Construction And Validation Of The Interest Development Scale

Document Type

Article

Publication Date

2021

Published In

Motivation Science

Abstract

There is a need to be able to assess adult interest as a variable that can develop. In contrast to vocational interest measures in which interest is assessed as a stable, trait-like characteristic of a person, the Interest Development Scale (IDS) assesses interest as a cognitive and motivational variable that develops (Hidi & Renninger, 2006). Three studies are reported on the construction and validation of the IDS, a domain general assessment of adult interest development. In each, the participant group was drawn from the diverse Amazon Mechanical Turk (MTurk), and interest was not restricted to a specific domain. Using exploratory factor analysis and parallel analysis, we used Study 1 (n = 348) to identify items and underlying factors. These factors are information seeking, motivation to reengage, persistence, self-regulation, and value. Results from Study 2 (n = 515) confirmed the factor structure identified in Study 1 and examined convergent, discriminant, and concurrent validity of the items. Findings demonstrated that the IDS was a reliable and valid measure of domain-general interest for adults. In Study 3 (n = 103), results from mixed methods further revealed that the IDS differentiated between earlier and later phases of interest development. The factor motivation to reengage differentiated among the three phases studied, and the other 4 factors distinguished between earlier and later phases of interest.

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