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The study experiences of the high achievers in a competitive academic environment: A cost of success?
Ivar Nordmo and Akylina Samara
University of Bergen, Norway
The present paper is a case study that explores the study experiences and possible costs of success for the students accepted into the professional program in psychology at the University of Bergen in Norway. In this highly competitive environment, between 500 and 1000 students compete for 36 places during the introduction year. The study is based on 31 students' written narratives about their studying experiences during the introductory year in psychology. The data were analysed from a qualitative phenomenological perspective, and resulted in four basic themes that describe the students' experiences. The main findings indicate sacrificing a normal social student life in order to deal with an excessive workload, a shift in motivation from intrinsic to extrinsic, and a declined interest in the subject and joy of studying. The students experienced considerable stress during the studies, partly caused by lack of informational feedback on their level of competence during the semesters prior to the final exams. The findings are discussed in relation to the learning environment, drawing on Self-Determination Theory and the satisfaction of the basic psychological needs of competence, autonomy and relatedness.
She still has not found the motivation to immerge herself into the subject material she really is excited about, mostly because the curriculum has dominated and consumed most of her reading and study energy, but also because the curriculum and exam chase has reduced the aspiration - the appetite for the subject. (Student 25)A sense of competition for good results and grades is felt at all levels of education to various degrees. A reason for that is that grades usually are part of what determines entrance into the next level of education or into attractive programs with limited access, or into good schools. In that sense, we all have experienced some kind of academic competition. Still, sometimes the competition gets to another level and becomes severe. What kind of study experience is it to perform well under such conditions?
The five-year Professional program in psychology at the University of Bergen (UiB), Norway's second largest university, is an example of a very attractive study program. It accepts only 36 students each semester, based on exam grades in an introduction to psychology year that enrols between 500 and 1000 students. Students have about a 1:20 chance of being accepted, thus making the introduction studies an extremely competitive learning environment. What is it like to study and try your best to succeed under such conditions? Is there a cost of success? What are the characteristics of the learning environment that can explain these experiences and possible costs?
Generally, a competitive environment is not considered to promote high quality learning. A wide body of research has shown how assessment influences the students' learning process (Boud, 2000; Boud & Falchikov, 2006; Havenes, 2004; Kvale, 1995; Lauvås & Jakobsen, 2002; Miller & Partlett, 1974; Raaheim & Raaheim, 2002; Snyder, 1971). A general claim is that students aiming for good grades design their study activities to fit the exam requirements, giving less attention to the course objectives and scheduled learning activities, if these are not well aligned with what is important in order to get good exam grades. Kvale (1980) found that "grade behaviour" made students in high schools more dependent on teachers, competing rather than cooperating with peers, moving their self-image towards grade identification, shifting motivation towards focus on rewards (extrinsic motivation), and adopting a surface approach to learning. This is behaviour that is contrary to the educational goals expressed in policy documents, namely student independence, peer cooperation, self-development, intrinsic motivation and a deep approach to learning.
Highly competitive learning environments have also been discussed in relation to students' well-being. Some research has been conducted on why law students report higher emotional distress and decline in subjective well-being during law school than students in other programs (Benjamin, Kaszniak, Sales, & Shanfield, 1986; Sheldon, 2004; Sheldon & Krieger, 2007). Benjamin et al. (1986) identified excessive workload, very limited student-faculty interactions and unbalanced development of student interpersonal skills as possible causes for the decline in well-being. Sheldon & Krieger in a resent longitudinal study (2007), used a model of thriving based on Self-Determination Theory (Ryan & Deci, 2000b) to explore possible factors in the learning environment that influenced subjective well-being and academic achievement. Their analysis supported a model that links subjective well-being to satisfaction of the basic psychological needs of autonomy, competence and relatedness, which are influenced by the degree to which students perceive the learning environment as autonomy supportive. Sheldon and Krieger (2007) argued that "the negative emotional effects they [the students] demonstrated were likely caused by the controlling and autonomy-denying features of legal education" (p.884). Together, these studies make us aware of the issue of well-being in relation to strong competition and unsupportive learning environments.
Surprisingly little research has addressed the student experience in the highly competitive learning environment of the introduction to psychology program at UiB. A recent report based partly on a student questionnaire (Hovland, Pallesen, Diseth, & Larsen, 2006) revealed that half of the students believed that there was not sufficient study time to understand everything in the curriculum, and another 25% of the students were uncertain on the issue. This clearly indicates that the workload is perceived as quite excessive. The same report found that 2/3 of the students were uncertain or did not know what was expected of them, strongly indicating that the students had poor understanding of the learning goals and how their performance would be measured. Investigating the relationships between measures of course experience, approaches to learning and academic achievement, the same authors argue for the importance of perceived appropriate workload and clearly stated goals and standards (Diseth, 2006). Nordmo (2007) has interviewed the most successful students in the introduction to psychology courses about study activities, but the complexity of the students' experiences and a possible "costs of success" were not addressed, and need further investigation.
In the present study we take a phenomenological approach and analyse the successful students' reflections of their experiences during the introduction to psychology courses. We are looking for the themes that comprise the structure of these experiences and present this as the study's findings. In discussing the findings, we go beyond describing the experiences and explore some possible explanations for them. To do so, we turn our focus to the study environment analysing some of its features with the help of Self-Determination Theory (SDT), with its concepts of support for the basic psychological needs of autonomy, competence and relatedness (Ryan & Deci, 2000b). This is expected to be a valuable conceptual framework for such an analysis because SDT addresses the design of social environments in relation to how they foster or undermine people's development, performance and well-being. The SDT approach is expected to contribute to a better understanding of the local conditions for the reasons which the students have the kind of experience we present in the findings. A better understanding will hopefully enable us to suggest some changes to improve the learning environment. More widely, the study will test the power of the SDT framework in providing explanations for the students' experiences in a specific learning environment. The study will thus add to the growing literature on environmental influence on students' experiences from a SDT perspective, with a particular focus on the experiences of successful students in a severe competitive learning environment.
Performance anxiety plays a notable role for her, even though she normally performs well in her studies. She is afraid of not living up to others' and her own expectations. I believe she is in danger of turning her study achievements into a far too important part of her identity. (Student 1)Motivational change was not widely reported. A few students reported increased engagement in the subject of psychology during their studies, and some others reported decreased engagement because they were not able to follow their own interests in the subject due to the sole focus on the exams. Still a few reported a loss in their general joy of studying and zest for learning, due to the huge study effort and lack of social life that resulted from it.
a) Reading to understand the literature in order to be able to describe and discuss any part of it was experienced as a heavy workload that demanded long study hours daily throughout the semester. With no external control of attendance or assignments it was the students' own responsibility to manage such efforts. The importance of good self-management can be sensed in that the students attributed their success to personal qualities like being goal-oriented, self-disciplined and well-structured. Some enjoyed executing self-management; others had clearly difficulties with procrastination or struggling to find a balance between studying and other activities.
She is not sufficiently relaxed about her achievements and this results in a constant feeling of guilt (one can always read more), but good results. She always puts pressure on herself and when this pressure is real (for example 'getting good grades'), well-being is poor. Well-being requires a social-life. The main goal from now on is to make social-life a higher priority. (Student 6)b) Being very much aware of the competition, the students tried to find out if their knowledge would be good enough to put them in the top 5% of the class, or if study efforts had to be intensified. The lack of formal information and feedback led them to informal comparison of knowledge, done in self-organised study-groups and in organised seminars. This process of sharing knowledge in order to be informed of each others' levels of understanding brought some tension: On one hand, the students would rather be the ones learning from others with more knowledge than being the ones giving knowledge away to potential competitors. On the other hand, increased self-confidence came from realising that they knew more than the others. This tension was partly solved by gravitating towards others with the same level of ambitions and knowledge.
He is not the kind of student who is lenient about his knowledge in relation to fellow students. He is happy to share and contribute that little bit extra in relation to them. Peter is trying to create a win-win situation. (Student 27)Study efforts were compared as well, by observing the number of daily study hours spent and how far other students had come with their readings in the study rooms. Some reported that this awareness made them more uncertain whether their own efforts were sufficient or not, and chose instead to study in isolation.
He has mostly been sitting by himself reading in his room. That is where he feels most comfortable. The times he has been in the study-rooms, he notices how much and for how long his fellow students read and he feels he is lagging far behind and is a bad student. That is why he is sitting alone, and it makes him feel very lonely in the long run. This loneliness results in poor well-being. (Student 11)c) More than half of the students accepted into the professional program had retaken courses and exams in order to improve their grades. Some seemed to accept this as part of the cost of getting into the professional program and did not express much disappointment about not making it on their first try. Others reported being surprised and strongly disappointed by not making it, leading them to seriously question their self-image of being hard-working, good students. Going back for a second try could be a risky endeavour that further jeopardised their self-image if they still did not achieve the necessary grade. Support from family, friends and fellow students seemed important in making the decision to re-enter.
She has always been a good student, so the drop was dramatic when she started at the university and did not get good grades at first. This has made her quite discouraged at times and has influenced her belief in her coping ability. Linda always has a tendency to "excuse" her successes. Generally, she believes she is not as good as probably is the case, and her self-confidence, at least on the subject of psychology, could have been better. (Student 5)d) This particular learning environment placed the responsibility for developing and maintaining a productive daily routine on the students. A few expressed disappointment in the university as they did not expect mainly self-studies. They criticised the introductory courses for accepting too many students and for not spending enough resources on teaching, and felt to some degree alienated by what seemed like the university's indifference concerning their success or failure.
Sean was dissatisfied with the introduction studies. He felt that he became alienated and that he was reduced to a small piece in a large jigsaw puzzle. It rained on his soul. (Student 31)
Many were now looking forward to being part of a small class where they could collaborate and engage in discussions, concentrating on sharing and building knowledge together rather than competing for good grades. These expectations imply that many felt lonely and missed the social part of learning and of being a student during the introductory studies. They also imply that many did not feel that competition for good grades would be of importance in the professional program.
The students that claimed to have lost interest and motivation due to huge study efforts in the introduction studies now had hopes or expectations to regain their interest and motivation to learn. Students that experienced lower academic self-worth after having retaken exams, now hoped to regain their self-confidence. One student hoped to feel more appreciated as a student by the faculty and another expected to get better at studying.
Some students were looking forward to getting the competencies needed to become professional psychologists rather than the knowledge needed to write good essays, regarding this to be the "real" knowledge that motivated them in the first place. Such expressions may, however, reflect that this theme was discussed previously in the day of writing the self-characterisation.
The study program consists, roughly speaking, of three stages: 1 - acquire the information, 2 - make outlines, and 3 - memorise them. (Student 4)
SDT (Ryan & Deci, 2000b) deals with motivation - why we act - and focuses "on the social-contextual conditions that facilitate versus forestall the natural processes of self-motivation and healthy psychological development" (p. 68). The theory is based on the assumption that humans are proactive and engaged, thriving for growth and integration. Rather than focusing on level or amount of motivation, SDT focuses on the quality of motivation and distinguishes between motivation being intrinsic or extrinsic. Intrinsic motivation is when a person is doing an activity for its inherent satisfaction. Based on the theory's assumption about human nature, intrinsic motivation is the natural basis for learning and development. This is in contrast to extrinsic motivation that leads a person to do an activity in order to attain some separable outcome. Educational institutions, however, are seldom designed to allow students to freely follow their intrinsic motivation, but instead use different forms of control to regulate student behaviour towards certain goals and learning activities. SDT has been concerned with differentiating extrinsic motivation in accordance with to what degree people self-regulate activities without external pressure. The theory describes self-regulation as more controlled or more autonomous, based on the extent to which the rationale and value behind the activities have been internalised. More internalised extrinsic motivation in learning environments is associated with greater engagement, better performance, less dropping out, higher quality learning and greater psychological well-being (Ryan & Deci, 2000b, p. 73). The mechanisms behind maintaining intrinsic motivation or developing the more internalised types of extrinsic motivation associated with higher quality learning and greater psychological well-being, underpin the three basic needs of competence, autonomy and relatedness. Failure to provide support for these basic needs thwarts self-regulation and contributes to alienation and ill-being.
Hence, the question posed in the discussion is to what degree this particular learning environment supports the satisfaction of the three psychological needs SDT views as essential for self-regulation, high performance and well-being.
Ann has worked for some part in study groups, but gets easily stressed by working together with others who know much of the curriculum, and she tends to think that "they know much more than me", but she has learned from experience that when the exam results are presented, she has done better than her study group friends. (Student 8)Writing two voluntary assignments and receiving feedback on them - if they choose to do so - is potentially quite valuable for the students. Nevertheless, the feedback comes from older students that cannot, and are not allowed to, use the grading scale, and it thus fails to answer the essential question: "Is this essay good enough for the grade needed for further studies?" Hence, in lack of better means of comparison, the students compare time spent on studies as a way of getting an idea of their level of competence. Many seem to believe that others put in more effort than themselves and this leads to a decreased rather than increased feeling of competence.
The large number of students that are retaking exams to get accepted into the professional program, expresses how previous failure to succeed made them seriously doubt their competence. Since the grade is the only informational feedback from the exam, the students gained little useful information on what was good enough and what needed improvement in order to get a better grade next time. We may claim that only a grade on the exam good enough to be accepted into the program, does function as positive informational feedback. Our conclusion drawn from the above is that the learning environment rather poorly supports the students' need for competence.
Secondly, autonomy is described as the "experience of integrity, volition and vitality that accompanies self-regulated actions" (Deci & Ryan, 2000, p. 254), and autonomous behaviours have an internal perceived locus of causality - they are experienced as emanating from the self (Deci & Ryan, 1994). How is this basic need met in the present learning environment? We can start by acknowledging that the students had chosen to study at the university and had chosen the subject of psychology, assuming this choice to be voluntary and out of interest. Having chosen psychology, however, the students had no further influence on the content, as the curriculum was defined by the university with no room for individual choice at the introduction level. When getting involved, the students faced a learning environment without control of attendance or compulsory assignments, and this gave the students freedom in choosing when, where, how and how much to study. By applying self- management techniques, the students got control of their reading providing a sense of autonomy.
John kept, during the first and second semester, a log of how many pages he read, in order to have control. He left this system the last semester because he felt it had a negligent effect on what was to be learned, that is the focus was directed towards getting through as many pages as possible, not towards learning the material. (Student 4)All the students had the clear goal of getting top grades, so in order to experience autonomy, they also needed to know how to reach this goal, meaning that they needed to know what was expected of them at the exam and how to get the necessary competences. Here, however, is where the need for autonomy got somewhat thwarted. If we look at the school essay exam with no books or notes allowed from the perspective of autonomy, the situation gave the students little perceived control. Neither did they know what knowledge to demonstrate nor who would assess them, but most importantly: they did not have a clear understanding of the assessment criteria and what distinguished an excellent essay from a merely very good one. We do not claim this distinction to be easy to express and make clear to students. However, as it is the difference between acceptance and rejection into the professional program, uncertainty about this demarcation line did contribute to difficulties in experiencing an internal perceived locus of causality and behaviour emanating from the self. Instead, the students experienced serious and troubling doubt while studying, and did not, until the exam results had proved to be good enough, fully attribute their success to their own efforts and control. In this way the learning environment only to some degree supported autonomy.
Thirdly, the need for relatedness is described in educational settings as "belongingness and connectedness to the persons, group, or culture disseminating a goal" (Ryan &. Deci, 2000a, p. 64). In the present case, such significant others can be the teachers and psychologists, as they represent a community of practitioners (Wenger & Snyder, 2000) the students aspire to be members of. Feeling connected with the professionals by way of personal contact is difficult, as the scientific staff appears in lecture halls with several hundred students present. Nevertheless, a feeling of belonging is possible on an intellectual level, and reports of feeling at home at the university and in academia can be taken as expressions of such.
At least she likes to study, loves to gain new knowledge and could not dream of having an occupation where she would not get to use her brain. So the university is a perfect place for her, where knowledge flourishes all over the place. (Student 30)If we take significant others to mean peers, we find that many of the students formed study groups with equally ambitious students for mutual help and support and that a sense of relatedness developed in such groups, even though the success or failure in the end depended on the individual effort on the exam.
During the introduction week, Laura got to know a group of others with the same goal as her. Later, she has often thought that the most important thing she did this first semester was to get together with these people; talk about psychology, the curriculum, the lectures, and about the common goal they had. (Student 20)The competition for best grades often undermined feeling connected, as many viewed their peers as competitors and preferred to study alone. The fact that the courses had such a large number of students also impeded relatedness, as a group identity was difficult to get and students felt like "one in the crowd". Many looked forward to belonging to a small group of students who would work together and follow each other for several years in the professional program, and we take this as a sign of limited feelings of relatedness in the introductory year.
Now that Laura has been accepted, she hopes to have a good class environment and engaged lecturers. She feels good about belonging somewhere, about being able to lower her shoulders, and get the education she desires. (Student 20)Family and friends outside the courses were sometimes the significant others providing a feeling of relatedness in valuing higher education and hoping for the students' success. Such relatedness seemed important to some of the students, especially in getting support (morally and probably financially) to carry on for an extra semester after not achieving the necessary grade the first time through the course. Our conclusion is that the learning environment of the introductory year only to some degree supported the basic need of relatedness due to large cohorts, poor student-teacher ratio and high competition.
Drawing on this analysis from a SDT perspective, we conclude that the competitive learning environment of the introduction study only partly supported the basic psychological needs of autonomy and relatedness and quite poorly supported the need for competence. Hence, it is expected and understandable that the students had difficulties in developing and maintaining intrinsic motivation as well as the more autonomous regulation of extrinsic motivation that is found to be important for commitment, effort, high-quality performance and psychological well-being. However, despite the poor support for the basic needs, the students in this study were able to show great commitment, make a huge effort and achieve a high-quality performance on the final exams. Our findings suggest that this was done with a personal cost of temporary decline in psychological well-being, ranging from a mild sense of isolation to more serious personal distress and a feeling of alienation. We believe that the SDT framework has proved its usefulness in giving some explanations of why the students had these experiences, considering the quality of the learning environment.
We have concluded that the learning environment rather poorly supported the basic psychological needs associated with thriving and natural growth tendencies, and we must ask why it is designed this way. One answer could be that it is designed this way to seek out the students that can succeed despite poorly supportive conditions, because these students will have qualities important for further studies and a career in the field of psychology. The premise for this assumption is, of course, that further studies and practising psychology is done in poorly supportive conditions. The main personal characteristics that the students, in retrospect, ascribed their success to were: having a clear goal and being goal-oriented, being self-disciplined and well-structured, and, mentioned by the many who retook exams, sometimes repeatedly, being determined enough to endure disappointments. These qualities are important for success in many parts of life, without any doubt, but are they essential for further studies and a career in psychology? We will not attempt to answer this question as it goes beyond the scope of the present investigation. We would like, however, to question the choice of keeping the learning environment unsupportive if done so in the interest of finding the top 5% of the students. Not mainly for the well-being of these few selected students, but in the interest of the remaining 95% of the students that are not selected. The university would serve them better if it created a learning environment that supported the three basic psychological needs associated with thriving and high quality learning.
The present study has several limitations. Its focus is on experiences of studying based on self-characterisations by the "winners", done after succeeding at the exams. These retrospective descriptions can be criticised with regard to their validity - is the experience coloured by the positive results? Could reflections gathered during studying reveal other elements of the studying process? Moreover, by focusing only on the successful students, our claims lack support from a possible comparison between experiences from students that did not succeed. Where do these students attribute their "failure"? What is their motivation and feeling of self-determination? Does the learning environment have a similar influence on them, and how do these experiences influence their further study and career choices? Such questions would be fruitful material for further studies. Finally, as SDT was used as a theoretical perspective in this study, we focused on social environmental conditions for support of thriving, and we neglected self-influence in applying effort and persistence to goal reaching. In further studies, a stronger intra personal component in the analyses could be incorporated.
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We ask you to write this character sketch from the point of view of an imaginary friend, someone who knows you extremely well, perhaps better than anyone really does. Include everything you think someone would need to know about you to help them understand your experience of studying and what affects your learning at the university. Write using the third person (using "him" or "her" rather than "I"), and start by saying: "(First name) is ...."
The descriptions will be used for research purposes and all names will be changed to ensure anonymity. You can always give yourself an imaginary name to further ensure anonymity. The description however, must not be imaginary.
(This instruction is strongly inspired by an unpublished work by P. Laybourn and G. Jeffrey, Department of Psychology and Sociology, Napier University, Edinburgh, UK.)
| Authors: The authors are assistant and associate professors in university pedagogy. Their research and teaching activities address issues on teaching and learning in higher education, such as students' study activities, various teaching forms, supervision, the design of learning environments, and policy issues in higher education. The present paper is part of Nordmo's doctoral dissertation. Email: ivar.nordmo@iuh.uib.no, akysam@online.no Please cite as: Nordmo, I. & Samara, A. (2009). The study experiences of the high achievers in a competitive academic environment: A cost of success?. Issues In Educational Research, 19(3), 255-270. http://www.iier.org.au/iier19/nordmo.html |