AIM. This study examined whether teachers' use of fear appeals in the classroom, attempts to motivate students to perform well in high-stakes examinations by highlighting the educational, and/or occupational consequences of failure did indeed motivate students or whether it contributed to an increase in worry, anxiety, and fear of failure. SAMPLE. A total of 132 secondary school students. METHOD. Self-report data were collected for teachers' use of fear appeals, test anxiety, and achievement goals in the context of Mathematics at the end of Years 10 and 11, the final 2 years of compulsory schooling. RESULTS. The frequency with which teachers were reported to make fear appeals was unrelated to future test anxiety and achievement goals. When fear appeals were perceived to be threatening, however, they were related to an increase in the worry and tension components of test anxiety and increases in performance-avoidance and mastery-approach goals. CONCLUSION. Fear appeals appear to have competing positive and negative outcomes, resulting in both anxiety and a fear of failure, and a mastery-approach goal.

Teachers' use of fear appeals in the mathematics classroom: terrifying or motivating students?

Different goals, different pathways to success: Performance-approach goals as direct and mastery-approach goals as indirect predictors of grades in mathematics

BACKGROUND: Fear appeals are persuasive messages that draw attention to the negative consequences (e.g., academic failure) that follow a particular course of action (e.g., not engaging in lessons) and how negative consequences can be avoided with an alternate course of action. Previous studies have shown that when fear appeals are appraised as threatening, they are related to lower examination performance. AIM: In this study, we examined how challenge, as well as threat, appraisals are indirectly related to performance on a mathematics examination through behavioural engagement. SAMPLE: A total of 579 students from two secondary schools. METHOD: Data were collected over four waves at approximately 3-month intervals. Behavioural engagement data were collected at T1 and T3 , fear appeal frequency and appraisal at T3 , and examination performance at T2 and T4 . RESULTS: A challenge appraisal of fear appeals predicted better examination performance through higher behavioural engagement whereas a threat appraisal of fear appeals predicted worse examination performance through lower behavioural engagement. CONCLUSION: The relationship between fear appeals and examination performance depended on their appraisal.

/pdf/fear-appeals-engagement-and-examination-performance-the-role-1utll1prql.pdf

Fear appeals, engagement, and examination performance: The role of challenge and threat appraisals

According to the self-referent executive processing (S-REF) model, test anxiety develops from interactions between three systems: executive self-regulation processes, self-beliefs, and maladaptive situational interactions. Studies have tended to examine one system at a time, often in conjunction with how test anxiety relates to achievement outcomes. The aim of this study was to enable a more thorough test of the S-REF model by examining one key construct from each of these systems simultaneously. These were control (a self-belief construct), emotional regulation through suppression and reappraisal (an executive process), and self-handicapping (a maladaptive situational interaction). Relations were examined from control, emotional regulation, and self-handicapping to cognitive test anxiety (worry), and subsequent examination performance on a high-stakes test. Data were collected from 273 participants in their final year of secondary education. A structural equation model showed that higher control was indirectly related to better examination performance through lower worry, higher reappraisal was indirectly related to worse examination performance through higher worry, and higher self-handicapping was related to worse examination performance through lower control and higher worry. These findings suggest that increasing control and reducing self-handicapping would be key foci for test anxiety interventions to incorporate.

/pdf/an-examination-of-the-self-referent-executive-processing-v38aonq2ig.pdf

An examination of the self-referent executive processing model of test anxiety: Control, emotional regulation, self-handicapping, and examination performance

Cyber security researchers are starting to experiment with fear appeals, with a wide variety of designs and reported efficaciousness. This makes it hard to derive recommendations for designing and deploying these interventions. We thus reviewed the wider fear appeal literature to arrive at a set of guidelines to assist cyber security researchers. Our review revealed a degree of dissent about whether or not fear appeals are indeed helpful and advisable. Our review also revealed a wide range of fear appeal experimental designs, in both cyber and other domains, which confirms the need for some standardized guidelines to inform practice in this respect. We propose a protocol for carrying out fear appeal experiments, and we review a sample of cyber security fear appeal studies, via this lens, to provide a snapshot of the current state of play. We hope the proposed experimental protocol will prove helpful to those who wish to engage in future cyber security fear appeal research.

/pdf/cyber-security-fear-appeals-unexpectedly-complicated-573e04s2vx.pdf

Cyber security fear appeals: unexpectedly complicated

https://research.edgehill.ac.uk/ws/files/20173802/Putwain%20et%20al%20(2016)-%20Final%20Word%20version.pdf

Fear appeals prior to a high-stakes examination can have a positive or negative impact on engagement depending on how the message is appraised

https://research.edgehill.ac.uk/ws/files/20187162/Teaching%20and%20Teacher%20Education%20paper.pdf

Teachers use of fear appeals prior to a high-stakes examination: Is frequency linked to perceived student engagement and how do students respond?

A person-centered approach was employed to investigate how students' evaluation of perceived teacher utility value messages, i.e., fear appeals, as a threat and as a challenge, combined within individuals and how these combinations related to student engagement. Two studies were conducted with students in their final two years of secondary education. Empirically distinct clusters emerged at two time points in the academic year. Evaluating the message in the fear appeal at a higher level of challenge than threat was beneficial. Unexpectedly, high threat was associated with high engagement, as long as high challenge was also present, however, this combination was also related to high emotional disaffection. Moderate threat combined with moderate challenge had the most detrimental relationship with student engagement. Educational interventions should aim to increase the likelihood of a challenge evaluation.

/pdf/a-person-centered-approach-to-students-evaluations-of-4o04vaz3if.pdf

Ghada Nakhla

Papers

Fear appeals prior to a high-stakes examination can have a positive or negative impact on engagement depending on how the message is appraised

Teachers use of fear appeals prior to a high-stakes examination: Is frequency linked to perceived student engagement and how do students respond?

A Person-Centered Approach to Students’ Evaluations of Perceived Fear Appeals and their Association with Engagement