The role of teacher feedback on students’ motivation: a situated expectancy-value perspective

Teacher feedback has been argued to enhance students’ learning. Recent studies, however, have shown mixed findings. Some studies reported positive, others negligible, and still others a negative impact of teachers’ feedback on students’ learning achievement. To clarify these ambiguities, research is needed to understand the motivational mechanisms through which teacher feedback shapes students’ learning. Through the lens of the Situated Expectancy-Value Theory (SEVT), this study examined whether and how expectancy and value beliefs mediated the relationship between teacher feedback and learning performance. We conducted a structural equation modelling analysis, linking teacher feedback, expectancy, value, and students’ performance, using data from 569,311 students from 80 countries. An inconsistency was identified between the direct and indirect effects of teacher feedback on reading performance. Although the direct relationship between teacher feedback and reading performance was negative, the indirect effect demonstrated that teacher feedback might partially enhance performance by boosting students’ expectancy and value beliefs. Our findings shed light on the motivational mechanisms by which teacher feedback shapes academic performance. Feedback is adaptive insofar as it can be leveraged to enhance students’ expectancy and value beliefs, thereby suggesting a potential pathway for the positive indirect effect of feedback on achievement. For teacher feedback to be truly effective, it needs to target the enhancement of students’ motivation, particularly helping students believe that they can succeed, to recognise the importance of what they are learning, and to derive joy from the learning process.