Social and Personal Identities: Their Influence on Scholastic Effort

When analysing the influence of identity on the motivations of scholastic effort, it is crucial to consider both social and personal identities. A child’s social identity can be shaped by family background through the transmission of parental values vis-a`-vis educational aspirations and achievements. As to personal identity, children may show a different locus of control over the successes and failures of their scholastic effort. In this paper, I develop an in-depth analysis of these aspects of social and personal identities and the nature of their interaction, and consider their influence on a child’s effort in school through a theoretical model. Overall, the results from the model show that a (non-)pro-school social identity influenced by family background and locus of control along with their antagonistic or complementary interaction play a key role in determining children’s scholastic effort by influencing their motivations.