Motivation and self-regulated learning in secondary vocational education: information-processing type and gender differences

In this article, information-processing type and gender differences in the interplay between motivational aspects (i.e., interest, persistence, test anxiety, and performance anxiety) and information processing were investigated. We argue that the two common information-processing modes, surface- and deep-level processing, should not be viewed as ends of the same continuum, but rather as discrete independent dimensions. In line with our presumption, the data showed only a weak correlation between the two information-processing modes for the whole sample. Thus, four typologies were identified: surface, deep, nonacademic, and strategic. In this study, the relations between interest and persistence on the one hand and information processing on the other hand differed for each of these typologies. It appeared that interested and persistent students tend to set up activities in their habitual mode of information processing. Furthermore, a gender difference in the relation between anxiety and information processing was found. Implications are discussed. (C) 2003 Elsevier Science Inc. All rights reserved.