NCPI affiliate researcher Chris Hulleman will be honored by the American Psychological Association (APA) at their upcoming convention on August 14 in San Diego, California. The award is presented annually to acknowledge excellence in doctoral research. Hulleman, a 2007 graduate of the University of Wisconsin at Madison, will be honored for his dissertation, entitled, “The Role of Utility Value in the Development of Interest and Achievement.” In the dissertation, Hulleman evaluates whether helping students see the value in their coursework contributes to interest and achievement.

An assistant professor of graduate psychology and assistant assessment specialist at the Center for Assessment and Research Studies at James Madison University, Hulleman will receive the Division 15 (Educational Psychology) Dissertation Award. The award is presented annually to acknowledge excellence in doctoral research.

Hulleman, a 2007 graduate of the University of Wisconsin at Madison, will be honored for his dissertation, entitled, “The Role of Utility Value in the Development of Interest and Achievement.” In the dissertation, Hulleman evaluates whether helping students see the value in their coursework contributes to interest and achievement. He begins by describing two studies that test the effectiveness of an instructional intervention to promote perceptions of utility value and interest, particularly for students with lower competence beliefs. Hulleman tests those findings using a long-term intervention with high school students, in addition to developing and testing a process model of utility value effects. Hulleman’s results demonstrate the intervention effectively increases perceptions of utility value and interest among students and support the hypothetical pathways of the process model he developed.

Portions of this dissertation have been published in several journals, including Science(December, 2009), Journal of Research on Educational Effectiveness (January 2009), andJournal of Educational Psychology (forthcoming, 2010).

Prior to his appointment at James Madison University, Hulleman was a research fellow in the Experimental Education Research Training (ExpERT) program at Vanderbilt University’s Peabody College. Hulleman is currently working on extending his expertise of motivation to NCPI’s research and evaluation work in Round Rock, TX and Austin, TX.