCron, 1968;Jencks, 1978),a technique used by many individuals to demonstrate the psychophysiological effectiveness of self-suggestion. The pendulum consists of a string from which a washer is suspended. The string is held between the thumb and forefinger. the students were instructed to rest their elbow on a desk top, allowing the pendulum to swing freely. When it came to rest, they were instructed to consciously decide which way they wanted the pendulum to swing and indicate the direction overtly. In almost every instance the pendulum moved in the desired direction. This procedure was then followed by a discussion of the thought-response interaction. A secondary purpose of this procedure was to encourage the students to begin initiating overt self-instructional behaviors as a preliminary step before specific training procedures began. To complete the first phase, the students were informed that they would receive training which would increase their academic efficiency by making use of this thought-response interaction in relation to tasks on the proficiency exam. The second phase of the training involved the students in the actual practice of the selfinstructional procedure during three separate 40-min sessions. The objective of this phase was to train the students to self-monitor their effort level and to self-instruct in both effort and positive reinforcement. In order to accomplish this objective, a three-question technique (see Table 1) was designed. The experimenter reviewed the three-questions technique (brief demonstrations) while the students were given handout examples of the tasks that were required on the high school proficiency examination in the area of reading. The students were asked to select any task which they felt comfortable with on the mock examination to demonstrate to the experimenter the following: 1. One intention (effort) rating at the beginning of the task; 2. One intention (effort) rating at the completion of the task; 3. At least two positive self-reinforcing statements regarding effort during the sequence of steps of task completion.

The third question attempted to enhance the self-instruction in the effort and positive reinforcement statements, and statements identified the necessary sequence of steps in the academic task.

HOW is the task to be performed?

The second question directed the student’s attention to the specific nature of the task involved. The student was asked to clarify the academic task at hand. This was accomplished through the use of three guiding statements on the blackboard (see blackboard guide).

WHAT is the nature of the task?

The student used a simple self-rating measure to identify his or her intention (effort) to participate in the assigned academic task. This was accomplished by using a scale of l-10. The student was asked to hold up in the air the appropriate number of fingers (0 = no intention (effort), 10 = maximum intention) to demonstrate self-monitoring of effort. This procedure was repeated again at the end of the task to reaffirm the level of intention. This WHO question represented the most critical aspect of the training with regard to the effort attribution shift.

WHO is performing the task?

Procedure

1. Decide how you will take your first step in completing the task. 2. Decide how you will take the next step in the task. 3. Reward yourself verbally (with a “that’s good” statement) and continue the process until you have completed the task. 4. Give yourself an effort rating (hold c...... I rn,

1. Decide what the task is about. 2. Decide exactly what you are supposed to do. 3. Reward yourself verbally (with a “that’s good” statement) for completing this section.

Decide how much effort you wish to apply to the task. Hold up the number of fingers that tell how much effort you are going to make (0 = no intention (effort), 10 = maximum intention (effort). Reward yourself verbally (with a “that’s good” statement) for your effort.

Blackboard guide

TABLE 1 SELF-INSTRUCTIONAL TRAININGGUIDE

“Now, how should I proceed? First, I’ll skim over all this information to see what it contains. Good, I have a pretty good idea of what is in here, now they want to know on what page the map of West North Central United States can be found. Okay, let me look for West North Central United States. Ah, okay, here it is on page 26.”

“All right now, what exactly is the task? I’m supposed to look at this Atlas Table of Contents and then answer the question at the bottom of the page. That’s good, I’ve got that straight.”

“Let’s see, (student holds up 9 fingers) I really want to apply my best effort here. Okay, that’s good, I’m really going to try hard on this.”

Example

z g $ 8

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It is important to realize at this point that it was not the primary interest of the experimenter to evaluate the subject’s plan of attack or sequence of steps in the task (HOW question) but instead, to make use of this process as an anchor point for the subject to initiate self-reinforcing effort statements. The final stage of the training was designed to provide a 40-min session for the application of the newly acquired self-instructional skills. Students in both experimental groups were asked to demonstrate the procedure on new academic tasks. If the student failed to selfmonitor or self-reinforce, the instructor provided additional guidance and instruction in the proper use of the procedure. The control group met for five 40-min sessions (identical time as the two experimental groups), and was given the identical academic tasks. These tasks included reading an Atlas’ table of contents, solving basic mathematical operations, using library reference skills, and comprehending reading passages. There was no self-instructional training of any kind involved in this procedure. The students were simply informed that they were being given sample materials from the forthcoming proficiency examinations. They were instructed to complete all the materials to help prepare for these examinations.

Dependent Variables Persistence. The post-test measure of persistence was derived from a procedure by Dweck (1975) in which a contrived list of problems in mathematics was developed according to each student’s ability and current level of academic functioning. For this particular task, the student was given a contrived set of spelling words and asked to spell them orally. Each student’s individualized set was constructed so that from a total of 25 words (five groups of five) there was one word in each group beyond the student’s current grade level (based on scores on the California Test of Basic Skills or Wide Range Achievement Test). Therefore, the student was only able to complete successfully 20 out of the total of 25 words. To make the causal determinants of the student’s performance ambiguous, the 25 words were arranged in five stacks of five words, each facing down in front of the student (each word was printed separately on an index card). The student was then given the following instructions: You are to spell 25 words by selecting one stack of 5 words at a time (each stack of five words had one contrived failure word). After the stack has been selected you will hand it to me and I will read you one word at a time until you complete the stack of live words. After I read each word out loud, you will spell the word orally. How well you spell the word will depend on several factors: how skillful you are in spelling, how lucky you might be in drawing an easy word, how hard you try on each word, or how difficult the word is to spell. If the word is spelled incorrectly, you will be informed immediately, and it may be reattempted as many times as you wish, or you may ask to go on to the next word. With this particular procedure it was possible for a student to misspell a word that was a nonfailure word. Therefore, the contrived failure word was randomly placed within the first four words of each five-word set. If the student misspelled a word other than the contrived failure word, it was simply acknowledged as correct. If the contrived failure word was spelled correctly, a substitute word was inserted on the fifth trial of the set (group of five). This procedure controlled for only one failure experience during each five-word set. A total of 276 noncontrived failure words were presented to the three groups. There were 13 times when a student misspelled a word that should have been spelled correctly. Persistence was measured by a number of times the student attempted to spell one of the embedded failure words. If the student sat without any attempt to respell a misspelled word, the experimenter waited fo a 2-min period and said, “Time is up; let’s go on to the next

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word.” If at any time during the post-test measure, the student asked for assistance, the experimenter said, “Just do the best you can.” Attribution. The attribution measure was used to provide support for the possible change in attributions after the experimental training. This behavioral measure was adapted from the apparatus used by Nicholls (1975). Students indicated their attributions by monitoring any of four circular discs with gradations from 1 to 10. Each of the four attributionsability, effort, luck, and task difficulty-was printed across the disc which was mounted on heavy cardboard with a screw through the center holding the head of a pointer. After each group of five spelling words, the student was asked to think carefully about his or her performance on the set of words and indicate the causal reason(s) for the performance by using the instrument. This measure allowed the student to indicate any one attribution or combination of the four attributions. On each disc, the numbers 1 through 10 were evenly spaced in a clocklike manner. By using the pointer (clock hand) a value of 1 (low) to 10 (high could be assigned to each causal factor during the measurement procedure. For each of the five separate measurement trials, the pointer was set on the number 1 for all four attributions. The student was then asked to move the pointer in the direction which accurately indicated the reason for his or her performance. The following directions were read aloud to the student: Think carefully about your performance on this group of five words. Now, by moving the clock hand on any one or more of the colored circles, indicate how important any one or more of the reasons were for your performance. Attribution scores were recorded for each trial (five separate trials). A total attribution score was calculated for the combined trials of all four attributions.

RESULTS

The original sample contained 90 students (3 groups of 30). Attrition problems (approximately 25%) were due to such factors as student scheduling difficulties, teacher resistance, subject confusion with reference to the time and location, and illness. Due to these attrition factors, the final group N’s were unequal with the control group having 22 subjects, and the two experimental groups having 23 and 24 subjects. For statistical analyses, it was deemed desirable to have equal N’s. Therefore, three individuals were randomly discarded from the appropriate groups, leaving all groups with 22 subjects. The standardized achievement test scores of the attrition group did not differ from the students who completed the study. The group means and standard deviations for the persistence measure and self-rated attribution criteria are presented in Table 2. To test the hypothesis that group means differed on the five dependent variables, a multivariate analysis was performed. These variables were persistence, ability, effort, task difftculty, and luck. The results of this analysis (Pillai’s Trace, F(10,123) = 2.46, p < .OS) indicated that the means of the three groups differed significantly. Because the multivariate analysis indicated a significant difference between group means, five one-way analyses of variances were performed

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(one for each of the dependent variables) to locate the significant mean differences. The results indicate that effort, F(2,63) = 8.99, p < .05, and persistence, F(2,63) = 4.50, p < .05, were significantly different in the tree groups. All other dependent variables were nonsignificant. To further identify the significant differences between the groups, a Turkey-B, a posteriori procedure was used on effort and persistence. This procedure used the average of Tukey and Student-Newman-Keuls range of values to identify significant differences. The results for persistence and effort (Table 2) indicated that the control group differed significantly from the two experimental groups, which did not differ from each other. These findings support the first hypothesis that students in the self-instructional training (both experimental groups) would persist longer in correcting their errors than would nontrained (control) subjects. With regard to the second hypothesis the data indicated no significant differences between the two experimental groups. Further analyses were performed to determine if conditions other than experimental treatment contributed to the differences between groups. A group by experimenter trial analysis with repeated measures was calculated to ascertain if experimenter or trials had an effect upon persistence scores. The findings identify a significant group effect, F(2,54) = 4.09, p < .05, as presented earlier. Other findings indicated no significant experimenter effect, effect of trials, nor significant interactions. From these data, it does not appear that fatigue or experimenter bias were critical factors in confounding the study. Pearson product-moment correlation coefficients were calculated to examine both the intercorrelations between attributions and the relationships between persistence and attributions. The data revealed significant correlations @ < .05) between persistence and effort for all groups (control r = .45; formal presentation r = .59; experiential r = .70.) To explore TABLE 2 MEANS

AND STANDARD

Attribution/ task persistence Ability Effort Luck Task difficulty Task persistence

DEVIATIONS

FOR CAUSAL

AITRIBLITIONS

Formal presentation

Control

AND TASK PERSISTENCE

Experiential

M

SD

M

SD

M

SD

22.57 25.14 15.05 35.77 44.55

7.50 8.81 6.30 8.52 9.21

23.90 35.45 15.00 37.23 57.50

8.51 8.53 8.95 6.10 18.33

24.36 32.95 14.27 33.00 58.95

10.78 9.02 7.59 8.02 21.89

Note. Higher scores indicate higher value given to causal attribute and greater persistence on task.

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the possiblity of a significant relationship between the two experimental groups, a Fisher z transformation of r was used to compare the effortpersistence correlations. The result of this statistical analysis was not significant. DISCUSSION

Attribution theory predicts that change in persistence is a reflection of the belief that effort is a critical causal factor in achievement. A reattribution training program emphasizing the causal element of effort would indicate that students receiving this training should attribute their success and failure to effort more than students who receive no such training. The findings of this study supported this prediction and were consistent with other reattribution training studies (Andrews & Debus, 1978; Chapin & Dyck, 1976; Dweck, 1975). The focus, however, of previous reattribution training research has emphasized an externally oriented behavioristic approach. The present study demonstrated that an internal self-instructional approach can be equally as effective in changing causal attributions regarding achievement in academic tasks. The approach has several strengths: First, the methodological approach used in this study was purposely generalized to allow for the use of a variety of academic tasks. In the training procedure, the focus on proficiency examinations provided a base from which three different content areas were explored using the training methodology. The self-instructional method was applied to the areas of reading, language, and mathematics. Second, the training was conducted in groups of more than 20 students not individually. This raises the possibility of a group process which can be explored with regard to broader school applicability. Third, the methodological training procedure is amenable to teacher training. The training can be reduced to a series of graduated stages allowing broad teacher accessibility. Finally, the methodology places great emphasis on an internal locus of responsibility through the use of self-monitoring, self-reinforcement, and self-instructional techniques. This approach to the change process would appear to be consistent with much of the literature on children’s self-control through cognitive interventions. Several researchers (Bugenthal, Whalen, & Henker, 1977; Meichenbaum, 1977; McFall & Lillesand, 1971) have emphasized the need for additional attention to the credibility or rationale which is given to the subject in a self-instructional procedure. The findings in the present investigation failed to support the hypothesis that the experimental group receiving only formal presentation in phase one. A number of factors may have contributed to this result. First, the time devoted to this aspect of the training was minimal, due to certain general time restrictions within

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the educational context. Second, the information itself may not have been unique or powerful enough within the group setting to create the necessary effect. Third, the entire training program was conducted under the guise of proficiency examination preparatory thinking. Because the proficiency examinations are necessary for high school graduation, this factor alone may have provided the credibility necessary for subject commitment to the training program. The experiential aspect of the program may not have been as significant to the subjects due to the overall credibility of the program. Further research in self-instructional attribution training programs should include an achievement criterion and follow-up evaluation. It is important to demonstrate that after training persistence and effort show a direct link to academic achievement. In addition, comparison studies in reattribution training methods are needed to determine whether cognitive modification approaches produce more generalized and desirable effects than other approaches (Keogh & Barkett, 1979; Keogh & Glover, 1980). REFERENCES ANDREWS, G. R., & DEBUS, R. S. Persistence and the causal perception of failure: Modifying cognitive attributions. Journal of Educational Psychology, 1978, 70, 154-156.

BAR-TAL, D., & FRIEZE,I. Achievement motivation for males and females as a determinant of attributions for success and failure. Journal of Sex Roles, 1977, 3, 301-313. BROWN,B. New mind, new body. New York: Harper & Row, 1974. BUGENTHAL,D., WHALEN, C., & HENKER, B. Causal attributions of hyperactive children and motivational assumptions of two behavior change approaches: Evidence for an interactionist position. Child Development, 1977, 48, 876-884. CHAPIN, M., & DYCK, D. G. Persistence in children’s reading behavior as a function of N length and attribution retraining. Journal of Abnormal Psychology, 1976,85, 511-515. CHEEK, D., & LECRON, L. Clinical hypnotherapy. New York: Grune & Stratton, 1968. COE, W., & BUCKNER, L. G. Expectation, hypnosis, and suggestion methods. In F. H. Kanfer & A. P. Goldstein (Eds.), Helping people change. New York: Pergamon, 1975. CRANDALL, V. C., KATKOVSKY, W., & CRANDALL, V. J. Children’s beliefs in their own control of reinforcement in intellectual-academic achievement situations. Child Development, 1965, 36, 91-109. DIENER, C. I., & DWECK, C. S. An analysis of learned helplessness: Continuous changes in performance, strategy and achievement cognitions following failure. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 1978, 36, 451-462. DWECK, C. S. The role of expectations and attributions in the alleviation of learned helplessness. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 1975, 32, 1077-1084. FRANK, J. D. Persuasion and healing. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins Press, 1972. HENKER, B., WHALEN, C. K., & HINSHAW, S. P. The attributional contexts of cognitive intervention strategies. Exceptional Education Quarterly, 1980, 1, 17-39. JENCKS,B. Your body, biofeedback at its best. Chicago: Nelson-Hall, 1978. KEOGH,B. K., & BARKETT,C. J. An educational analysis of hyperactive children’s achievement problems. In C. Whalen & B. Henker (Eds.), Hyperactive children: The social and treatment. New York: Academic Press, 1979. ecology of identification

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KEOGH, B. K., & GLOVER, A. T. The generality and durability of cognitive training. Exceptional Education Quarterly, 1980, 1, 75-82. KLJKLA, A. Attributional determinants of achievement-related behavior. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 1972, 21, 166-174. MAHONEY,M. J. Cognition and behavior modification. Cambridge, Mass.: Ballinger, 1974.

MCFALL, R., & LILLESAND,D. Behavioral research with modeling and coaching in assertion training. Journal of Abnormal Psychology, 1971, 77, 313-323. MEICHENBAUM, D. Cognitive-behavioral modification. New York: Plenum, 1977. NICHOLLS, J. G. Causal attributions and other achievement related cognitions: Effect of task over outcome, attainment, value, and sex. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 1975, 31, 379-389. WEINER,B., & KUKLA, A. An attributional analysis of achievement motivation. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 1970, 15, l-20. WEINER, B., HECKHAUSEN, H., MEYER, W., & COOK,R. E. Causal ascriptions and achievement behavior: The conceptual analysis of effort. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 1972, 71, 239-248.