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Abstract
Evidence suggests that many Jamaican students perform below established national achievement benchmarks (Davis, 2004). Internationally, Jamaican literacy and numeracy outcomes trail those of other nations, including within the Caribbean region (Valverde & Hadley, 2010). Harnessing expectancy-value theory (EVT), this investigation examined academic motivation and behavioural engagement to better understand Jamaican students’ achievement outcomes. Data were collected from 585 students attending five Jamaican middle schools to investigate the role of Jamaican students’ motivation milieu (students’ perceptions of the expectancies and values held by parents, teachers, and peers) and self-motivation (students’ own expectancies and values) in predicting their behavioural engagement (class participation, homework completion, absenteeism) and subsequent achievement. It was hypothesised that students’ self-motivation would be positively predicted by their perceptions of the motivation milieu. It was further hypothesised that students’ self-motivation would directly predict their behavioural engagement which, in turn, would directly predict their academic achievement. Two approaches to data analysis were adopted: variable-centred (using structural equation modelling; SEM) and person-centred (using cluster analysis). All hypothesised relationships were confirmed in SEM. Girls perceived that the motivation milieu had higher expectancies and valuing for them, whereas older students and low-SES students were more likely to be absent from school. Cluster analysis indicated four distinct groups differing in their motivation milieu perceptions, and each group had varying motivation, engagement, and achievement outcomes. Taken together, these findings confirm the generality of EVT and motivation and engagement as predictors of achievement outcomes among students in Jamaica and represent a novel contribution to the study of developing and emerging educational contexts.