Making Learning Fun : A Taxonomy of Intrinsic Motivations for Learning

TLDR

Over the past two decades, research has advanced cognitive models of learning, yet motivational factors have been largely ignored, especially Bruner’s notion of an intrinsic will to learn that becomes problematic only when schooling imposes rigid curricula that fail to harness natural learning energies. The authors seek to correct this imbalance by refocusing research on intrinsic motivations for learning. p.

Abstract

Over the past 2 decades, great strides have been made in analyzing the cognitive processes involved in learning and instruction. During the same period, however, attention to motivational issues has been minimal. It is now time to redress this imbalance. As Bruner (1966) has put the case: The will to learn is an intrinsic motive, one that finds both its source and its reward in its own exercise. The will to learn becomes a ‘problem’ only under specialized circumstances like those of a school, where a curriculum is set, students confined and a path fixed. The problem exists not so much in learning itself, but in the fact that what the school imposes often fails to enlist the natural energies that sustain spontaneous learning . . . (p. 127)