Informational sources, self-efficacy and achievement: a temporally displaced approach

Abstract

Personal self-efficacy is an important theoretical orientation that helps to explain students' learning and academic achievements. One area of research inquiry has involved the four major sources of information and their predictive effects on self-efficacy. As an extension for examination, the purpose of our investigation was to explore the interrelations between antecedents (e.g. enactive performance accomplishment), self-efficacy beliefs and academic achievement of elementary school students. Our research conceptualisation, unlike previous cross-sectional studies, entails a time displacement between sources of information (Time 1) and self-efficacy (Time 2 and Time 3) and between self-efficacy and academic achievement in science learning (Time 4). Three hundred and thirty-two (152 girls and 180 boys) third and fourth grade students from three government schools participated in this study. Likert-scale inventories were used to measure informational sources and self-efficacy beliefs. Structural equation modelling yielded evidence that supports, in part, our conceptual model. Only enactive performance accomplishment and vicarious experience exerted positive temporally displaced effects on self-efficacy. Self-efficacy at both Time 2 and Time 3 also contributed to the prediction of academic achievement.