Psychology Of Interest Research Paper

Interest as a psychological state involves focused attention, increased cognitive functioning, persistence, and affective involvement. Although focusing attention and continuing cognitive engagements normally require increased effort, when interest is high these activities feel relatively effortless. Increased affect has also been associated with the experience of interest, and researchers generally consider mainly positive affect, such as enjoyment or liking, when they refer to the affective component of interest. Interest as a disposition may be central to how individuals attend, select, and persist in processing certain types of information in preference to others (Hidi 1990, 1995). It has been suggested that interest has evolutionary profit since it causes individuals to concentrate their cognitive, emotional, and motor processes on a certain part of their environment for continuous periods (Rheinberg 1998).

Common to most conceptualizations of interest is an interactive relationship between people and their environment. This feature goes back to Dewey (1913) who said that in interest ‘self and world are engaged with each other in a developing situation’ (p. 126). Thus, interest always refers to a person’s interaction with a specific class of objects, events, or activities, and as such has been identified as having physiological, affective, and cognitive correlates. This strong focus on the specificity of the person and environment relation (as opposed to being localized in either the person, or in the task, topic, activity, etc.) distinguishes interest from other psychological constructs such as general curiosity and intrinsic motivation. Since interest develops over a history of interactions with a class of specific objects and/or activities that include both intrinsic and extrinsic aspects, it is inappropriate to describe interest as the outcome of either purely intrinsic or extrinsic factors (Hidi 2000).

1. History

The first theory of interest is often attributed to the German philosopher Herbart ([1806] 1965), who stated that cultivation of diversified interests was a prerequisite for learning and should be one of the primary goals of education. In the early part of the twentieth century many important thinkers were grappling with the relationship between interest and learning. In this period the many different ways in which academics looked at interest reflected the complexity of the concept. Dewey (1913) paved the way for future educational research by suggesting that interest-based learning was different from learning that lacked interest. Furthermore, Dewey argued that interest was necessary to maintain self-initiated, content-related activities that result in pleasure, satisfaction, and learning.

As the fields of education focused on concepts that could be operationalized and empirically tested, there was a noticeable decline in research devoted to the less precise concept of interest. Not until the last two decades of the twentieth century did researchers renew their focus on the concept of interest. Consequently, a renaissance of interest research occurred, with most of the work being produced in Germany and North America. In this period, researchers started to recognize that both emotional and cognitive factors can elicit interest (Kintsch 1980, Schank 1979) and to view interest as being domain and/or content-specific (e.g., Schiefele et al. 1979). The early conceptualizations were further developed into the more recent categorizations of interest.

2. Various Categories Of Interest

Situational and individual interest are currently the two categories most commonly associated with experiencing the psychological state of interest.

2.1 Situational Interest

Situational interest is generated by particular conditions and/or objects in the environment. Such interest involves focused attention and an affective reaction that may or may not last (Hidi 1990). Although the affective reaction associated with situational interest tends to be positive, negative emotions may also be involved in experiencing interest (Hidi and Harackiewicz 2000). For example, a student who is not interested in science may watch a television show that demonstrates how sheep and cows may be cloned. The student reacts with surprise and a little concern. Her interest has been triggered and her attention has been focused. She experiences fascination mixed with some negative emotions driven by her apprehension over what might happen if humans are cloned. If the television show does not further sustain these reactions, the student will stop watching and move on to other activities. Thus, her situational interest has been linked only to that moment and proved to be shortlived. On the other hand, if the content of the show presents further images that engage her attention and she continues to watch it, her situational interest has been maintained. In this case, the student has continued to experience the psychological state of interest. She became fully engaged, and may even be riveted to the television program.

The above examples suggest that situational interest should be conceptualized as having two potential stages, one in which interest is triggered, and a subsequent stage in which interest is further maintained (Hidi and Baird 1986). Several experimental investigations have found empirical support for this two-stage model (e.g., Harackiewicz et al. 2000, Mitchell 1993).

2.2 Individual Interest

Individual interest has been described as an individual’s relatively enduring predisposition to attend to certain objects, stimuli, and events, and to engage in certain activities (e.g., Krapp et al. 1992, Renninger and Wozniak 1985). Through repeated engagements over time, individuals build related knowledge structures, experience positive affects, and come to value highly the object of their individual interests. For example, a person with an individual interest in science values and seeks out opportunities to engage in scientific activities that he or she finds stimulating and enjoyable, works through difficulties that may involve negative emotions, continues to seek out opportunities to accumulate scientific knowledge, and experiences the psychological state of interest (Krapp and Fink 1992, Renninger 2000). Investigations that focused on individual interest have demonstrated that it influences learning and as such is an important component of academic motivation (e.g., Ainley 1998, Alexander et al. 1995, Prenzel 1992, Schiefele 1996).

2.3 The Relationship Between Situational And Individual Interest

Although situational interest and individual interests are distinct, they are not dichotomous phenomena, and they can be expected to influence each other’s development. Situational interest, once maintained, may contribute to the development of a longer-term individual interest leading to increased knowledge, value, and positive feelings for the object of interest (Krapp 1998, Renninger 2000). For example, a student assigned a project on Freud starts reading his work only because it is required reading. As the student reads, his (situational) interest is triggered, and he becomes captivated with Freud’s personality theory. He becomes excited, develops his own assumptions on how the behavior of significant others in his life could be best understood, and wants to learn more. From a cognitive point of view, a wide range of knowledge patterns have been activated. As the student continues to read about Freud’s theory, makes connections, and develops new hypotheses, corresponding changes can be expected to occur across declarative, conceptual, and logical knowledge structures (Farnham-Diggory 1994). From a motivational point of view, although interest has been elicited through an externally triggered cognitive activity, it leads to continued and persistent engagement. As the activity proceeds, it is no longer externally imposed on the student, but becomes enjoyable, self-determined, and autonomous. The potential of situational interest to affect both cognitive and motivational functioning is an important consideration since environmental influences such as teachers and parents can contribute in this way to developing individual interest in students lacking such interest.

Individual interest can influence situational interest by moderating the impact of environmental factors on the psychological state of interest (Bergin 1999, Murphy and Alexander 2000, Pintrich 2000). For instance, having an individual interest in science would predispose a student to watch science television programs. If the program turns out to be a basic introduction to cloning and reiterates information the student knows well—even if the video is arresting for novices—the student will turn to something else.

2.4 Topic Interest

Another form of interest that has been investigated in the literature is topic interest. To date, the meaning ascribed to the term topic interest is ambiguous. Some researchers have considered topic interest to be a form of individual interest but others have treated it more like a form of situational interest. To demonstrate the ambiguity of the way the term has been used, consider what might happen when students are presented with a text entitled ‘Cloning Sheep in the 21st Century.’ For students with a well-developed individual interest in biological science, the interest aroused by the text title (topic interest) would be closely linked to their individual interest. However, students who do not have a well-developed interest in the area might also report strong topic interest. In the latter case, this would most likely be due to situational factors such as the novelty or the uncertainty conveyed by the title. Thus, both individual and situational factors influence topic interest. Topic interest has also been investigated in the extensive literature that deals with vocational choice. However, reviewing this literature is outside the scope of this research paper.

3. Interest And Gender

Although parents and teachers have always been aware of gender difference in interest, only in the last decade of the twentieth century did researchers begin systematically to examine how gender influences individuals’ interests. The results of a number of other investigations indicated that gender differences also play a role in the development and outcome of situational, individual, and topic interest (see Hoffmann et al. 1998, for a review of the literature) For example, boys have been found to be more interested in physics than girls, whereas interest in writing shows the opposite trend. In addition to the gender differences in interests, boys’ and girls’ performances are differently affected by the experience of interest. The literature suggests that it may be particularly important for boys to be interested in their school activities, since their task performance seems to be more adversely affected than that of girls by low levels of interest.

4. New Directions

4.1 Relation Between Interest And Other Motivational Concepts

Until the beginning of the twenty-first century, motivational research tended to be clustered around a few concepts such as interest, intrinsic motivation, self-efficacy, task value, and goal orientation. Whereas the considerable literature resulted in the clarification of these concepts, little understanding developed as to how they were interrelated. Many researchers argue that the time now seems ripe for investigating the interrelations among these motivational clusters (Murphy and Alexander 2000). Interest, intrinsic motivation, self-efficacy, and mastery goals seem to have similar behavioral outcomes such as focused attention, persistence, effort, and positive emotional reactions. It is incumbent upon future research to investigate and clarify how these motivational variables develop and influence each other.

4.2 Neuropsychological Aspects

It has been proposed that the psychological and physiological processes associated with interesting information have unique aspects not present in processing information without such interest (Hidi 1990). By elucidating how the brain works when engaged in interesting as opposed to uninteresting activities, current developments in neuropsychology may legitimize this claim. Thus, a multidisciplinary research agenda that coordinates the findings of the newer techniques of brain behavioral analysis with the longer tradition of educational psychological research on interest holds exciting promise for the future.

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