That was a laboratory study where the learning situation was somewhat artificial. These results indicate that performance goals help short-term learning, whereas mastery goals facilitate long-term learning. The participants in the performance goal condition showed better memory performance in an immediate memory test, but when the memory was assessed one week later, participants in the mastery goal condition showed better memory performance. Participants in the mastery goal condition were told that the goal was to develop their cognitive ability through the task, whereas those in the performance goal condition were told that their goal was to demonstrate their ability relative to other participants. Critically, participants performed the problem-solving task with different goals. In the study, participants were engaged in a problem-solving task and received a surprise memory test related to the task.
We conducted a series of behavioral experiments to examine how these two different types of motivation influence learning (Murayama & Elliot, 2011). Mastery goals and performance goals represent the same overall quantity of motivation, but they are qualitatively distinct types of motivation. In the literature of achievement goals, for example, people study primarily for two different goals - to master materials and develop their competence, which are called mastery goals, and to perform well in comparison to others, which are called performance goals (Dweck, 1986 Nicholls, 1984). The critical fact is that not all motivations are created equal.
This sounds like an obvious fact, but our lab showed that the reality is more nuanced. If you are motivated, you learn better and remember more of what you learned. We explore a number of overlapping basic and applied research questions with the ultimate goal of providing an integrated view on human motivation. Our Motivation Science lab takes an integrative approach, drawing from multiple disciplines (e.g., cognitive, social and educational psychology, cognitive/social neuroscience) and multiple approaches (e.g., behavioral experiments, longitudinal data analysis, neuroimaging, meta-analysis, statistical simulation/computational modeling, network analysis ). This multidisciplinary, multimethod pursuit, called Motivation Science, is now an emerging field (Kruglanski, Chemikova & Kopez, 2015). In recent years, researchers have recognized the importance of more unified and cross-disciplinary approach to study motivation (Braver et al., 2014). In other fields such as cognitive psychology, motivation has been normally treated as a nuisance factor that needs to be controlled (see Simon, 1994). Furthermore, the way motivation is defined and theorized is fundamentally different in cognitive/affective neuroscience (Murayama, in press). For example, I studied a number of motivation theories proposed in educational psychology (as my PhD is in educational psychology) but these theories are not connected with the motivational theories studied in social psychology or organizational psychology. Despite its obvious importance, empirical research on motivation has been segregated in different areas for long years, making it difficult to establish an integrative view on motivation. When you study mathematics, your motivation to study mathematics clearly affects the way you learn it. When you make a decision, your choice is certainly influenced by your motivational state. Motivation is important in almost every aspect of human behavior. He has recently started a large project on the nature of human curiosity and intrinsic rewards, funded by the Leverhulme Trust. McGuigan Early Career Investigator Prize from the American Psychological Foundation, and the Transforming Education Through Neuroscience Award from the Learning & the Brain Foundation.
15 (Educational Psychology) of the American Psychological Association, the F.J. Snow Award for Early Contributions from Div. He obtained his PhD at the University of Tokyo as an educational psychologist, and thereafter expanded his expertise and research scope (to include such areas as social psychology, cognitive psychology, cognitive neuroscience and psychometrics) through postdoctoral positions at four different institutions in three different countries (Japan, the United States, Germany).
Kou Murayama is an associate professor at the University of Reading, heading the multidisciplinary Motivation Science lab with the aim of achieving an integrative understanding of human motivation.