Regulation of cognition: Validation of a short scale for Portuguese first-year university students

Abstract

La calidad del aprendizaje en la Educación Superior depende, especialmente, de las habilidades de los estudiantes para regular su cognición. Esta regulación requiere habilidades cognitivas y metacognitivas, así como dimensiones motivacionales. Dada su relevancia en el rendimiento académico y el desarrollo de habilidades para el aprendizaje a lo largo de la vida, es importante aumentar la investigación en el campo. Este estudio pretende adaptar y validar una versión abreviada da dimensión Regulación de la Cognición del Metacognitive Awareness Inventory para estudiantes universitarios portugueses de primer año. Se empleó una muestra de 360 estudiantes y se identificó una estructura tridimensional (Planificación, 4 ítems; Estrategias, 7 ítems; y Monitoreo y evaluación, 7 ítems) con un factor de segundo orden (Regulación de la cognición). Los valores de consistencia interna de la escala reducida son aceptables para una escala de autoinforme y las correlaciones con el logro académico al final del primer año de la universidad garantizan su validez predictiva. Esta versión abreviada para medir la regulación de la cognición puede usarse en investigación junto con otros instrumentos en estudios más amplios y puede funcionar como una herramienta de diagnóstico para ayudar a los estudiantes en los desafíos de aprendizaje de la enseñanza superior. The quality of learning in Higher Education is particularly dependent on students' skills in regulating their cognition. This regulation requires cognitive and metacognitive skills as well as motivational dimensions. Due to its relevance in explaining students' academic achievement and developing lifelong learning skills, it´s important to increase research in the area. This study aims to adapt and validate a short version of the Regulation of Cognition of Metacognitive Awareness Inventory to first-year Portuguese university students. A sample of 360 students was considered and was identified a three-dimensional structure (Planning, 4 items; Strategies, 7 items; and Monitoring and evaluation, 7 items) with a second-order factor (Regulation of Cognition). The internal consistency values of the reduced scale are within the acceptable parameters for a self-report scale and the correlations with academic achievement at the end of the first year of the university guarantee the predictive validity of the scale. This short version of regulation of cognition measure allows its use in research with other instruments in larger studies and can function as a diagnostic / screening tool to help students in higher education learning challenges.

Improve teaching with modalities and collaborative groups in an LMS: an analysis of monitoring using visualisation techniques

“…This is a significant element for reflection, since these differences may be due to various factors related to the students' own characteristics, such as digital competences (García-Peñalvo, 2021), cognitive, metacognitive, affective strategies, etc. (Bártolo-Ribeiro et al, 2020;Cloude et al, 2019;Wiedbusch et al, 2021;Yilmaz et al, 2020;Yoon et al, 2021), learning style and their response to Self-regulated learning (Valadas et al, 2017) or teacher characteristics, also related to digital competences and teaching style. These aspects will be addressed in future studies.…”

“…All this will make sustainable education possible by making profitable use of the resources that the teacher implements on the platform, as these resources will be used according to the students' learning styles (Sáiz-Manzanares et al, 2021a ). In short, higher levels of performance, coupled with higher quality of learning by students, are achieved when students mobilize metacognitive skills and deep approaches in their learning process (Bártolo-Ribeiro et al, 2020 ). Especially in higher education, when it requires greater autonomy of students, the capacities for regulating cognition and learning are fundamental to assure academic achievement (Valadas et al, 2017 ).…”

Academic success, engagement and self-efficacy of first-year university students: personal variables and first-semester performance

“…It is worth noting that the regression path of GPA to 1st semester achievement was statistically significant but not GPA to 2 nd semester achievement. Academic background, expressed in the GPA on entering HE, gives us some information about students' academic experience and, although there is some discontinuity from secondary to tertiary education, it provides information about their academic knowledge and skills, study habits, and academic selfregulation (Bártolo-Ribeiro et al, 2020;Ferrão & Almeida, 2019). Nonetheless, GPA did not predict 2 nd semester achievement, indicating progressive changes in the learning process that students have to deal with to meet the challenges of HE.…”