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Moderating effect of family structure on the relationship between early clinical exposure and emotional labor of nursing students: a cross-sectional study

• Ruiyang Xu 1 ,
• Shan Wang 1 ,
• Meng Zhao 1 ,
• Sijing Peng 2 ,
• Xinning Peng 1 ,
• Qingyuan Ye 1 ,
• Chen Wu 1 &
• Kefang Wang 1  

BMC Nursing volume  23 , Article number:  606 ( 2024 ) Cite this article

Metrics details

Emotional labor is an essential component of nursing practice and is important for Generation Z nursing students born from the mid-1990s to early 2010s. They will become the backbone of the nursing workforce but present more emotional regulation problems. Studies on emotional labor are limited to clinical nurses and influencing factors at the individual level. The impacts of external systems on emotional labor of nursing students have not been explored. This study aimed to quantify the relationship between early clinical exposure and emotional labor and test the moderating effect of family structure on the relationship.

The cross-sectional study recruited 467 nursing students using convenience sampling from seven colleges and universities in mainland China. An e-survey created on WJX.CN was used to collect data in January 2023. Emotional labor (surface acting and deep acting) was measured with the Emotional Labor scale. Early clinical exposure (exposure or not and times of exposure) and family structure (nuclear family, extended family, and single-parent family) were assessed with self-reported questions. Descriptive statistics and the linear mixed-effects modeling were used to do the analyses.

The mean scores of surface acting and deep acting were 26.66 ± 5.66 and 13.90 ± 2.40, respectively. A significant difference in scores of surface acting was not observed for exposure or not, whereas such a significant difference was found for times of exposure. Nursing students from extended families demonstrated significantly lower scores on surface acting while exposed to clinical practice compared with those from nuclear families. Family structure moderated the relationship between times of exposure and surface acting of nursing students when exposed to clinical practice for one time, but the significance disappeared when the times of exposure increased. No significant findings of early clinical exposure on deep acting were observed.

Conclusions

Early clinical exposure influenced emotional labor, and students from extended families were more likely to get benefits from early clinical exposure. Studies are needed to help students from nuclear families get comparable benefits on emotional labor as those from extended families, and improve deep acting by early clinical exposure.

Peer Review reports

Emotional labor is an inevitable form of labor in nursing practice [ 1 ], and is the regulation of feelings and expressions to fulfill the interpersonal role expectations at work [ 2 ]. Emotional labor includes two emotional coping strategies: surface acting and deep acting. Surface acting is defined as the act of individuals trying to meet others’ expectations by suppressing negative and exaggerating positive expressions when interacting with people at work; deep acting is bringing feelings in line with observable expressions as required by display rules [ 3 , 4 ]. Understanding the emotional labor among Generation Z (born from the mid-1990s to early 2010s) nursing students is particularly vital. Generation Z nursing students will become the backbone of the nursing workforce shortly [ 5 ]; in addition to requiring nurses to master proficient clinical skills, modern nursing work requires nurses to express appropriate emotion when communicating with patients, which is more emotionally challenging. Further, Generation Z was more likely (36%) than millennials (27%) and Generation X (20%) to report that their mental health and emotional well-being were as poor or only fair [ 6 ], and they present more emotional regulation problems under different conditions [ 7 , 8 ].

Most studies on emotional labor were designed to quantify the impacts of emotional labor on clinical nurses’ health and work performances [ 9 , 10 , 11 , 12 ]; surface acting was found to be disadvantageous for nurses’ well-being [ 9 , 13 ]and their professional performances [ 10 ], whereas deep acting was found to be constructive [ 10 , 14 ]. Few studies were designed to explore influencing factors of emotional labor among nursing students. The human body is an open system, and individuals are exposed and influenced by various external systems, such as family, school, and workplace [ 15 , 16 ]. Grandey et al. proposed in the model of emotional labor that external systems should be taken into consideration when investigating individuals’ emotional labor [ 3 ]. Therefore, we aimed to explore the impacts of representative external systems (i.e., school system and family system) on emotional labor of nursing students.

Early clinical exposure and emotional labor

Undergraduates spent most of their time at school, and traditional education programs were designed to enrich their knowledge and skills, but limited information was designed to tailor to students’ emotional labor. Early clinical exposure may be taken as a candidate factor to understand the status of emotional labor. Early clinical exposure is a unique element in the school system for medical students, which fosters students to expose to the patients as early as the first year of medical college and includes teaching and learning activities such as observation, clinical bedside teaching and case-based learning lectures [ 17 ]. In China, early clinical exposure has been adopted into the training programs by some nursing schools in recent years.

Early clinical exposure brings some benefits and challenges to students in medical relevant education programs. Empirical evidence demonstrated that medical students in their first two or three years (i.e., the time when their learning is often from books or lectures in school) benefit from their encounters with patients [ 17 ], and the benefits include a better understanding of professional knowledge, and the enhancement of the clinical skills and professional attitudes [ 18 ]. A recent qualitative study also found that early clinical exposure may expose students to challenges that can evoke various strong emotions (i.e., bad, angry or scared), and nursing students would conduct surface acting when interacting with patients [ 19 ]. Furthermore, nursing students with higher scores of surface acting would have a stronger turnover intention in clinical practicum [ 20 ]. However, the effect of early clinical exposure on nursing students’ emotional labor remained unclear.

Family structure and emotional labor

In addition to the school, family is a predominant system for cultivating individuals’ emotional regulation as individuals contact with their family of origin throughout their lives [ 21 ]. Family structure, an important variable of the family was found to be the significant contributor to emotional labor of individuals. Nuclear family, extended family and single-parent family are three common types of family structure. The nuclear family is often defined in literature as a family that consists only of parents and children [ 22 ]; the extended family is taken as an expansion of the nuclear family to a wider circle of relatives within the resident clan, and all the members should live close together, pool resources and undertake family responsibilities [ 23 ]; the single-parent family is comprised of a parent/caregiver and one or more dependent children without the presence and support of a spouse or adult partner who is sharing the responsibility of parenting [ 24 ]. When encountering emotional challenges, adolescents living with more family members would obtain more support, and that would empower them to regulate their feelings and expressions under different contexts; therefore, they would demonstrate more favorable emotional status [ 25 , 26 , 27 ]. For example, it was found that adolescents from extended families had less emotional problems and fewer risks of suffering from depression compared with those from nuclear families [ 25 ]; adolescents in nonnuclear homes were happier and less sad when interacting with older siblings or extended family members [ 26 ]. But within our knowledge, the relationship between family structure and emotional labor remained unclear among nursing students.

Moderation effect of family structure

Existing studies limited studies to explore the association of factors in one system on individuals’ well-being while ignoring the interaction of factors of multiple systems. As proposed in the social-ecological model [ 16 ], there are multifaceted and interactive effects of systems and individuals. When students embark on their college/university education, school system is physically closer to students compared with family system, and the time of their interactions with school system is longer than that with their family system. Therefore, we aimed to explore the direct effect of school system (i.e., early clinical exposure) on emotional labor and the moderating effect of family system (i.e., family structure), and we proposed two hypotheses as follows.

Hypothesis 1

Early clinical exposure is significantly associated with emotional labor of nursing students.

Hypothesis 2

Family structure moderates the relationship between early clinical exposure and emotional labor of nursing students.

Design and sampling

We conducted a cross-sectional study with a convenience sampling strategy to collect data from students pursuing their bachelor’s degrees in the schools of nursing in mainland China. This study was launched in January 2023. Baccalaureate nursing education programs are typically four years in China. The first three years include courses on humanities character, social sciences, basic medicine and nursing, and students will start their internship in hospitals, community healthcare centers, and mental health centers in the fourth year. The inclusion criteria were full-time undergraduates enrolled in a four-year nursing education program; these students were in their first, second or third year of study and provided informed consent. Nursing students who have suspended their studies over six weeks for diseases or other reasons were excluded. According to Kendall’s sample size calculation method [ 28 ], the sample size is 5–10 times the number of independent variables, and this study used a total of 10 independent variables. Considering the loss of 20% samples, the sample size was 120 [ n  = 10 × 10 × (1 + 20%)].

Measurements

Sample characteristics were assessed with a self-reported questionnaire. Age, sex (male/female), grade (freshman/sophomore/junior), single child (yes/no), and key decision maker on major selection (by myself/by my parents/by other relatives or friends/by the school) were assessed with close questions; video games play in daily life were assessed with open questions: “Do you play video games in daily life? What are they?”; nursing students who play interactive games that run on electronic media platforms, e.g., Honor of Kings, Counter-Strike: Global Offensive, League of Legends and Eggy Party in their daily lives were categorized as video gamers, and those left no response to these questions were categorized as non-video gamers.

Emotional labor was assessed with the Chinese version of the Emotional Labor scale [ 29 ]. This scale has 7 items to assess surface acting and 3 items to assess deep acting. Each item is graded on a 6-point Likert scale from 1 = strongly disagree to 6 = strongly agree. The higher sum score for each subscale indicates that individuals were more likely to act or display the corresponding emotional labor. The Chinese version of the Emotional Labor scale demonstrated satisfactory validity, and Cronbach’s α coefficients for surface acting and deep acting were 0.711 and 0.826, respectively [ 29 ].

Early clinical exposure was assessed with a self-reported questionnaire. In China, early clinical exposure was designed in some schools to bridge theoretical courses and clinical practice; it intersperses among the semesters or the vacations before the final-year internship, the schedule of which differs across schools; early clinical exposure once designed, students are mandatory to participate to get credits, and the predominant setting of exposure is the hospital. Guided by the interpretation of early clinical exposure proposed by Tayade and Latti [ 17 ] and the facts in China, we set up two open questions as follows to measure the early clinical exposure of nursing students.

Did you have a specialty practice in the hospital? ( thereafter , exposure or not)

Times of hospital exposure ( thereafter , times of exposure)

Family structure was assessed with one self-reported question “What was your family structure?” and responses were graded as nuclear family, extended family, and single-parent family with corresponding descriptions to assist in answering.

Data collection

Seven medical colleges and universities were contacted for participation. Once the agreement was obtained from the director of the Office of Student Affairs, an e-survey created on WJX.CN along with a short descriptive text would be disseminated by students’ counselors to WeChat class groups. Nursing students could identify the link of the e-survey to respond to the questionnaire and were asked to provide informed consent at the first screen of the e-survey before proceeding. It takes approximately 10 min to complete the e-survey. A total of 559 responses were recorded for this study. After removing respondents who refused to participate ( n  = 89), 470 valid questionnaires were obtained.

Data analysis

No outlier or missing value was detected in the data; we deleted the category of the single-parent family from the data because there were only 3 cases. Descriptive statistics were run for all variables. To assess the effect of early clinical exposure on students’ emotional labor, linear mixed-effects models were run, and each was used to regress one variable representative of early clinical exposure, family structure, and all sample characteristics (fixed effects) except school and grade (random effects) on surface acting or deep acting. In consideration of the cross-over interaction, an interaction term created by early clinical exposure × family structure was added to the model to estimate the significance of the moderation effect no matter whether the significant finding of the variable representative of early clinical exposure was observed in the reduced model. IBM SPSS Statistics Desktop 24.0 was used for all analyses. The effect size of each variable was estimated and reported with a 95% confidence interval (CI), and a p -value of lower than 0.05 was taken as statistically significant.

Sample characteristics

In Tables  1 and 467 Generation Z nursing students were analyzed in this study. More than 50% of the students aged between 19 and 20 years old, and selected the major of nursing primarily by themselves. More than 80% of the students were female and lived in nuclear families, and more than two-thirds of them were not the single child of their parents. Almost 50% of the students were freshmen, and the majority of students (64.2%) enrolled in this study were not video gamers. There were 51% (238/467) of the students reported the experience of early clinical exposure, and of them, 49 and 49 exposed to hospitals 1 time and 2 times, respectively, and 140 reported the experience of exposing to hospitals 3 times or more. The average score of surface acting was 26.66 ± 5.66, while that of deep acting was 13.90 ± 2.40.

Effects of early clinical exposure on surface acting and moderating effects of family structure

As demonstrated in Tables  2 and 3 , exposure or not had no significant effect on surface acting ( β = -0.497, 95%CI [-1.931, 0.938], p  = 0.494); times of exposure demonstrated a significant effect on surface acting ( p  = 0.045). When the interaction term of family structure × exposure or not was added to the model, we found students living in extended families would benefit more from early clinical exposure ( β = -4.101, 95%CI [-7.219, -0.982], p  = 0.010) compared with those living in nuclear families, i.e., their scores of surface acting decreased significantly after exposing to early clinical practice, see Table  4 , Fig.  1 (a) ; meanwhile, the interaction term of family structure × times of exposure was found to be significant after being added to the model ( p  = 0.036), see Table  5 . As shown in Fig.  1 (b) and Table  5 , students living in extended families demonstrated significantly lower scores on surface acting when exposed to clinical practice for one time compared with those living in nuclear families ( β = -6.436, 95%CI [-10.921, -1.951], p  = 0.005), but the significance disappeared when the times of exposure increased.

Moderating effects of family structure between early clinical exposure and surface acting of nursing students

Effects of early clinical exposure on deep acting and moderating effects of family structure

As demonstrated in Tables  2 and 3 , exposure or not had no significant effect on deep acting ( β = -0.158, 95%CI [-0.696, 0.379], p  = 0.562); times of exposure also had no significant effect on deep acting ( p  = 0.320). The effect of the interaction term of family structure × exposure or not was not significant when being added to the model ( β = -0.015, 95%CI [-1.357, 1.326], p  = 0.982), see Table  4 , Fig.  2 (a) ; the effect of the interaction term of family structure × times of exposure was not significant when being added to the model ( p  = 0.971), see Table  5 , Fig.  2 (b) .

Moderating effects of family structure between early clinical exposure and deep acting of nursing students

Emotional labor is often overlooked yet it is essential for nursing education, especially for Generation Z nursing students, as the nursing occupation is filled with emotional events, and emotional problems were frequently observed among this age cohort. This study was conducted to quantify the emotional labor of nursing students and investigate the impacts of variables from two closely related external systems, i.e., school and family on their emotional labor. We found some evidence to support the hypotheses that early clinical exposure was associated with emotional labor, and family structure moderated the relationship between early clinical exposure and emotional labor of nursing students.

Surface acting and deep acting are two compatible forms of emotional labor, which are conducted to respond to the service demands of patients and hospitals. Higher surface acting was a contributor to emotional exhaustion and depression [ 20 , 30 , 31 ], while higher deep acting would benefit individuals’ mental health [ 32 ]. Nursing students in this study demonstrated higher surface acting and lower deep acting in contrast with nurses working more than one year in tertiary hospitals [ 33 ], indicating that clinical environment may influence the development of individuals’ emotional labor.

In this study, we found exposure or not was not significantly associated with surface acting, yet times of exposure had a significant effect on surface acting. This further consolidated the findings of previous qualitative studies that early clinical exposure would evoke strong emotions and lead to emotional labor of students [ 19 , 27 ]. Furthermore, family structure moderated the relationship, and students from extended families had lower surface acting than students from nuclear families once exposed to hospitals, that indicated students from extended families experienced more benefits from early clinical exposure. Specifically, students from extended families demonstrated reduced scores on surface acting when exposed to hospitals one time, two times, and 3 times or more, but that was not the case for students from nuclear families. Meanwhile, we found that the scores of surface acting of students from extended families were significantly lower than those among students from nuclear families during their first time of clinical exposure. Students may encounter unexpected emotional events (e.g., witness patients’ or their caregivers’ sorrow or hear stories of patients tortured by diseases) while exposed to the clinical setting; students from extended families would have more coping resources to buffer these clinical emotional challenges [ 34 ]. For example, extended family members might share some of their experiences with students to help them adapt to the emotional challenges [ 25 , 27 ]. As such, students from extended families would be more likely to experience benefits. We did not capture the significant benefits along with the increase in the “dosage” of exposure, and this might be explained by that we did not investigate or take measures to balance the content of clinical exposure. Future studies may consider the content of early clinical exposure to elucidate the impacts of early clinical exposure on surface acting, and extra attention should be paid to students from nuclear families to understand how to help them get comparable benefits in reducing the scores of surface acting with those from extended families.

We failed to corroborate that early clinical exposure was significantly associated with deep acting in this study, nor did we find the moderation effect of family structure on such a relationship. Deep acting is a process where an individual psyches himself or herself to the desired emotion, which needs more emotional involvement [ 35 ]. In the literature, nursing students were found to prioritize learning procedural knowledge of different clinical tasks over learning how to interact with patients during early clinical exposure [ 36 ]. Some students reported that they would avoid deeply communicating with patients in poor conditions, such as cancer patients because they lacked of necessary communication skills and were fear of hurting patients [ 37 ]. These issues might explain the insignificant findings on the relationship between early clinical exposure and deep acting from this study. Future studies should explore complex interventions to deepen the involvement of nursing students in clinical exposure, such as developing strategies covering components of awareness raising, communication skills advancement, and encouraging deep interaction with patients during the exposure.

Limitations

This study had several limitations. First, the inherited disadvantages including lack of sample representativeness and unable to make causal inferences of the cross-sectional study using convenience sampling strategy are nonnegligible. Future studies may want to launch cohort studies in representative samples to corroborate findings from this study. Second, family function is an important variable of family systems and may also influence the emotional labor of nursing students. We failed to address this variable in our study due to the diversity of its operationalizations across studies, and that its relationship with emotional labor has not been empirically identified. Meanwhile, family structure only included three common family types: nuclear family, extended family and single-parent family. Future studies may enroll students from other family structures, e.g., blended family and orphaned family, and assess the heterogeneity of their emotional labor. Third, we operationalized early clinical exposure as exposure or not and times of exposure, and one internship was considered as one exposure. However, exposure duration and exposure content might also be important parameters of early clinical exposure. Future researchers may want to measure high-resolution early clinical exposure and provide more sound evidence about the contributions of early clinical exposure to emotional labor of nursing students. Fourth, many other factors may influence individuals’ general emotional regulation including social interactions, physiological factors, and lifestyle choices, which may be potential influencing factors of emotional labor among nursing students, but the assessment of these variables is out of scope of this study. Future studies may want to collect data on these variables and use statistical methods such as the dominance analysis to present a comprehensive picture of factors associated with emotional labor.

This study set out to verify the impacts of early clinical exposure and family structure on emotional labor of Generation Z nursing students. This study provided preliminary evidence supporting the significant contributions of early clinical exposure to surface acting, and the significant moderating role of family structure on this relationship. More efforts are needed to help students from nuclear families get benefits from early clinical exposure and to improve the deep acting of nursing students in general during nursing education.

Data availability

The datasets generated and/or analysed during the current study are not publicly available due to data privacy but are available from the corresponding author on reasonable request.

Abbreviations

Confidence Interval

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Acknowledgements

We appreciate the contribution of Zixin Liu from School of Nursing and Rehabilitation, Shandong University, who assisted in editing the references section of this manuscript.

This work was supported by the College Students’ Innovation and Entrepreneurship Training Programs [grant number #2023338].

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Contributions

L.L. made substantial contributions to the conception and design of the work, analyzed and interpreted data and made a major contributor in writing the manuscript. RY. X. analyzed and interpreted the data regarding early clinical exposure and emotional labor and drafted the manuscript. S.W., M.Z., SJ.P., XN.P. and QY.Y. substantively revised the manuscript. C.W. and KF.W. made substantial contributions to the conception and design of the work and interpretation of data, and substantively revised the manuscript. All authors have read and approved the final version of the manuscript.

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Correspondence to Chen Wu or Kefang Wang .

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The ethical approval of this study was obtained from the Institutional Review Board of School of Nursing and Rehabilitation, Shandong University (No. 2023-R-044). Informed consent was obtained from all nursing students. It had no impact on nursing students’ academic achievements or other welfare whether or not they participated in this study.

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Li, L., Xu, R., Wang, S. et al. Moderating effect of family structure on the relationship between early clinical exposure and emotional labor of nursing students: a cross-sectional study. BMC Nurs 23 , 606 (2024). https://doi.org/10.1186/s12912-024-02149-8

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DOI : https://doi.org/10.1186/s12912-024-02149-8

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More than two hours of homework may be counterproductive, research suggests.

A Stanford education researcher found that too much homework can negatively affect kids, especially their lives away from school, where family, friends and activities matter.   "Our findings on the effects of homework challenge the traditional assumption that homework is inherently good," wrote Denise Pope , a senior lecturer at the Stanford Graduate School of Education and a co-author of a study published in the Journal of Experimental Education .   The researchers used survey data to examine perceptions about homework, student well-being and behavioral engagement in a sample of 4,317 students from 10 high-performing high schools in upper-middle-class California communities. Along with the survey data, Pope and her colleagues used open-ended answers to explore the students' views on homework.   Median household income exceeded $90,000 in these communities, and 93 percent of the students went on to college, either two-year or four-year.   Students in these schools average about 3.1 hours of homework each night.   "The findings address how current homework practices in privileged, high-performing schools sustain students' advantage in competitive climates yet hinder learning, full engagement and well-being," Pope wrote.   Pope and her colleagues found that too much homework can diminish its effectiveness and even be counterproductive. They cite prior research indicating that homework benefits plateau at about two hours per night, and that 90 minutes to two and a half hours is optimal for high school.   Their study found that too much homework is associated with:   • Greater stress : 56 percent of the students considered homework a primary source of stress, according to the survey data. Forty-three percent viewed tests as a primary stressor, while 33 percent put the pressure to get good grades in that category. Less than 1 percent of the students said homework was not a stressor.   • Reductions in health : In their open-ended answers, many students said their homework load led to sleep deprivation and other health problems. The researchers asked students whether they experienced health issues such as headaches, exhaustion, sleep deprivation, weight loss and stomach problems.   • Less time for friends, family and extracurricular pursuits : Both the survey data and student responses indicate that spending too much time on homework meant that students were "not meeting their developmental needs or cultivating other critical life skills," according to the researchers. Students were more likely to drop activities, not see friends or family, and not pursue hobbies they enjoy.   A balancing act   The results offer empirical evidence that many students struggle to find balance between homework, extracurricular activities and social time, the researchers said. Many students felt forced or obligated to choose homework over developing other talents or skills.   Also, there was no relationship between the time spent on homework and how much the student enjoyed it. The research quoted students as saying they often do homework they see as "pointless" or "mindless" in order to keep their grades up.   "This kind of busy work, by its very nature, discourages learning and instead promotes doing homework simply to get points," said Pope, who is also a co-founder of Challenge Success , a nonprofit organization affiliated with the GSE that conducts research and works with schools and parents to improve students' educational experiences..   Pope said the research calls into question the value of assigning large amounts of homework in high-performing schools. Homework should not be simply assigned as a routine practice, she said.   "Rather, any homework assigned should have a purpose and benefit, and it should be designed to cultivate learning and development," wrote Pope.   High-performing paradox   In places where students attend high-performing schools, too much homework can reduce their time to foster skills in the area of personal responsibility, the researchers concluded. "Young people are spending more time alone," they wrote, "which means less time for family and fewer opportunities to engage in their communities."   Student perspectives   The researchers say that while their open-ended or "self-reporting" methodology to gauge student concerns about homework may have limitations – some might regard it as an opportunity for "typical adolescent complaining" – it was important to learn firsthand what the students believe.   The paper was co-authored by Mollie Galloway from Lewis and Clark College and Jerusha Conner from Villanova University.

Clifton B. Parker is a writer at the Stanford News Service .

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Education scholar Denise Pope has found that too much homework has negative effects on student well-being and behavioral engagement. (Image credit: L.A. Cicero)

A Stanford researcher found that too much homework can negatively affect kids, especially their lives away from school, where family, friends and activities matter.

“Our findings on the effects of homework challenge the traditional assumption that homework is inherently good,” wrote Denise Pope , a senior lecturer at the Stanford Graduate School of Education and a co-author of a study published in the Journal of Experimental Education .

The researchers used survey data to examine perceptions about homework, student well-being and behavioral engagement in a sample of 4,317 students from 10 high-performing high schools in upper-middle-class California communities. Along with the survey data, Pope and her colleagues used open-ended answers to explore the students’ views on homework.

Median household income exceeded $90,000 in these communities, and 93 percent of the students went on to college, either two-year or four-year.

Students in these schools average about 3.1 hours of homework each night.

“The findings address how current homework practices in privileged, high-performing schools sustain students’ advantage in competitive climates yet hinder learning, full engagement and well-being,” Pope wrote.

Pope and her colleagues found that too much homework can diminish its effectiveness and even be counterproductive. They cite prior research indicating that homework benefits plateau at about two hours per night, and that 90 minutes to two and a half hours is optimal for high school.

Their study found that too much homework is associated with:

* Greater stress: 56 percent of the students considered homework a primary source of stress, according to the survey data. Forty-three percent viewed tests as a primary stressor, while 33 percent put the pressure to get good grades in that category. Less than 1 percent of the students said homework was not a stressor.

* Reductions in health: In their open-ended answers, many students said their homework load led to sleep deprivation and other health problems. The researchers asked students whether they experienced health issues such as headaches, exhaustion, sleep deprivation, weight loss and stomach problems.

* Less time for friends, family and extracurricular pursuits: Both the survey data and student responses indicate that spending too much time on homework meant that students were “not meeting their developmental needs or cultivating other critical life skills,” according to the researchers. Students were more likely to drop activities, not see friends or family, and not pursue hobbies they enjoy.

A balancing act

The results offer empirical evidence that many students struggle to find balance between homework, extracurricular activities and social time, the researchers said. Many students felt forced or obligated to choose homework over developing other talents or skills.

Also, there was no relationship between the time spent on homework and how much the student enjoyed it. The research quoted students as saying they often do homework they see as “pointless” or “mindless” in order to keep their grades up.

“This kind of busy work, by its very nature, discourages learning and instead promotes doing homework simply to get points,” Pope said.

She said the research calls into question the value of assigning large amounts of homework in high-performing schools. Homework should not be simply assigned as a routine practice, she said.

“Rather, any homework assigned should have a purpose and benefit, and it should be designed to cultivate learning and development,” wrote Pope.

High-performing paradox

In places where students attend high-performing schools, too much homework can reduce their time to foster skills in the area of personal responsibility, the researchers concluded. “Young people are spending more time alone,” they wrote, “which means less time for family and fewer opportunities to engage in their communities.”

Student perspectives

The researchers say that while their open-ended or “self-reporting” methodology to gauge student concerns about homework may have limitations – some might regard it as an opportunity for “typical adolescent complaining” – it was important to learn firsthand what the students believe.

The paper was co-authored by Mollie Galloway from Lewis and Clark College and Jerusha Conner from Villanova University.

Media Contacts

Denise Pope, Stanford Graduate School of Education: (650) 725-7412, [email protected] Clifton B. Parker, Stanford News Service: (650) 725-0224, [email protected]

The New York Times

Motherlode | homework’s emotional toll on students and families, homework’s emotional toll on students and families.

When your children arrive home from school this evening, what will be your first point of conflict? How’s this for an educated guess? Homework.

Do they have any? How much? When are they going to do it? Can they get it done before practice/rehearsal/dinner? After? When is it due? When did they start it? Even parents who are wholly hands off about the homework itself still need information about how much, when and how long if there are any family plans in the offing — because, especially for high school students in high-performing schools, homework has become the single dominating force in their nonschool lives.

Researchers asked 4,317 students from 10 high-performing high schools in upper-middle-class California communities to describe the impact of homework on their lives, and the results offer a bleak picture that many of us can see reflected around our dining room tables. The students reported averaging 3.1 hours of homework nightly, and they added comments like: “There’s never a break. Never.”

It “takes me away from everything I used to do,” says one.

Lack of sleep and lack of time were a theme, said the researcher Denise Clark Pope, a senior lecturer at the Stanford Graduate School of Education and a co-author of the study, which will be published in The Journal of Experimental Education. While the students didn’t report grieving for the children they were just a few months or years ago, they should have. There is something about that phrase — “everything I used to do” — that makes a parent take notice.

It’s not just the hours, Ms. Pope said. Students describe stress and sleep deprivation. “They feel out of control,” she said. “They often have no idea when a teacher will assign what. They can’t plan around Grandma’s birthday dinner, and it’s really not their fault.”

My students aren’t even in high school yet (my oldest is a seventh grader), and I’m not looking forward to the change. I don’t want them to give up “everything they used to do.” Already, homework struggles dominate many of our evenings. For some children at some ages (it has varied with mine), just getting them to sit down takes more time than the worksheets in their backpacks. For others, homework becomes an excellent place to enact a nightly dramatic rendition of “I Can’t Do It” (whether they can or not). The stress homework places on families starts early.

There are parenting strategies available to deal with those struggles, certainly — but when, and why, did our evenings at home become so dedicated to that particular interaction? I’m perpetually dismayed by how much of our evenings is consumed by schoolwork, and at the end of a particularly fraught night — for example, one when my two second graders each have a report on a South American animal due, and are fighting not just over the homework, but also over their share of my coveted attention and my unique ability to download and print images — I find myself wondering how our family life would be different without the flash point that homework so often becomes.

For the older students who participated in the research, homework was a family flash point of a different kind. Ms. Pope and her colleagues intentionally designed their research and wrote their paper to focus on the voices of the students and on their perspective about homework, arguing that it is the students’ experience that “influences how they do their homework, and consequently, how homework affects them.”

Much of the pressure they described feeling came from their parents, Ms. Pope said, and a sense that if they didn’t do the homework, they wouldn’t get the grades and they wouldn’t succeed. For those students (no matter what their parents might say about the same interactions), homework is affecting their relationship with their parents and how they feel about their family and their place in it.

To take my relationship with my children out from under homework’s shadow, I have pulled back (way back) on any involvement, and we have made an active choice as parents to let the work and any consequences for not doing it fall to their schools, not to us. That doesn’t work for all families. It also doesn’t help when the sheer number of hours a child is expected to spend at his books is destructive to family relationships because there is little or no time left to spend together, particularly once a sport or other activity enters the mix.

Ms. Pope suggests asking teachers and schools to provide homework packets that a student can spread out over a week, rather than springing large assignments due tomorrow that can derail family plans. Schools and teachers can also help by building in time for students to get started on homework and ask any questions they might have.

Looking at the larger picture, she said, things are changing. “These students are already averaging an hour more than what’s thought to be useful,” she said, and teachers, schools and parents are beginning to think harder about what kinds of homework, and how much of it, enhance learning and motivation without becoming all-consuming.

It might be easier than you think to start the conversation at your student’s school. “Load doesn’t equal rigor,” Ms. Pope said. “There are other developmental things students need to be doing after school, and other things they need to be learning.”

And if you are at the point where some of the pressure over homework might just be coming from you? “Don’t fall into the trap of parent peer pressure,” said Ms. Pope, a mother of three. “Nothing is permanent, and it’s up to you to remind your children that. We live in a country where you can drop out of high school and later community college and still ultimately get a Ph.D. from Stanford. At a certain point, it’s O.K. to get some sleep instead of studying for that test.”

And it’s really O.K. to go out to dinner for Grandma’s birthday. When do they assign the homework that teaches students that while work matters, family matters more?

Follow KJ Dell’Antonia on Twitter at @KJDellAntonia or find her on Facebook and Google+ .

What's Next

10 Ways – How Does Homework Affect Student Social Life

Homework is a crucial part of a student’s academic life, but it can also significantly impact their social life. While homework helps students reinforce their learning and improve their academic performance, it can also create stress and take up valuable time spent socializing with friends and family.

When students are asked to do Homework, they are often urged to “do what you love.” However, doing Homework has been shown to affect students’ social life negatively.

Table of Contents

What is “homework”?

Homework can be a valuable source of information for students and teachers, as it provides information about what happens in the classroom and other influences on student learning.

10 ways how Homework affects students social life

1. students have less time for social activities.

Homework is often a burden for students as they spend less time on their free time activities and spending time with their friends. Regular homework assignments can take students out of the academy or to regions they cannot usually reach.

2. Students are more socially anxious

The high expectations that students must meet with their parents and teachers make them feel more pressure and stress when it comes to their studies.

3. Students have less time for sleep

4. students have less time for family and friends.

Students” limited free time due to Homework takes them away from family and friends, which might affect relationships with parents and other family members.

5. Students have less time for entertainment

6. students have less time for sleep.

Homework requires a lot of effort and concentration. Thus it can be physically and mentally exhausting. Students may get too tired to do their Homework as it is a long period and frequently interrupts the students’’ sleep.

7. Students have less time for learning

8. students have less time for exercise and other physical activities.

Homework stresses students, making them too tired to go for a healthy meal or workout. It is not just mentally tiring but causes physical fatigue too.

9. Students may have less time for socializing

10. students are more stressed out and less happy.

FAQ – How Does Homework Affect Social Life

Is homework beneficial for students.

Homework is beneficial for students as it increases their knowledge. Students can always receive education, even when they are not at school. Moreover, there is evidence that practicing problems and taking tests while learning positively affects students’’ performance in later exams.

How Much Homework Should Be Assigned?

Will homework benefit students in the future, will homework overload students.

Homework overload is possible for some students. Homework has many disadvantages for some students, like a lack of time for family and friends and not getting enough sleep.

Is Homework Helpful?

What is the best way to reduce the amount of homework.

The best way is to balance homework and other aspects of student life. This means that kids need enough time to study but spend enough time with friends and family. Parents should clarify that they will not help their students with Homework.

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Is homework robbing your family of joy? You're not alone

Children are not the only ones who dread their homework these days. In a 2019 survey of 1,049 parents with children in elementary, middle, or high school, Office Depot found that parents spend an average of 21 minutes a day helping their children with their homework. Those 21 minutes are often apparently very unpleasant.

Parents reported their children struggle to complete homework. One in five believed their children "always or often feel overwhelmed by homework," and half of them reported their children had cried over homework stress.

Parents are struggling to help. Four out of five parents reported that they have had difficulty understanding their children's homework.

This probably comes as no surprise to any parent who has come up against a third grade math homework sheet with the word "array" printed on it. If you have not yet had the pleasure, for the purposes of Common Core math, an array is defined as a set of objects arranged in rows and columns and used to help kids learn about multiplication. For their parents, though, it's defined as a "What? Come again? Huh?"

It's just as hard on the students. "My high school junior says homework is the most stressful part of high school...maybe that’s why he never does any," said Mandy Burkhart, of Lake Mary, Florida, who is a mother of five children ranging in age from college to preschool.

In fact, Florida high school teacher and mother of three Katie Tomlinson no longer assigns homework in her classroom. "Being a parent absolutely changed the way I assign homework to my students," she told TODAY Parents .

"Excessive homework can quickly change a student’s mind about a subject they previously enjoyed," she noted. "While I agree a check and balance is necessary for students to understand their own ability prior to a test, I believe it can be done in 10 questions versus 30."

But homework is a necessary evil for most students, so what is a parent to do to ensure everyone in the house survives? Parents and professionals weigh in on the essentials:

Understand the true purpose of homework

"Unless otherwise specified, homework is designed to be done by the child independently, and it's most often being used as a form of formative assessment by the teacher to gauge how the kids are applying — independently — what they are learning in class," said Oona Hanson , a Los Angeles-area educator and parent coach.

"If an adult at home is doing the heavy lifting, then the teacher never knows that the child isn't ready to do this work alone, and the cycle continues because the teacher charges ahead thinking they did a great job the day before!" Hanson said. "It's essential that teachers know when their students are struggling for whatever reason."

Hanson noted the anxiety both parents and children have about academic achievement, and she understands the parental impulse to jump in and help, but she suggested resisting that urge. "We can help our kids more in the long run if we can let them know it's OK to struggle a little bit and that they can be honest with their teacher about what they don't understand," she said.

Never miss a parenting story with the TODAY Parenting newsletter! Sign up here.

Help kids develop time management skills

Some children like to finish their homework the minute they get home. Others need time to eat a snack and decompress. Either is a valid approach, but no matter when students decide to tackle their homework, they might need some guidance from parents about how to manage their time .

One tip: "Set the oven timer for age appropriate intervals of work, and then let them take a break for a few minutes," Maura Olvey, an elementary school math specialist in Central Florida, told TODAY Parents. "The oven timer is visible to them — they know when a break is coming — and they are visible to you, so you can encourage focus and perseverance." The stopwatch function on a smartphone would work for this method as well.

But one size does not fit all when it comes to managing homework, said Cleveland, Ohio, clinical psychologist Dr. Sarah Cain Spannagel . "If their child has accommodations as a learner, parents know they need them at home as well as at school: quiet space, extended time, audio books, etcetera," she said. "Think through long assignments, and put those in planners in advance so the kid knows it is expected to take some time."

Know when to walk away

"I always want my parents to know when to call it a night," said Amanda Feroglia, a central Florida elementary teacher and mother of two. "The children's day at school is so rigorous; some nights it’s not going to all get done, and that’s OK! It’s not worth the meltdown or the fight if they are tired or you are frustrated...or both!"

Parents also need to accept their own limits. Don't be afraid to find support from YouTube videos, websites like Khan Academy, or even tutors. And in the end, said Spannagel, "If you find yourself yelling or frustrated, just walk away!" It's fine just to let a teacher know your child attempted but did not understand the homework and leave it at that.

Ideally, teachers will understand when parents don't know how to help with Common Core math, and they will assign an appropriate amount of homework that will not leave both children and their parents at wits' ends. If worst comes to worst, a few parents offered an alternative tip for their fellow homework warriors.

"If Brittany leaves Boston for New York at 3:00 pm traveling by train at 80 MPH, and Taylor leaves Boston for New York at 1:00 pm traveling by car at 65 MPH, and Brittany makes two half hour stops, and Taylor makes one that is ten minutes longer, how many glasses of wine does mommy need?" quipped one mom of two.

Also recommended: "Chocolate, in copious amounts."

Allison Slater Tate is a freelance writer and editor in Florida specializing in parenting and college admissions. She is a proud Gen Xer, ENFP, Leo, Diet Coke enthusiast, and champion of the Oxford Comma. She mortifies her four children by knowing all the trending songs on TikTok. Follow her on Twitter and Instagram .

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Associations of time spent on homework or studying with nocturnal sleep behavior and depression symptoms in adolescents from Singapore

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Homework goal orientation, interest, and achievement: testing models of reciprocal effects

• Published: 26 February 2020
• Volume 36 , pages 359–378, ( 2021 )

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• Jianzhong Xu   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0002-0269-4590 1 , 2  

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Whereas it is often a challenge to keep students motivated and interested in academic tasks, it is more of a challenge to have students stay motivated and interested in academic tasks outside school during nonschool hours—homework. Prior research, however, has largely overlooked the reasons or purposes students have for doing homework and their interest in homework. Informed by achievement goal theory and interest theory, along with cultural differences pertaining to these theories, the present study uses reciprocal models to study longitudinal relationships among homework goal orientation, interest, and math achievement. Participants were 1450 Chinese students in grade 8. Results found reciprocal influences of mastery-approach and math achievement. Additionally, prior mastery-approach had a positive effect on subsequent performance-approach. Furthermore, prior interest had a positive effect on subsequent mastery-approach. Meanwhile, prior performance-approach negatively influenced subsequent achievement. Taken together, the present study points to the complex interplay among mastery-approach, performance-approach, homework interest, and math achievement over time. These findings hold important practical implications (e.g., to promote mastery-approach and math achievement simultaneously and to help students focus on developing competencies through math homework, not how well they have done compared with their peers).

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Fan, H., Xu, J., Cai, Z., He, J., & Fan, X. (2017). Homework and students’ achievement in math and science: A 30-year meta-analysis, 1986–2015. Educational Research Review , 20 , 35–54. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.edurev.2016.11.003 .

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Xu, J. Homework goal orientation, interest, and achievement: testing models of reciprocal effects. Eur J Psychol Educ 36 , 359–378 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10212-020-00472-7

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Individual Precursors of Student Homework Behavioral Engagement: The Role of Intrinsic Motivation, Perceived Homework Utility and Homework Attitude

Natalia suárez.

1 Department of Psychology, University of Oviedo, Oviedo, Spain

Bibiana Regueiro

2 Department of Psychology, University of A Coruña, A Coruña, Spain

Iris Estévez

3 Department of Pedagogy and Didactics, University of A Coruña, A Coruña, Spain

María del Mar Ferradás

M. adelina guisande.

4 Department of Developmental and Educational Psychology, University of Santiago de Compostela, Santiago de Compostela, Spain

Susana Rodríguez

Currently, the concept of engagement is crucial in the field of learning and school achievement. It is a multidimensional concept (e.g., behavioral, emotional, and cognitive dimensions) that has been widely used as a theoretical framework to explain the processes of school engagement and dropout. However, this conceptual framework has been scarcely used in the field of homework. The aim of the present study was to analyze the role of intrinsic motivation, perceived homework utility, and personal homework attitude as precursors of student homework engagement (behavioral engagement) and, at the same time, how such engagement is the precursor of academic achievement. Seven hundred and thirty students of Compulsory Secondary Education (CSE) (7th to 10th grade) from fourteen schools northern Spain participated. A structural equation model was elaborated on which intrinsic motivation, perceived utility and attitude were observed variables, and student engagement (time spent on homework, time management, and amount of teacher-assigned homework done) and academic achievement (Mathematics, Spanish Language, English Language, and Social Science) were latent variables. The results reveal that (i) intrinsic motivation is a powerful precursor of student behavioral engagement (also perceived utility and attitude, although to a lesser extent), and (ii) academic achievement is closely linked to the level of student engagement, qualifying the results of many of the previous studies conducted from a task-centered perspective (as opposed to a person-centered perspective).

Introduction

In accordance with the proposal of Trautwein et al. (2006) , we study herein the role of motivational variables as individual antecedents of student behavioral homework engagement and its impact on academic achievement. Assuming the principles of the theory of expectancy-value ( Eccles, 1983 ; Pintrich and De Groot, 1990 ; Eccles and Wigfield, 2002 ), we focused this study on the role of the motivational variables related to the value attributed to homework and we addressed the construct of engagement in accordance with the contributions of the theory of school engagement ( Fredricks et al., 2004 ).

Nowadays, it seems little debatable that the value attributed by students to academic tasks such as tests or homework is linked to their engagement and the effort dedicated to these tasks ( Greene et al., 2004 ; Xu, 2005 ; Cole et al., 2008 ). Thus, students with high-value beliefs spend more time, devote more effort, and complete more homework than those who do not value academic activity ( Bong, 2001 ; Miller and Brickman, 2004 ; Wise and DeMars, 2005 ; Liem et al., 2008 ; Eccles and Wang, 2012 ). This attributed value thereby indirectly influences their achievement ( Pintrich and De Groot, 1990 ; Wolters and Pintrich, 1998 ; Wigfield and Eccles, 2002 ; Trautwein et al., 2006 ).

Motivation and Homework Behavioral Engagement

Compared with students who do their homework to avoid blame or to please their parents, the evidence suggests that intrinsically motivated students devote more effort, persist more, and obtain better results when they engage in an activity ( Wigfield and Eccles, 2002 ; Hardre and Reeve, 2003 ; Coutts, 2004 ; see the review of Wigfield et al., 2009 ). Along with personal expectancies, the link between the value attributed to homework and the intentions of learning and devoting effort is well documented in the literature ( Bandura, 1997 ; Wigfield and Eccles, 2000 ; Eccles and Wigfield, 2002 ; Wigfield et al., 2009 ; Metallidou and Vlachou, 2010 ). Assuming the principles of the theory of Expectancy-Value, this study aims at verifying to what extent the value students attribute to homework predicts their intentions and real decision to engage in homework and to do it ( Eccles et al., 1993 ; Eccles, 2005 ; Wigfield et al., 2017 ).

Most of the research that supports the expectancy value models has argued that the value attributed to homework has at least three dimensions or components: the degree to which it is perceived as interesting—its intrinsic value— personally significant and important for the student—achievement value—, and useful—utility value. Thus, students who consider homework important, useful, and/or interesting hold high self-efficacy beliefs and persevere in the face of difficulties encountered when doing homework ( Bandura, 1997 ). In fact, this value-effort relationship has been found for homework, showing the direct influence of the value attributed to dedication and engagement ( Trautwein et al., 2006 ; Hong et al., 2009 ; Xu, 2017 ; Xu et al., 2017 ), and underlining the importance of the utility perception of homework in the promotion of diverse academic outcomes ( Trautwein et al., 2006 ; Yang et al., 2016 ; Xu et al., 2017 ). The term attitude is understood as an evaluative predisposition (positive or negative) that conditions the subject to perceive and to react in a determined way in light of the objects (people, groups, ideas, situations, etc.). It is a learned predisposition, not innate, and stable although it can change ( Hidalgo et al., 2004 ). Therefore, the attitude toward homework refers to the positive or negative predisposition of these students to do homework.

Homework Behavioral Engagement and Academic Achievement

School engagement is receiving increasingly more attention in psychological research because it has been shown to be a relevant predictor of different educational outcomes ( Ladd and Dinella, 2009 ; Wang and Peck, 2013 ), and specifically, of academic achievement ( Ladd and Dinella, 2009 ; Reeve and Tseng, 2011 ). Although there are significant variations in the implementation of the construct, we consider engagement as a meta-construct with affective-emotional, cognitive, and behavioral subcomponents ( Fredricks et al., 2016 ; Rodríguez-Pereiro et al., 2019 ).

In this context, the review of students’ behavioral engagement usually refers to their participation at school, indicators of pro-social behavior in academic contexts, compliance with rules, and/or dedication to homework (e.g., Fredricks et al., 2004 ; Christenson et al., 2012 ). Behavioral engagement, in terms of time, effort, amount of homework performed, persistence, and/or dedication ( Eccles and Wang, 2012 ), must have an impact on adolescents’ academic achievement ( King, 2015 ; Mikami et al., 2017 ).

The construct student homework behavioral engagement usually includes behavioral indicators concerning the time devoted to homework, the management of that time, or the amount of homework performed ( Trautwein et al., 2006 ).

Although among other factors, achievement could depend on students’ age, the quality of the assigned homework, and/or the procedure used to measure achievement, research tends to support a positive relationship between the amount of homework carried out and academic achievement (e.g., Cooper et al., 1998 , 2006 ; Cooper and Valentine, 2001 ; Epstein and Van Voorhis, 2001 ; Trautwein et al., 2002 ; Fernández-Alonso et al., 2015 ; Núñez et al., 2015a ).

Some works have found positive relationships (see review of Cooper, 1989 ; Cooper and Valentine, 2001 ; Cooper et al., 2006 ; Fernández-Alonso et al., 2015 ), with more obvious effects in secondary education than in primary education, and some studies have shown that the time spent on homework and achievement may not be related or may even be negatively related ( De Jong et al., 2000 ; Trautwein, 2007 ; Kitsantas et al., 2011 ). There may be a differential effect of the time devoted to homework, and also of the amount of homework performed, at the classroom and individual level.

Both students’ committed effort and their good use of homework time have a positive effect on their achievement ( Schmitz and Skinner, 1993 ; Trautwein and Köller, 2003 ; Trautwein et al., 2006 ; Xu, 2013 ). In this sense, Xu (2010) concluded, for example, that a good study time management contributes to completing a greater amount of homework. Trautwein (2007) found that effort is a better predictor of achievement than time spent on homework. As proposed by Núñez et al. (2015a) , the use of homework time could positively affect academic achievement insofar as it contributes to increasing the amount of homework performed.

The Present Study

According to Lawson (2017) , behavioral engagement is a manifestation of internal motivational processes such as intrinsic motivation, self-efficacy, or the value attributed to homework ( Becker et al., 2010 ; Schiefele et al., 2012 ; Guthrie et al., 2013 ), which energize and direct action. In this study, we focus on the value component in terms of the conceptual model of homework developed by Trautwein and colleagues and tested in various studies (e.g., Trautwein and Lüdtke, 2007 ; Dettmers et al., 2010 , among others). As in other studies of this field ( Hughes et al., 2008 ; King, 2015 ; Mikami et al., 2017 ), we propose a structural model in which homework behavioral engagement (i.e., the amount of time dedicated to doing teacher-assigned homework; homework time management; and the amount of homework assigned) mediates between certain student motivational conditions— students’ motivational conditions (perceived homework utility; homework intrinsic motivation; and homework attitude) and their general academic achievement (Social Sciences, Math, Language, and English as second language). In the present study we focus on students in grades 7–10, it is the proper age in which they should begin to take importance the accomplishment of homework. Despite the large number of research on homework in secondary education, it seems interesting to begin to verify models of relationships that allow us to interpret adequately the relationships between motivation and behavioral engagement.

Figure 1 shows the model to be tested. The main hypotheses of this model are as follows:

Structural model to be tested.

• simple (1) Students’ homework behavioral engagement will be significantly and positively determined by their motivational conditions (homework intrinsic motivation, homework utility, and homework attitude). Based on previous studies (e.g., Trautwein et al., 2006 ; Hong et al., 2009 ; Regueiro et al., 2015 , 2017 , 2018 ; Valle et al., 2018 ; Yang et al., 2016 ; Xu, 2017 ; Xu et al., 2017 ), we expect that the intensity of this relationship (in terms of the effect size) will be medium or large.
• simple (2) Students’ homework behavioral engagement will positively and significant predict their overall academic achievement (in terms of average grades in the four core academic areas). Based on the results of previous studies of the relationship between homework and academic achievement in Secondary Education students (e.g., De Jong et al., 2000 ; Trautwein et al., 2002 ; Cooper et al., 2006 ; Trautwein, 2007 ; Kitsantas et al., 2011 ; Fernández-Alonso et al., 2015 ; Núñez et al., 2015a ; Fan et al., 2017 ), we expect that the effect size of the relationship will be moderate (or small).

Materials and Methods

Participants.

Participants were 730 students in Compulsory Secondary Education (CSE) (aged between 12 and 16 years ( M = 13.5, SD = 1.15) from 14 schools randomly selected (12 public schools and 2 private-subsidized schools) in three provinces of northern Spain. Fifty-six students were eliminated due to missing data. Half of the schools are in urban areas and the other half are in rural or semi-urban areas. Of the participants, 43.4% were boys and 56.6% were girls. Besides, 194 students (26.6%) were in 1st grade of CSE, 152 students (20.8%) were 2nd-graders, 182 students (24.9%) were in 3rd grade, and 202 students (27.7%) were 4th-graders.

Instruments

Student’s motivational variables.

The items used to measure homework intrinsic motivation, homework perceived utility, and homework attitude were obtained from the Homework Survey, an instrument already used in previous studies (e.g., Núñez et al., 2015a , b , c ; Valle et al., 2015a , 2018 ). The fact of having chosen the questionnaire as a data collection instrument was mainly due to its characteristics of versatility, efficiency and generalizability, which have made this research instrument one of the most widespread in the educational and psychological field, as established authors such as McMillan and Schumacher (2005) .

- HW Intrinsic Motivation . We evaluated the students’ degree of enjoyment, satisfaction, and the benefits obtained by doing homework. This dimension consists of 8 items (α = 00.85), which are rated on a 5-point Likert-type scale ranging from 1 ( completely false ) to 5 ( completely true ). An example item is: “I enjoy doing homework, because it allows me to learn more.” - HW Perceived Utility . This variable was assessed with a single item asking students whether they considered the homework assigned by their teachers to be useful. The response scale ranged from 1 ( completely false ) to 5 ( completely true ). - Homework Attitude . In this study three items to evaluate the affective dimension of the homework attitude were used: students’ preference for, their willingness to (their disposal to), and their positive emotions generated and associated with doing homework (α = 0.77). Students responded on a 5-point Likert-type scale ranging from 1 ( completely false ) up to 5 ( completely true ).

Homework Behavioral Engagement

Behavioral engagement was measured through three indicators: time spent on homework, homework time optimization, and amount of teacher-assigned homework carried out by the students. The items used to obtain three measurements were taken from the aforementioned Homework Survey.

- Homework Time Spent . To measure the time spent on homework, students responded to two items (“How much time do you usually spend on homework every day from Monday to Friday?,” and “How much time do you usually spend on homework on the weekend?), with the following response options: 1 ( less than 30 min ), 2 ( 30 min to 1 h ), 3 ( 1 h to an hour and a half ), 4 ( 1 h and a half to 2 h ), and 5 ( more than 2 h ). The alpha coefficient was α = 0.72 in this study). - Homework Time Management . This variable was measured through the responses to two items asking students to indicate how they managed the time normally spent doing homework (Monday through Friday, and on the weekend), using the following scale: 1 ( I waste it completely; I am constantly distracted by anything ), 2 ( I waste it more than I should ), 3 ( regular ), 4 ( I manage it pretty well ), and 5 ( I optimize it completely; I concentrate and, I don’t think about anything else until I finish ). The alpha coefficient was α = 0.78 in this study. - Amount of Homework Done. The estimate of the amount of teacher-assigned homework completed by students was obtained through one item rated on a 5-point Likert-type scale: 1 ( none ), 2 ( some ), 3 ( one half ), 4 ( almost all ), and 5 ( all of it ).

Academic Achievement

The evaluation of academic achievement was calculated from average grade obtained by the students at the end of the academic year they were enrolled in at that time. The subjects used to calculate the mean were Social Sciences, Mathematics, Spanish Language, and Foreign Language (English as a second language) because they have the greatest weight in the curriculum.

The data referring to the variables under study were collected during school hours by personnel external to the school itself, after obtaining the written informed consent of the parents or legal guardians, the management team, and the students’ teachers, respecting the ethical standards established in the Declaration of Helsinki. In each session, the staff give some practical indications to students on how to address those questions. Then, participants fill in all the questions of the self-report individually by themselves, and without time limit.

Data Analysis

After verifying that the distribution of the variables could be considered sufficiently normal to allow the use of the maximum likelihood procedure, a structural equation analysis, using the computer program AMOS 18, was employed to contrast a hypothesized model predicting the influence of homework motivation on homework engagement and achievement. In addition to chi-square (χχ 2 ) and its associated probability ( p ), we used two absolute indices: the goodness-of-fit-index (GFI) and the adjusted goodness-of-fit-index (AGFI). We also provide a relative index, the comparative fit index (CFI) ( Bentler, 1990 ); and a close-fit parsimony-based index, the root mean square error of approximation (RMSEA), including 90% confidence intervals ( Hu and Bentler, 1999 ). The model fits well if GFI and AGFI >0.90, CFI >0.95, and RMSEA ≤ 0.05.

The effect sizes were calculated using Cohen’s d ( d < 0.20 = non-significant effect; d ≥ 0.20 and d < 0.50 = small effect; d ≥ 0.50 and d < 0.80 = medium effect; d ≥ 0.80 = large effect).

Preliminary Analysis

Table 1 shows the means, standard deviations, skewness, kurtosis, and bivariate Pearson correlations. In general, the relationship between the variables included in the study was as expected. Specifically, the three motivational variables considered— intrinsic motivation, utility, and homework attitude—significant and positive correlations with the time spent doing homework, time optimization, and the amount of homework done. These three variables that constitute the construct of homework behavioral engagement correlated positively and significantly with each other and with the grades obtained by the students in the four subject areas considered.

Descriptive statistics and Pearson correlations ( N = 730).

We observed moderate correlations between the utility perception and the intrinsic value of homework and students’ grades, whereas the interrelationship between homework attitude and academic achievement was lower. Statistically significant correlations were also observed among the three homework motivational variables, as well as among the grades obtained in the subjects that constitute the academic achievement measures.

Structural Model Fit

In Figure 1 , the relationships expressed in the formulation of the hypothesis of the contrasted model are made explicit. With the exception of χ 2 (31) = 75.548; χ 2 / df = 2.43, p < 0.001, all the fit indices suggest that the hypothesized model adequately represents the relations of the empirical data matrix: GFI = 0.980; AGFI = 0.964; TLI = 0.980; CFI = 0.986; and RMSEA = 0.044, 90% CI [0.032, 0.057], p > 0.05. As a result, the model does not need any changes. In addition, as can be seen in Table 2 , the factor loadings as well as the corresponding estimation errors of the three measurement variables corresponding to student homework behavioral engagement (time spent; homework time management; amount of homework done) and to the academic achievement areas (Social Sciences, Mathematics, Spanish Language, and English as Second Language) suggest that both latent variables were reliably constructed.

Assessment of the hypothesized homework model.

Assessment of Model Hypotheses

Correlations between the three independent variables, standardized regression weights, and their statistical significance are presented in Table 2 and Figure 2 .

Correlations and standardized regression weights for the final model. All coefficients are statistically significant at p < 0.001, except for HW Attitude on HW Behavioral Engagement ( p < 0.01).

In the present study, two general hypotheses were formulated. First, we hypothesized that students’ homework behavioral engagement would be significantly and positively determined by their motivational personal variables. In addition, based on previous studies, we expected that the intensity of this relationship would be medium or large. In general terms, the results confirm this hypothesis. As a whole, the effect is statistically significant and positive: students who perceive greater homework utility have a more positive attitude toward homework and consider it an opportunity to learn. They also engage more in their homework than students who express low utility, a poor attitude, and low intrinsic motivation. However, the effect sizes suggest that students’ homework behavioral engagement depends little on perceived homework utility and homework attitude, although it does depend on intrinsic homework motivation (interest in working on homework to achieve learning and gain competence), with an effect size between medium and large. The three motivational variables explain 17.5% of students’ homework behavioral engagement.

Secondly, we formulated the hypothesis that students’ homework behavioral engagement would significantly and positively predict their overall academic achievement, and that the effect size of that relationship would be moderate, or even small. The data obtained confirm this hypothesis, both in the intensity (the mean effect size) and the sign (positive). The higher the students’ homework behavioral engagement, the greater was their academic achievement, and vice versa. The amount of total explained academic achievement variance was 41%.

The role of students’ behavioral homework engagement is a highly controversial issue. For example, prior studies indicate that spending more time on homework is no guarantee of higher academic achievement. Also, there is not sufficient empirical evidence about the determinants of such engagement. This research intended to provide some information about these two large gaps. On the one hand, we wondered whether the motivational factors could be important determinants of student homework engagement (as derived from the motivational theories of academic learning) and, on the other hand, we wished to confirm the predictive power of student homework engagement for academic achievement when using latent variables (instead of specific measures of engagement or achievement).

The results confirm the contribution of motivation and, specifically, of its value component, on students’ academic engagement ( Bong, 2001 ; Eccles and Wang, 2012 ). Moreover, according to our results, the value attributed to homework in terms of enjoyment and satisfaction, utility perception, and positive attitude moderately explain students’ dedication to and engagement with homework.

Specifically, when students approach homework due to their interest, in order to learn and acquire competence, they spend more time, optimize the time spent, and also do more homework ( Trautwein et al., 2006 ; Hong et al., 2009 ; Xu et al., 2017 ). As defended from different theoretical frameworks, interest would contribute to achievement to the extent that, in general, it increases behavioral engagement, dedication, management of the learning process, and the attentional resources that are implemented ( Lee et al., 2014 ; Trautwein et al., 2015 ; Harackiewicz et al., 2016 ). The prescription and correction of homework can become an instructional strategy for the learning promotion and academic performance, as teachers manage to adjust to the needs and interests of their students (e.g., Akioka and Gilmore, 2013 ). Beyond the interventions focused on self-monitoring and self-management (e.g., Breaux et al., 2019 ) or the use of reinforcements ( Reinhardt et al., 2009 ), homework that are prescribed from classroom must be meaningful and purposeful if we want the apprentices to actively engage with them ( Kalchman and Marentette, 2012 ).

Likewise, it seems that homework utility perception contributes somewhat to helping students spend more time on homework, better manage that time, and do more homework ( Cooper et al., 2006 ; Yang et al., 2016 ; Fan et al., 2017 ). Intrinsic motivation and perceived utility also guarantee a more positive attitude toward doing homework. Given the strong association found, if students perceive the utility of the assigned homework, they could improve their more intrinsic reasons for engaging in homework, which would promote more positive attitudes toward such engagement.

The value students attribute to homework, a key aspect of motivation in self-regulated learning models ( Pintrich and Zusho, 2007 ; Wigfield and Cambria, 2010 ), should be understood as a multidimensional construct that integrates students’ personal interests and the interest aroused by the situations, but also their estimates of its importance or usefulness. As learners will probably engage intrinsically in their homework if they perceive its utility, and in view of the fact that direct intervention in the intrinsic value of homework is not always easy and could even undermine students’ sense of autonomy ( Deci and Ryan, 1985 ), homework utility value becomes a core support in the educational intervention with students who show little interest in homework.

Thus, as Epstein and Van Voorhis (2001 , 2012 ) concluded, when teachers explicitly present the meaning and utility of the homework they assign, they could be affecting students’ behavioral engagement and homework time management. In general, the research seems consistent, suggesting that student homework engagement could be optimized if the teacher assigns quality homework, that is, homework perceived as useful and interesting, which enables students’ progress (adapted to the potential of each student or group of students) and is causally linked to academic success (e.g., Trautwein et al., 2006 ; Trautwein and Lüdtke, 2009 ; Dettmers et al., 2010 , 2011 ; Rosário et al., 2018 ).

In any case, we should not lose sight of the fact that the explanatory potential of the motivational variables considered herein is relatively low and, in fact, more than 80% of the variability of homework behavioral engagement would be explained by variables that were not included in this work. In this regard, we acknowledge that we did not address the expectancy component of motivation, which, as defended from different theoretical frameworks ( Eccles, 1983 ; Pintrich and De Groot, 1990 ; Bandura, 1997 ; Eccles and Wigfield, 2002 ), can be considered a predictor of homework behavioral engagement, at least in terms of effort and persistence ( Trautwein et al., 2006 ; Nagengast et al., 2013 ). On the other hand, although we must assume that motivation energizes cognitive engagement ( Greene et al., 2004 ; Greene, 2015 ), in this case, we did not study the resources and learning strategies implemented by students when approaching homework. However, the research of Valle et al. (2015b) allows us to hypothesize the importance of intrinsic motivation and attitude in the decision to engage more or less deeply in homework, and thereby related to homework behavioral engagement.

On another hand, as has already been stated by many previous studies ( Cooper et al., 1998 , 2006 ; Cooper and Valentine, 2001 ; Epstein and Van Voorhis, 2001 ; Trautwein et al., 2002 ; Xu, 2010 ; Fernández-Alonso et al., 2015 ; Núñez et al., 2015a ), the time spent on homework along with good time management the amount of homework done largely contribute to students’ grades in different curricular subjects. Compared with other studies that found null or negative relationships (e.g., see De Jong et al., 2000 ; Trautwein, 2007 ; Kitsantas et al., 2011 ), the results of this research not only corroborate the positive relationship between behavioral engagement measures and academic achievement, but also show that the effect size is higher than that reported in most of the previous studies. High school students who spend more time, manage that time well, and do all the homework clearly perform better than those who dedicate little time, are easily distracted, or do not finish their homework.

If, indeed, the more students engage in their homework, the better grades they obtain, then doing homework is better than not doing homework, and assigning homework in class will therefore contribute to improving students’ academic achievement. In this regard, no doubt, students’ competence and abilities will mediate their management of resources like time, the environment, or help ( Du et al., 2016 ; Xu et al., 2017 ), as well as the role of parents, teachers, and peers ( Núñez et al., 2015b , c ).

Finally, as student engagement and dedication to homework impact on their academic results and depend to some extent on homework utility perception, parents and teachers need to converge so we can sustain the utility perception of homework as a society. In this sense, there is a risk that the increasing and recurrent loss of prestige of homework will end up diminishing students’ intrinsic motivation and promoting a negative attitude toward homework.

Limitations of the Work and Future Research

Although the results of the study seem to be robust (consistent effects of the predictions, estimation errors within normal parameters, etc.), they should be taken with some precaution due to some limitations inherent in the nature of the data of the study, the sample used, or the measuring instruments.

The research is cross-sectional, so any causal inferences are seriously compromised. Although we used a powerful multivariate strategy to analyze the data, which could lead us to think in terms of causality, this is not possible because, for this purpose, we should have used a longitudinal design (three repeated measures could be sufficient for this model) or an experimental design. Although in the present investigation, we chose a cross-sectional strategy, we accept and appreciate the suggestion of Xu et al. (2017) about the need to develop causal research where the effects of homework assignment—type of tasks, frequency, etc.—and teacher feedback on students’ motivation and homework engagement are confirmed. In line with different works of research within the framework of the expectancy-value models (e.g., Durik et al., 2006 ; Simpkins et al., 2006 ), it also seems interesting to begin to develop longitudinal follow-up studies that allow us to determine whether, indeed, students’ attitudes and motivation have a greater explanatory potential for homework behavioral engagement throughout their schooling and to observe the extent to which we can assume evolutionary changes in the influence of homework on academic achievement.

Another limitation has to do with the student sample used in this study. We must admit that the results could vary significantly if the sample had been obtained randomly and were representative of the population from which it comes (educational stage, types of educational centers, sociometric features of the families, etc.). However, we are confident that the procedure used is sufficiently sensitive to the variables and that it has strengthened the reliability of the results described.

Finally, data collection regarding homework was done through self-reports. Although this methodology is commonly used in psychology and education, possibly essential to measure thoughts and behaviors that are otherwise hardly observable, it is necessary to replicate the findings using complementary strategies and measuring instruments (of various types). In addition, some variables of this study were assessed with a relatively low number of items, which may compromise the robustness of these measures (although consistency coefficients higher than 0.70 are usually considered reliable). In relation to this type of measure, a matter which we must not forget when interpreting the data and drawing conclusions and implications for educational practice, is that the information obtained is self-reported, which may be more or less subjective, depending on the individual’s variables and the variables of the context. For example, homework utility in itself was not considered, but instead students’ utility perception. Reality and perception of reality may not coincide completely.

Finally, we emphasize that, in this investigation, like in many others carried out within the field of education, we used students’ grades at the end of course as an indicator of academic achievement. However, it should not be forgotten that the magnitude of the relationship between student homework engagement and academic achievement could be significantly different if we had used a more objective measure of achievement (for example, the result of a standardized achievement test). Nevertheless, this study used the final grades as a measure of achievement due to its markedly ecological nature (compared to the standardized test).

This work allows us to suggest the need to incorporate motivational variables such as interest, usefulness and attitude toward homework in research agendas given the incidence found for active participation and student dedication. It is also important to emphasize the need to develop improvement programs, integrated into the school curriculum and implemented from schools with the involvement of parents.

Ethics Statement

Does the study presented in the manuscript involve human or animal subjects: Yes.

This study was carried out in accordance with the recommendations of Research and Teaching Ethics Committee of the University of A Coruña and the Declaration of Helsinki. The protocol was approved by the Research and Teaching Ethics Committee of the University of A Coruña and the Declaration of Helsinki.

Data about the target variable were collected in accordance with the recommendations of the ethical standards established in the Research and Teaching Ethics Committee of the University of A Coruña and the Declaration of Helsinki. This study was carried out with the written informed consent from parents or legal guardians.

Author Contributions

NS, BR, and IE contributed to conception and design of the study. MdMF organized the database. MG and SR performed the statistical analysis. NS, BR, and IE wrote the first draft of the manuscript. MdMF, MG, and SR wrote the sections of the manuscript. All authors contributed to manuscript revision, read and approved the submitted version.

Conflict of Interest Statement

The authors declare that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest.

Funding. This work was developed with the financing of the research projects EDU2013-44062-P (MINECO), EDU2017-82984-P (MEIC), and Government of the Principality of Asturias, Spain. European Regional Development Fund (Research Groups Program 2018–2020 FC-GRUPIN-IDI/2018/000199).

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