Findings From a Pilot Study Examining the Positive and Negative Achievement Emotions Associated With Undergraduates’ First-Year Experience

Abstract

Research shows that undergraduate students’ achievement emotions are critical in determining motivation and success in higher education. This article reports on the results of a pilot study using the Achievement Emotions Questionnaire involving 10 (n = 10) mostly ethnic minority undergraduates at an urban 4-year university. In general, findings reveal increases in feelings of hope, hopelessness, and boredom as well as decreases in enjoyment throughout students’ first-year experience. Students’ positive and negative emotions impact their perceptions of both their classes and instructors and affect their motivation, on-task behavior, and academic success. These results also compare and show significant differences in the emotions associated with the first-year experiences of immigrants, Hispanic, and first-generation students as compared with their citizen, non-Hispanic, and nonfirst-generation peers, respectively. These findings paint an intimate portrait of the narrators’ experiences and the impact that emotions had on their motivation and achievement during their first year in college.

Keywords

achievement emotions undergraduate case study urban university first-year experience

College is a time of emotional growth and change for students. Even more so for students who are ethnic minorities, underrepresented in their chosen field of study, or they are first in their families to attend college. Research has shown that emotions such as enjoyment, hope, pride, anxiety, hopelessness, and boredom play an integral part in students’ motivation, learning performance, identity development, health, and ultimately their academic success (Barker, Howard, Galambos, & Wrosch, 2016; Ketonen, 2017; Pekrun, Goetz, Daniels, Stupnisky, & Perry, 2010; Pekrun & Linnenbrink-Garcia, 2014).

The development of self-reporting instruments such as the Academic Emotions Questionnaire (AEQ) enables researchers to gauge and understand students’ emotional responses to typical academic settings and situations. However, these instruments are typically single use and provide a snapshot of students’ academic emotions at only one point in time. In reality, students’ emotions are in a constant state of change. As they progress through their college careers, students’ coursework becomes more rigorous and expectations, as well as workloads, increase. Thus, the emotions experienced in academic settings and situations will change semester-to-semester and year-to-year.

The AEQ, as described by Pekrun, Goetz, Frenzel, Barchfeld, and Perry (2011) and Pekrun, Goetz, and Perry (2005), was integrated into a longitudinal pilot study of 10 undergraduate students at an urban university. The instrument was applied to each narrator in the study once per semester at the same meeting in which they participated in semistructured interviews. In this way, students’ emotional responses were collected at least twice during each academic year. This collection method allowed the collection and compilation of students’ scores across semesters. This article presents data, analysis, and discussion of the positive and negative achievement emotion data from a case study of 10 (n = 10) undergraduate students’ first (freshman) year at an urban university in the southern United States.

Literature Review

Control-Value Theory of Emotions

The control-value theory of emotions (Daniels & Stupnisky, 2012; Pekrun, 2006; Pekrun, Frenzel, Goetz, & Perry, 2007; Pekrun & Perry, 2014; Pekrun & Stephens, 2009) served as the framework for both the inclusion of the AEQ in this study and the development of associated research questions. This theory provides an integrative approach for the analysis of various emotions experienced by the students in academic and achievement contexts and situations (e.g., attending class, studying, and taking tests; Daniels & Stupnisky, 2012; Ketonen, 2017; Pekrun et al., 2007; Pekrun & Perry, 2014). With a focus on both outcome-related and activity-related achievement emotions, the control-value theory assumes that individual evaluations of events cause specific reactions in different people and that responses can have long-term positive or negative impacts on achievement.

Defining Achievement Emotions

Despite a lack of agreement on the definition of emotions, researchers generally agree that emotion consists of several components: a subjective feeling component, a motor component (expressive), a physiological component, an action-tendency component (motivational), and an appraisal component (cognitive; Burić, Slišković, & Macuka, 2018; Goetz, Frenzel, Pekrun, & Hall, 2006; Ketonen, 2017; Mandler & Sarason, 1952; Pekrun et al., 2011). Scherer (2005) explained that the appraisal perspective defines emotions as “episode(s) of interrelated, synchronized changes in the states of all or most of the five organismic subsystems in response to the evaluation of an external or internal stimulus event” (p. 697). Frenzel, Becker-Kurz, Pekrun, and Goetz (2015) goes a step further by suggesting “that individuals’ subjective judgments of situations—for example, their expectancies, attributions, self-concepts and self-efficacy, subjective values, or goals—are of primary importance for general emotion arousal” (p. 3).

This study defined academic emotions similarly to Pekrun et al. (2011) in that there is a direct link between emotions and achievement-related activities and outcomes. Rather than focusing on only prospective outcome emotions—linking emotions such as hope or anxiety to possible success or failure—and retrospective outcome emotions—linking emotions such as pride and shame to past success or failure—the definition proposed by control-value theory, and used in this study, suggests linking activity emotions to current achievement-related activities.

Self-Reporting Devices

As a method for gathering and assessing emotions, self-reporting instruments have several shortcomings. These include the potential for respondents’ lack of understanding of the questions or statements or a reluctance on the part of the respondent to report their emotions honestly (Burić et al., 2018; Hong et al., 2016). However, self-reporting instruments are economical with research showing that they are both precise and useful for assessing conscious aspects of emotion (i.e., cognitive, subjective, motivational, expressive). As a result, self-reporting instruments remain a dominant tool for emotional research (Burić et al., 2018; Hong et al., 2016; Mandler & Sarason, 1952; Pekrun, Goetz, Perry, Kramer, & Hochstadt, 2004; Pekrun & Linnenbrink-Garcia, 2014).

The Achievement Emotions Questionnaire

The AEQ (Pekrun et al., 2005, 2011), based on the control-value theory of emotion (Pekrun, 2006), is a theoretically grounded instrument developed to assess the college students’ typical, individual emotional reactions in academic situations. The AEQ is a multidimensional self-report instrument that is based on qualitative and quantitative research examining the academic emotions experienced by students in class-, learning-, and test-related situations (Pekrun et al., 2004; Pekrun, Goetz, Titz, & Perry, 2002).

Two main criteria led to the inclusion of the AEQ in this study. First, the AEQ presents students with an opportunity to self-report on a more substantial range of both emotions and academic situations than other self-reporting instruments. The depth and breadth of the AEQ not only considers the individual emotional reaction to the same scenario (i.e., enjoyment vs. anxiety of going to class) but also considers that the same emotion may be experienced differently in various situations (enjoyment of classroom instruction vs. enjoyment of taking an exam). Second, the AEQ has been subjected to rigorous multinational and multilanguage use and validation with versions available in English, German, and Chinese and can be adapted to measure emotions in single courses, specific situations, or specific points of time (Frenzel, Thrash, Pekrun, & Goetz, 2007; Peixoto, Mata, Monteiro, Sanches, & Pekrun, 2015; Pekrun, Elliot, & Maier, 2009; Raker, Gibbons, & Cruz-Ramírez de Arellano, 2019).

The 232 statements are divided four positive (enjoyment, hope, pride, and relief) and five negative (anger, anxiety, hopelessness, shame, and boredom) emotions frequently experienced by college students (Goetz et al., 2006; Pekrun et al., 2002). Statements are from a first-person perspective and contextualized within specific class-related (e.g. “I enjoy being in class”), learning-related (e.g., “I’m discouraged about the fact that I’ll never learn the material”), and test-related (e.g., “I worry whether I have studied enough”) academic situations. Students rate their emotional experiences using a 5-point Likert-type scale (1 = strongly disagree and 5 = strongly agree).

Studies of both general and specific affect from a control-value theory perspective exist with the AEQ used, in some studies, to analyze the achievement emotions both generally and specifically. This includes, but is not limited to, elementary (Lichtenfeld, Pekrun, Stupnisky, Reiss, & Murayama, 2012; Peixoto et al., 2015) and undergraduate students (Webster & Hadwin, 2015), cross-cultural analyses (Frenzel et al., 2007), students in discipline-specific contexts such as mathematics (Vega, 2018) and organic chemistry (Raker et al., 2019) courses, and context-specific situations such as testing (Pekrun et al., 2004) or doing homework (Goetz et al., 2012). The tactical use of the AEQ has been used effectively to gauge students’ emotional responses at a particular point in their college careers (i.e., after midterm or final exams, just prior to graduation), the experiences of specific groups of students (i.e., students transferring from community college to 4-year university, graduating seniors, racial minorities in the sciences), and to correlate emotional responses to gender, race, age, and academic success (Frenzel et al., 2007; Hong et al., 2016; Lichtenfeld et al., 2012; Peixoto et al., 2015; Webster & Hadwin, 2015).

Study Purpose and Overview

One of the purposes of this study was to learn how positive and negative emotions are experienced by undergraduate students throughout their college careers. The researcher hypothesized that undergraduate students’ achievement emotions changed from semester-to-semester and year-to-year. First-year experience data begin to answer the research questions: To what extent do the students’ positive emotions change from semester-to-semester during their first-year experience? To what extent do the students’ negative emotions change from semester-to-semester during their first-year experience? This article reports on statistics and correlation analyses of quantitative data with students’ corresponding qualitative data on their positive and negative achievement emotions based on the constructs of the AEQ as defined in the control-value theory of achievement emotions.

The number of college students who are the first in their families to attend college/university is growing, as postsecondary degrees have become a prerequisite for employment. Consequently, there is a growing body of literature focusing on ethnic minorities and their college experiences (DeAngelo, Franke, Hurtado, Pryor, & Tran, 2011; Hurtado, Carter, & Spuler, 1996; Smedley, Myers, & Harrell, 1993). This research has revealed how ethnic minorities college experiences, mainly African American/Black, Latinx, and Asian populations, are unique and differ from those of their Caucasian peers (Gloria, Castellanos, Lopez, & Rosales, 2005; Gloria, Castellanos, & Orozco, 2005; Wei, Ku, & Liao, 2011; Zalaquett, 1999).

A U.S. Department of Education’s report (Musu-Gillette et al., 2017) entitled Status and Trends in the Education of Racial and Ethnic Groups 2017 noted that “of the 17.3 million undergraduate students in the fall 2014, about 9.6 million were White [and] 3.0 million were Hispanic” (p. 96) which represents a 119% increase from 10 years prior. Between 2005 and 2015, the White–Hispanic gap in total college enrollment narrowed from 18 to 5 percentage points (42% and 37%, respectively). While the number of bachelor degrees awarded to Hispanic students between 2004 and 2014 increased 113.9% from 94,644 to 202,412, among traditional college-age students, there is a completion gap of 17.5-percentage points between Hispanic students (49.3%) and their White peers (66.8%). Furthermore, female enrollment was higher than male enrollment, 43% to 38%, across all major ethnic groups for traditional college-aged students (18–24 years; DeAngelo et al., 2011; Musu-Gillette et al., 2017).

Undergraduate Affect

Pekrun et al. (2007) posited an association between achievement emotions and appraisals of cognitive strategies, metacognition, task value, motivation, and self-regulated learning in both general and discipline-specific academic contexts (Pekrun & Perry, 2014; Pekrun & Stephens, 2009). Achievement emotions, they maintain, influence choice, study habits, resource use, effort, and the appraisal of strategies such that positive emotions (e.g., hope and pride) promote rehearsal, elaboration, and self-regulation strategies, while negative emotions (e.g., anxiety and boredom) suppress such strategies (Pekrun et al., 2009). As such, achievement emotions can be predictors of undergraduate success in both general and discipline-specific academic settings.

College is a time of change, challenges, and emotional upheaval for all students. The stresses of higher education, however, are magnified for ethnic minority students. Research by Crisp, Taggart, and Nora (2015), Gloria, Castellanos, and Orozco (2005), and Vega (2018) explain that first-year minority undergraduates experience additional psychological, physiological, and behavioral stress. Gloria, Castellanos, Lopez, et al. (2005), Smedley et al. (1993), and Wei et al. (2011) expand on this and explain how these stresses, and instances of depression, are more common and profound for women, immigrants, and the first in their families to attend college where stress can interfere with integration in the university community and college adjustment. In addition, three of the participating students, Cynthia, Emma, and Ivonne, are undocumented undergraduates. Scholars, such as Allaire (in press), Benuto, Casas, Cummings, and Newlands (2018), Cadenas, Bernstein, and Tracey (2018), Pérez, Cortés, Ramos, and Coronado (2010), and the comprehensive report entitled In the Shadows of the Ivory Tower by Teranishi, Suárez-Orozco, and Suárez-Orozco (2015) have revealed and contextualized how undocumented students’ college experiences are unique and differ from those of their citizen peers.

In particular, Contreras (2009) and Pérez et al. (2010) describe minority and immigrant undergraduates’ limited access to financial aid, their struggle to manage multiple jobs to pay for their college education, and how minority and immigrant students work to contribute to their family’s income. Wei et al. (2011) explained that “when ethnic minority students experience such minority stress, they are likely to feel discouraged about staying in college” (p. 195). Franklin, Smith, and Hung (2014) found that racialized and microaggressive incidents on college campuses lead to emotional and psychological fatigue among minority students. As a result, minority students, particularly Latinx and African American students, have lower rates of academic persistence and graduation than their majority peers (Contreras, 2009; Crisp et al., 2015; González, 2015; Tajalli & Ortiz, 2018).

Research by, for, and with ethnic minority students has found a variety of factors that contribute to their success in higher education (Crisp et al., 2015; Richardson, Abraham, & Bond, 2012; Rodriguez, Myers, Morris, & Cardoza, 2000; Roska & Whitley, 2017). These factors include highly developed and active academic support networks (Allaire, 2017; Hurtado et al., 1996; Zander, Brouwer, Jansen, Crayen, & Hannover, 2018), self-motivation (Contreras, 2009; Gloria, Castellanos, & Orozco, 2005), real and perceived academic preparedness (Boden, 2011), and the importance of familial support systems (Allaire, 2017; Pérez, Espinoza, Ramos, Coronado, & Cortes, 2009; Pérez Huber, 2009).

Although there has been some research involving the role of achievement emotions for ethnic minority students, their inclusion has not necessarily been purposeful. Research on ethnic minority students and their academic experiences has revealed a reality differently and, at times, distinctly separate from their nonminority peers. As such, there is a need for focused research on the emotional experiences of ethnic minority students to better understand how they perceive and experience academic situations.

Method

Participating Students

This case study involved 10 (n = 10) undergraduate students who, at the time of the collection of these data, were enrolled at the University as first-year college students. All of the students self-identified as interests in pursuing a degree and career in teaching and were enrolled in a “freshmen seminar” through the University’s education department at the time of selection. The University is a minority, and Hispanic-serving institution with approximately 40% (1,091) of all undergraduates self-identifying as Hispanic or Latinx, and over 65% of Hispanic undergraduates were females. Hispanic females are also the student demographic with the highest graduate rate (23%; Data USA, 2016; University, 2017). As such, this study focused on female, primarily Hispanic, undergraduate students and their emotional experiences at the university. Two non-Hispanic students were included in this pilot study to provide a comparison of the experiences of the majority–minority students.

Students were purposefully selected for this study based on a number of factors including being the first in their family to attend college, first time in college, ethnicity, and the certification area (e.g., early childhood through sixth grade, fourth through eighth grade) in which they expressed interest (see Table 1). All of the students chose a pseudonym (Ana, Cynthia, Emma, Guadalupe, Ivonne, Jade, Jay, Lee, Tina, and Yolanda) to protect their anonymity and agreed to be interviewed once per semester. Per the university’s institutional review board, students were made aware of their rights to withdraw from the study at any time.

Table 1.

Narrator Biographical Information.

Narrator	Age	Ethnicity	Immigrant	FTIC	First-generation college student	Low-income student	Intended certification area
Ana	18	Hispanic/Latinx		✓		✓	EC-6 Bilingual
Cynthia	18	Hispanic/Latinx	✓	✓	✓		EC-6 ESL
Emma	18	Hispanic/Latinx	✓	✓		✓	EC-6 ESL
Guadalupe	18	Hispanic/Latinx		✓	✓	✓	EC-6 Bilingual
Ivonne	20	Hispanic/Latinx	✓		✓		EC-6 ESL
Jade	20	Multiracial					4-8 ESL
Jay	18	Hispanic/Latinx		✓			EC-6 ESL
Lee	18	White (non-Hispanic)		✓			EC-6 Bilingual
Tina	19	Hispanic/Latinx		✓	✓		EC-6 Bilingual
Yolanda	18	Hispanic/Latinx		✓			7-12 Mathematics

Note. FTIC = first time in college; EC = Early Childhood ; ESL = English as a Second Language .

Data Collection

The AEQ was administered digitally via a smartphone or tablet immediately following the semistructured interview. For this study, the directions and statements were identical to those described by Pekrun et al. (2005, 2011). Verbal and written directions for the AEQ requested students to be honest, explained there were no right or wrong answers, and clarified that the purpose of the questionnaire was to find out how they think and feel about their university experiences. Students’ pseudonyms were used to connect AEQ data longitudinally as well as quantitative and qualitative data.

Statistical Analysis

It was not the purpose of this study to validate the AEQ for a particular population or to compare one population with another. Instead, the AEQ was used to quantify the discreet emotions each of the students experienced throughout their first academic year at university.

SPSS was used to calculate the totals and means for each discreet emotion for each narrator during each semester of their first academic year at university. Analysis of the data was conducted in several stages. The first stage of analysis compiled students’ scores of positive and negative emotions and provided descriptive statistics of all nine emotions for each narrator as well as the overall group for each of the individual semesters. Students’ ratings for statements related to each discreet emotion were added together to create “emotional scores.” These, in turn, were used to determine the average emotional score of the group. The second stage was a comparison of data for each discrete emotion across semesters for both the entire group and individual students to determine whether there were statistically significant differences in the emotions experienced by students within a given semester or across semesters. Data from this stage were shared with students for reflection and comment. Finally, Spring 2018 emotional data were correlated with the students’ 2017 to 2018 cumulative grade point average (GPA) using a two-tailed Pearson’s correlation to determine whether there were statistically significant relationships between the two.

Following the guidelines recommended by Pekrun et al. (2005, 2011), the narrator data were aggregated for both Fall 2017 and Spring 2018 semesters based on each of the positive emotions—enjoyment, hope, pride, and relief—and negative emotions—anger, anxiety, shame, hopelessness, and boredom. This aggregation resulted in nine emotional scores for each of the 10 students, which was presented to them as an individual “emotional scorecard” for comment and reflection during their subsequent Fall 2018 interviews.

Paired t tests and analysis of variance were used to compare Fall 2017 and Spring 2018 emotional scores for each narrator, and the Spring 2018 emotional scores were correlated with each narrator’s cumulative GPA. During their subsequent Fall 2018 interviews, each narrator was shown their emotional scores from the 2017 to 2018 academic year and asked to reflect and comment. Those comments have been integrated into the discussion portion of this article.

Results

Students’ Fall 2017 and Spring 2018 AEQ data were gathered after interviews via an online Google form. All 10 students participated in both surveys. Table 2 shows the possible score range and mean for each discreet emotion. This table also provides descriptive statistics for students’ positive and negative emotions collected during the Fall 2017 and Spring 2018 semesters and average change from one semester to the next.

Table 2.

Comparison of Participants’ (n = 10) Mean Emotion Scores From Fall 2017 and Spring 2018.

Variable	Possible score range	Possible M	Fall 2017		Spring 2018		Change	F	p
Variable	Possible score range	Possible M	Actual score range	M	Actual score range	M	Change	F	p
Positive emotions
Enjoyment	30–150	90	81–118	106.4	78–125	103.1	−3.3	.288	.598
Hope	18–110	64	72–96	85.2	64–110	89.0	+3.8	.638	.435
Pride	25–125	75	83–113	101.8	80–123	100.8	−1.0	.042	.840
Relief	6–30	18	17–30	24.1	17–29	23.0	−1.1	.348	.563
Negative emotions
Anger	28–140	84	30–60	45.9	31–65	44.9	−1.0	.049	.828
Anxiety	35–175	105	76–124	94.0	59–127	90.7	−3.3	.153	.700
Shame	32–160	96	45–89	73.5	38–126	69.1	−4.4	.249	.624
Hopelessness	32–160	96	32–68	52.8	41–84	57.6	4.8	.619	.442
Boredom	22–110	66	29–67	46.1	34–62	45.7	−0.4	.009	.928

Comparison of Fall 2017 and Spring 2018 Semesters

Descriptive and inferential statistics of data collected from the Fall 2017 and Spring 2018 semesters revealed trends at both the group and individual levels. Change in emotional scores was determined for both individually and collectively by subtracting the initial emotional score compiled from Fall 2017 data from the final emotional score compiled from Spring 2018 data. A “+” indicates an increase in a particular emotion from one semester to the next, while a “−” indicates a decrease. Compared with individual emotional scores, group averages were relatively stable with small degrees of change across semesters. A Levene test for homogeneity of variances revealed that the students’ scores across semesters were not statistically significantly different and that both semesters have equal homogeneous variance. Results of one-way analysis of variance indicated a nonsignificant trending in differences in students’ emotions from Fall 2017 to Spring 2018.

During the Fall 2017 semester, mean positive emotion scores were higher than possible means, while negative emotion score means were lower. Guadalupe had some of the highest scores for positive emotions (hope = 96, pride = 113, and relief = 30) as well as the highest score for shame (89). These scores were similar to those of other students who were also the first in their families to attend college. These scores also echoed themes which emerged through interviews in which students expressed a great deal of hope and pride but also struggled with the pressure of not wanting to disappoint the family that supports their dream of a college education. Ana, on the other hand, had the highest scores for four of the five negative emotions (anxiety = 124, shame = 89, hopelessness = 68, and boredom = 67). Variability was high for all emotions, given the sample size. However, students’ perception of their negative emotions, particularly anxiety (M = 94.0, standard deviation [SD] = 15.11), was the most varied during their first semester.

Similar to the Fall 2017 semester, actual score ranges and means for the students’ positive emotions continued to be higher than the possible score ranges and means, and actual score ranges and means for negative emotions continued to be lower. Disaggregation of achievement emotion scores found that Tina had the highest scores for three of the four positive emotions (enjoyment = 125, hope = 112, and pride = 123) while Yolanda had the lowest scores in those same emotional categories (enjoyment = 78, hope = 64, and pride = 80). Ivonne had the highest scores for three of the five negative emotions (anxiety = 127, shame = 126, and hopelessness = 84). Variability in students’ responses was high, particularly given the sample size. Variance in students’ responses was most significant for shame (M = 69.1, SD = 24.90) and lowest for relief (M = 23.0, SD = 4.08) indicating that students had very different opinions on how their second semester impacted their perception of Shame, but almost all were glad the semester was almost over.

Comparison of Groups of Students

Purposeful selection enabled the comparison of different groups of students based on the AEQ data during the 2017 to 2018 academic year. Participants’ AEQ data for each discreet emotion (e.g., enjoyment, anxiety) were added together to produce a total positive and negative emotion score. The range for positive emotion scores was 79 (minimum) to 415 (maximum), and the range for negative emotion scores was 181 (minimum) to 745 (maximum). The total positive and negative emotion scores were averaged across different groups of participants to allow for comparisons. Table 3 displays comparisons of the mean positive and negative emotion scores for different groups of student participants.

Table 3.

Comparisons of Participant Groups (n = 10) Mean Positive and Negative Emotion Scores From Fall 2017 and Spring 2018.

Semester	Immigrant (n = 3)	Citizen (n = 7)	Difference	Hispanic (n = 8)	Non-Hispanic (n = 2)	Difference	First generation (n = 4)	Nonfirst generation (n = 6)	Difference
Positive emotions
Fall 2017	331.0	311.7	19.3	317.8	316.5	1.3	331	292.2	38.8
Spring 2018	331.0	309.4	21.6	319.8	300.5	13.8	338.5	300.8	37.7
Score change	0.0	−2.3		+2.0	−10.5		+7.5	+8.6
Negative emotions
Fall 2017	290.7	321.6	30.9	313.9	306.0	7.9	320.5	287	33.5
Spring 2018	349.0	290.4	58.6	315.3	279.0	36.4	362.5	271.7	90.8
Score change	+58.3	−31.2		+1.5	−27.0		+42.0	−15.3

Positive emotion scores for individual groups were relatively steady as compared with negative emotion scores. Interestingly, the immigrant, Hispanic, and first-generation groups’ positive emotion scores either remained the same or increased from the fall to spring semesters. However, these same groups had increases in negative emotion scores. The most significant increases in negative emotion scores were for the immigrant (+58.3) and first-generation (+42.0) groups. Conversely, citizen, non-Hispanic, and nonfirst-generation groups experienced significant decreases in negative emotions from fall to spring semester. Given that the student participants were enrolled in many of the same courses, these data demonstrate that different groups experience the reality of the first-year experience differently. It also demonstrates that groups such as Hispanics, despite being the majority–minority population at the University, immigrants, and first-generation students do not feel as supported or confident in their abilities throughout their first-year experience. Allaire (in press) presents a thorough qualitative exploration of the first-year experiences of the undocumented undergraduate participants.

Collective Changes in Emotions

As a group, the students experienced decreases in enjoyment, pride, anxiety, and shame; increases in hope, and hopelessness; and no change in anger and boredom. While not substantial, decreases in enjoyment (−4), pride (−1), and relief (−1) and an increase in hopelessness (+1) was troubling to many of the students and echoed sentiments expressed during interviews. Although the group’s descriptive and inferential statistics are interesting, they are not truly representative of the individuals’ emotional experiences during the first year of this study.

Potentially more significant were changes in the individual emotional scores and the variation of students’ appraisals of emotional statements from Fall 2017 to Spring 2018. Figure 1 is a box and whisker plot comparing the distribution of students’ Fall 2017 and Spring 2018 positive and negative emotions. Except for relief and boredom, both the overall and interquartile ranges for positive and negative emotion scores in Spring 2018 were higher than in Fall 2017. In addition, the skewness of Spring 2018 scores for hope and boredom shifted left from the previous semester. On the other hand, anger, anxiety, shame, and hopelessness were much more right skewed as compared with Fall 2017 scores. Although students’ scores for pride also shifted right, the interquartile range indicates an overall drop in levels of pride for the students.

Figure 1.

Box and whisker plots comparing narrators’ (n = 10) Fall 2017 and Spring 2018 emotion scores.

Disaggregation of the data, especially when paired with students’ reflections and comments, provides a more accurate glimpse of the emotional experiences during their first academic year. For example, Guadalupe, Ivonne, and Lee all reported dramatic increases in most or all of their negative emotional scores from the Fall 2017 to Spring 2018 semesters. These students’ anxiety scores increased +12, +24, and +33 points, respectively. The scores of Guadalupe and Ivonne regarding hopelessness also increased by +31, and +38 points with Ivonne also reporting a 50-point increase in her feelings of shame from 76 to 126 points. Jade and Yolanda, on the other hand, reported decreases in almost all of their positive and negative emotions. Enjoyment scores dropped −26 and −30 points, and anxiety scores also dropped −35 and −20 points, respectively. Ana and Tina, both of whom are first time in colleges, reported increases in almost all their positive emotions and decreases in their negative emotions. Ana reported increases of +16 points and +13 points for hope and pride, respectively, and double-digit decreases in all of her negative emotions, including −46 points for anxiety and −36 points for shame. Tina reported increases of +26, +22, and +19 points for hope, enjoyment, and pride, respectively, and a 21-point decrease in hopelessness.

Correlations

There was an expectation of strong positive correlations within broad emotion categories and strong negative correlations between broad emotion categories. Results of a two-tailed Pearson correlation for narrator emotions in Spring 2018 revealed few strong positive correlations and no strong negative correlations. Enjoyment was the only positive emotion to demonstrate strong correlations with other positive emotions. Students’ enjoyment was strongly correlated with both hope, r(8)= .896, p < .01, and pride, r(8) = .774, p < .01. A potential positive correlation was also demonstrated between hope and pride, r(8)=.759, p < .05. On the other hand, anxiety and hopelessness were the only negative emotions to demonstrate strong correlations with other negative emotions. Anxiety strongly correlated with students’ feelings shame, r(8) = .887, p < .01, and hopelessness, r(8) = .808, p < .01. Hopelessness was also strongly correlated with shame, r(8) = .817, p < .01.

Generalizations about relationships between emotions cannot be generalized given the sample size involved with the study. However, the results suggest an interconnection between enjoyment, hope, and pride in which an increase or decrease in one emotion will have a similar impact on the others. Similarly, results also suggest an increase or decrease in anxiety, shame, or hopelessness could change the others. While not statistically significant, the strongest negative correlation among the students’ was between relief and shame, r(8) = −.413.

Emotions and GPA

Similarly, it was hypothesized that there would be strong correlations between students’ emotional data collected during Spring 2018 and cumulative GPA. The results of a two-tailed scale Pearson’s correlation of students’ emotion scores and cumulative GPA in Spring 2018 revealed no statistically significant strong positive correlations between students’ GPA and any of the discreet emotions. However, there were three significant negative correlations between students’ cumulative GPA and hopelessness, r(8) = −.659, p < .05, anxiety, r(8) = −.663, p < .05, and shame, r(8) = −.770, p < .05. Given the sample size, this suggests an inverse relationship in which increases in hopelessness, anxiety, or shame can negatively impact GPA.

Discussion

The results of this study begin to answer our primary research question: How are positive and negative emotions experienced by the students throughout their college careers? In addition, it also answers the second research question—To what extent do students’ positive/negative emotions change from semester-to-semester—specifically in terms of the 2017 to 2018 academic year.

As previously explained, discussions on both individual and collective AEQ scores were incorporated into the students’ Fall 2018 interviews. Incorporation of AEQ scores into the semistructured interviews allowed students to comment on their scores and to reflect upon their meaning. Students’ also described how the knowledge of their emotional shifts during their first-year experience might influence their achievement-related behaviors during subsequent years in college. In just about all cases, the students agreed with the AEQ results. Some also recognized a shift in both their positive and negative emotions anecdotally from one semester to the next. During their interviews, students were asked to think about their experiences during each semester of their first-year experience. Students also reflected upon the factors that could have contributed to both their initial achievement emotion scores and changes in the values they ascribed to their emotions.

Factors Influencing Initial Emotion Values

As described previously, anxiety had the most considerable variability among the students. Several factors, according to the students, contributed to the variance in their perceptions of anxiety during their first semester. Some factors were overarching and linked students regardless of the journey that brought them to university. Echoing Pekrun et al. (2007, 2011) and the postulate of control-value theory, students felt that the context in which anxiety was experienced (i.e., in class, when studying for class or a test, or taking a test) was a critical factor in determining the levels of their anxiety. Different students experienced more or less anxiety than others in different academic contexts (Crisp et al., 2015; Goetz et al., 2006, 2012; Ketonen, 2017). This anxiety, according to the students, was coupled with excitement and is evidenced by high emotional scores for hope and pride.

A second overarching factor influencing their emotions was students’ self-perception of belonging and level of preparedness for the rigors of university coursework (Boden, 2011; Contreras, 2009; Gloria, Castellanos, & Orozco, 2005; González, 2015). Smedley et al. (1993) found that minority students “experienced … heightened concerns over their academic preparedness [leading to] questions about their legitimacy as students at the university” (p. 447). Some students, such as Ana, revealed that their high schools did not adequately prepare them for the rigors of university classes. Other students, like Cynthia, felt unprepared because she was both an immigrant and first in her family to attend college (Boden, 2011; Contreras, 2009; Rodriguez et al., 2000). Thus, there was no one in her family with college-level experience whom she could turn to for guidance, help, or support leading her, and students like her, to have to figure things out on her own. Cynthia, Guadalupe, Ivonne, and Tina, all of whom are the first in their families to attend college, noted both pressure and pride at being the “trailblazer” for their younger siblings and cousins. Guadalupe, in particular, noted that she wanted to be the role model that she did not have. These comments support findings that first-in-family college students experience additional challenges and anxiety in university settings (Boden, 2011; Contreras, 2009; Lippicott & German, 2007; Roska & Whitley, 2017; Wibrowski, Matthews, & Kitsantas, 2017).

In addition to the normal stresses of university coursework, after only 1 week of classes, Hurricane Harvey made landfall on August 25, 2017. Historic amounts of rainfall, totaling 60+ inches, fell on parts southeastern Texas disrupting the lives of millions with catastrophic flooding. Rainfall and Harvey-related flooding forced the cancelation of classes for a week. Fortunately, Harvey did not directly impact any of the students. However, in their interviews, some students spoke of how Harvey caused an interruption in their acclimation to college life, and the subsequent adjustment of course calendars and assignments negatively impacted their first semester (Allaire, 2019).

Factors Influencing Shifts in Emotion Values

Generally, despite having more hope during their second semester, Spring 2018, students enjoyed it less than their first semester. Students’ anxiety and shame decreased, while their hopelessness increased. Individual students, such as Ana, Jade, and Tina, admitted that personal and familial issues negatively impacted their feelings during the spring semester. These issues combined with the type, caliber, and rigor of classes and intensified the struggle to balance the academic and familial demands. Gloria, Castellanos, and Orozco (2005) noted that “Latina students find themselves balancing home and family values with the university environment” resulting in a conflict between “one’s personal cultural values and those of the university environment” (p. 163). As members of the majority–minority at the University, most of the students have found supportive networks of students experiencing similar conflicts between the demands of home and university cultures (Contreras, 2009; Crisp et al., 2015; González, 2015; Rodriguez et al., 2000; Smedley et al., 1993).

As second-semester freshmen, all of the students had a semester’s worth of experience. Most of the students reported feeling more comfortable and confident in their classes and a greater sense of ownership and belonging on campus (Lippicott & German, 2007; Smedley et al., 1993). However, a majority of the students also described feeling that the spring semester was not as exciting as the fall semester, with several noting that they were bored. Students, such as Cynthia, Jade, and Lee, noted that while stressful, the fall semester was more interesting and exciting because everything was new. Yolanda explained, “There’s such a build-up to ‘freshmen year,’ then you get here and that first semester is a whirlwind. The second semester … it’s like the air is out of the balloon.” As a result, many of the students felt that they let their grades slip and procrastinated more than their first semester. In her interview, Ivonne spoke of an overall malaise and lackadaisical attitude toward the spring semester, which she attributed to a drop in her grades. This aligns with findings that boredom can manifest itself in lack of concentration, distractibility, reduced motivation and effort, and increases in off-task and task-irrelevant thinking (Pekrun et al., 2010; Pekrun, Hall, Goetz, & Perry, 2014; Richardson et al., 2012).

Finally, there was also a perceived decrease in University-driven support from one semester to the next. Upon the resumption of classes during the Fall 2017 semester, there was a conscious university-wide effort to provide academic, emotional, and financial support to students, faculty, and staff negatively impacted by Harvey-related flooding. However, the students agreed that the perceived decrease in support was more likely a return to normal levels of support rather than an actual decrease. In addition, most of the students established supportive relationships with peers in their classes.

Emotions Impacting Perceptions

Focused coding of interviews found that students’ positive and negative emotions colored their perceptions of their classes, learning, and tests throughout their first-year experience. Thematic coding of these themes revealed that both the interpersonal relationships between instructors and students and students’ interest in a class were predictive of their appraisal of the learning and test-taking contexts (Pekrun et al., 2004, 2014). Research shows that university-level instructors who create supportive classroom environments that foster control and value for students “improve their [instructor’s] chances of positively impacting students’ achievement emotions, as well as their subsequent motivation, learning, and performance” (Artino, Holmboe, & Durning, 2012, p. 158). Interviews revealed that students who did not “like” an instructor or felt that an instructor did not “like” them said that they were less likely to prepare for class or study for a test. Similarly, students who did not “like” a class or did not see value in that class were also less likely to prepare for class or study for a test. Conversely, students who “liked” an instructor, felt an instructor “liked” them, or placed a high value on the course subject were much more likely to prepare for class and study for tests (Pekrun et al., 2002, 2011; Roska & Whitley, 2017; Webster & Hadwin, 2015; Zander et al., 2018).

Consequently, according to some students, there was a “vicious cycle” in which their lack of preparation led to poor grades which further fueled students’ distaste for a class or instructor. Fondness for a class or instructor-led, according to students, “success cycles” in which they were motivated to prepare for class and study for tests, which led to higher grades and further fueled their positive emotional connections. Students’ descriptions of both vicious and success cycles are consistent with class-, learning-, and test-related emotions in which strong positive or negative emotional reactions to classes and instructors can have measurable impacts on students’ academic achievement (Goetz et al., 2006, 2012; Pekrun et al., 2004). In addition, students’ positive appraisal of classes also led them to seek extra help when they needed it instead of feeling hopeless and resigned to receiving poor grades.

AEQ as Intervention

The inclusion of the AEQ into the Fall 2018 interview protocol became both an emotional and academic intervention. AEQ scoresheets, which detailed both individual narrator and group emotional scores, were used to guide discussions and reflections. These discussions centered on factors that may have impacted students’ scores as well as how their emotions may have impacted their class, learning, and test-related perceptions during both the Fall and Spring semesters of their first-year experience (Ames, 1992; Daniels & Stupnisky, 2012). Almost all of the students appreciated the opportunity to discuss their AEQ scores with some, such as Cynthia and Yolanda, calling it an “eye-opening experience.” Results showed that hopelessness, anxiety, and shame had statistically significant negative correlations to the students’ GPA (Gloria, Castellanos, & Orozco, 2005; Vega, 2018). These correlations became the basis of individual dialogs on student burnout and exhaustion as well as discussions on the services the University offers and the types of accommodations that instructors could make to classes and coursework if students felt that negative emotions would prevent them from being successful in college (González, 2015; Tajalli & Ortiz, 2018; Vega, 2018; Zalaquett, 1999). Finally, it provided students with the opportunity to (re)commit to doing well in future semesters and trying not to let negative emotions impact their perceptions of instructors and classes as much (Barker et al., 2016).

Limitations and Future Research

The results from this pilot study show that the students’ positive and negative emotions changed, in some cases, dramatically, during their first-year experience. The data and analysis are unique to the individuals participating in the study. However, there are three tentative conclusions we can point to as a result of this pilot study. The first is that the positive and negative emotions of this group of undergraduate students changed throughout their first-year experience due to a mix of both internal and external factors.

In addition, students’ emotions had a genuine and measurable impact on their academic success in terms of preparing for and attending class, completing assignments on time, staying on-task, studying for tests, and their overall enjoyment of their first-year experience. Second, this study reveals a need to broaden the use of the AEQ to learn about emotional changes in undergraduate students beyond the purposeful selection of students for this study. Finally, this study demonstrates that the AEQ can be used as a tool to measure shifts and changes in students’ achievement emotions longitudinally. The impact of the long-term use of the AEQ with the students in this study will become evident as data from sophomore, junior, and senior years are collected, analyzed, and compared with results from their first-year experience.

Limitations

There are several limitations to the data and conclusions in this study. First and foremost, the sample size and purposeful selection of the students do not allow for generalizability of the data. The experiences and realities of the students are their own and should be taken as such. A second limitation is that despite efforts to interview and administer the AEQ to students at similar times during each semester, this was not accomplished due to conflicts between narrator and researcher schedules. The differences in the administration of the AEQ, especially in proximity to midterm or final exams, could have impacted the results. For example, a student participant who took the AEQ before final exams may report higher levels of anxiety or a student participant to took the AEQ after final exams may report higher levels of relief. The factors could have impacted the results and will be taken into consideration in future research using the AEQ.

Future Research

There are several avenues of potential research opened through this project. The 10 participants show that the AEQ could be a viable way of measuring the emotions experienced by students during their first-year experience. An expansion of this project, involving more first-year students, would provide a more accurate picture of the emotions experienced. This could potentially involve all of the first-year students who self-identify their interest in pursuing a teaching degree, as these student participants have done. At this time, there are discussions taking place to integrate the AEQ into the first-year pathways program for teachers. In this program, advisors meet with each first-year student before the academic year begins and at least once per semester. The AEQ could be incorporated into the advising sessions to provide at least three data points that are more consistent across student participants than what was collected during this pilot study.

A second potential avenue for research would be to involve all first-year students throughout the University. Similar to the teaching degree cohort, advisors in other departments and degree programs meet with their students once before the start of the academic year and at least once per semester. Such a project would provide the most accurate picture of the emotions experienced by students at the University. However, it would take buy-in from other departments and careful coordination across multiple colleges, departments, and degree plans.

Finally, a comparative analysis of AEQ data from first-year students in teacher preparation programs at different universities could also be attempted. A study such as this could compare first-year emotions for students of various backgrounds, or similar backgrounds, to find commonalities as well as differences experienced during students’ first year at university. A study across universities would provide the broadest view of students’ first-year experiences and the changes in achievement emotions related to class-, learning-, and test-related academic situations.

Footnotes

Declaration of Conflicting Interests

The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Funding

The author(s) disclosed receipt of the following financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article: This work was supported by a grant from the University of Houston-Downtown’s College of Public Service.

Author Biography

Franklin S. Allaire, Ph.D. is an assistant professor of Science Education in the Department of Urban Education at the University of Houston-Downtown. Dr. Allaire brings fifteen years of experience as a high school science teacher to his undergraduate and graduate courses in elementary and secondary science methods. His passion is finding ways to make science fun and accessible to all students. His research interests focus on issues impacting the success of underrepresented minorities in STEM-related fields and the innovative use of technologies and pedagogies in the development and maintenance of science teaching self-efficacy in teacher candidates.

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