1. Rediscovering the Concept of Conation
Melody Thompson
Assistant Professor
Adult Education Program
Penn State University
mmt2@psu.edu
Lorna Kearns
Instructional Designer
Center for Instructional
Development and
Distance Education
University of Pittsburgh
lrkearns@pitt.edu
2. Situate conation within the learning domain
landscape
Recognize its importance to adult learning
and distance learning
Discuss how to support and develop conation
among your students
Introduce some Web 2.0 tools
3. Plato’s Tripartite Soul (4th century BC)
Rational soul (mind/intellect)
Spirited soul (will/volition)
Appetitive soul (emotion/desire)
Scottish and German Psychologists (1700s)
Three faculties of mind:
Cognition (knowing)
Affect (valuing; emotion)
Conation (striving; volition)
4. 1932
“We say we are trying, striving, endeavoring, paying
keen attention, making an effort, working hard, doing
our utmost, exerting ourselves, concentrating all our
energies; in technical terms, we are manifesting
conation.”
--William McDougall
The Energies of Men
1980
Hilgard calls for a renewed effort to investigate
affective and conative constructs involved in learning.
5. 1987 – Atman proposes a model of conative
goal accomplishment for distance learners
7. Organize
8. Make it happen
9. Don’t procrastinate
10. Finish what you start
11. Evaluate
12. Fit into long-range
purpose
1. Recognize need, problem,
challenge, opportunity
2. Set goal
3. Brainstorm alternatives
4. Assess risks
5. Select strategy
6. Visualize finished project
6. Conation Cognition Affect
•What do I want to
work toward?
Why?
•How do I set and
manage my
learning goals?
•How do I achieve
my goals?
•How do I learn
new information?
•How do I come to
understand?
•How do I create
new knowledge?
•How do I feel
about my
learning?
•How do I feel
about what I
know?
Knowledge EmotionBehavior
7. Motivation Volition
•Need for
achievement
•Fear of failure
•Self-esteem
•Self-efficacy
•Personal interests
and attitudes
•Persistence
•Will to learn
•Mental effort
investment
•Mindfulness in
learning
•Attitudes about
the future
•Work ethic
•Self-regulation of
goal-oriented
behavior
•Awareness of
short-term and
long-term goals
and consequences
Pre-decisional Post-decisional
“I want to learn” “I will learn”
9. Self-directed learning is a process by which
learners take the initiative to:
Diagnose their learning needs
Formulate learning goals
Identify resources for learning
Choose and implement appropriate learning
strategies
Evaluate learning outcomes (Knowles, 1975)
Self-regulated learning encompasses the
processes by which learners achieve learning
goals.
10. Persistence among adult learners is a
continuing concern.
It can be affected by:
Competing demands for time
Competing demands for resources
Need to respond to unanticipated events
Role conflicts
Lack of integration with learning community
Institutional focus on younger learners
11. Although the cognitive and affective perspectives
suggest that a student will “do” something, they
don’t address the energy requirements necessary
for “doing.”
As Maslow noted, “healthy people are more
integrated…In them the conative, the cognitive, the
affective, and the motor are less separated from
each other…working collaboratively without
conflict to the same ends.”
14. Sense of
achievement
Pride
Pleasure
External rewards
Resource
investment
Discomfort of
change
Fear of failure
Benefits Costs
“In general, the potential for pleasure resulting from
striving and obtaining dreams, desires, and goals must
outweigh the discomfort of change or fear of failure if
action is to be taken.” --Huitt, 1999
15. Regular monitoring of thoughts, emotions,
and behavior
Evaluation of strategies and progress
Appropriate attribution
Resourcefulness
Attentional control
Emotional and motivational control
Adaptive help-seeking
Goal protection
16. Direction Energizing Persistence
• Imagine
possibilities
• Make decisions
• Identify goals
• Develop plans
• Overcome inertia
• Develop and
regulate self-
esteem
• Focus attention
• Manage emotions
• Practice self-
renewal
strategies
• Control attention
• Monitor emotions
and behavior
• Evaluate progress
• Reward
completion
17. What can you do to help students…
Imagine possibilities?
Set attainable goals?
Develop goal achievement plans?
Implement plans?
Practice self-observation?
Reflect on progress?
Seek help appropriately?
Manage emotions?
18. Angermeier, Markus. Web 2.0 universe map. Licensed under Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 2.0 Germany. Retrieved May 19, 2010 from http://kosmar.de/wp-content/web20map.png
20. 1. Recognize need,
problem, challenge,
opportunity
2. Set goal
3. Brainstorm alternatives
4. Assess risks
5. Select strategy
6. Visualize finished
project
7. Organize
8. Make it happen
9. Don’t procrastinate
10.Finish what you start
11. Evaluate
12.Fit into long-range
purpose
21. Web-based groupware application for:
• Creating, editing and hosting HTML pages
• Version tracking
• Page linking and organization
22. “We thought that networking was a way that
we could share resources with one another …
thereby multiplying our learning process.”
“...it was a way of collaborating even though
not seeing each other.”
“I gained a lot of confidence and also
appreciation of the work by sharing and
learning from my peers on the wiki.”
23. 1. Recognize need,
problem, challenge,
opportunity
2. Set goal
3. Brainstorm alternatives
4. Assess risks
5. Select strategy
6. Visualize finished
project
7. Organize
8. Make it happen
9. Don’t procrastinate
10.Finish what you start
11. Evaluate
12.Fit into long-range
purpose
24. Web log or journal to which students can
post text, images, and hyperlinks