School achievement is highly predictive of future success. Students with better grades achieve better results at university and perform better in job-related contexts and receive higher salaries. Thus, variables predicting school achievement are of interest to teachers, recruiters, and psychologists. Besides cognitive abilities and personality traits, differences in volition are likely to influence the individual’s performance. Biopsychologists from Ruhr University Bochum, therefore, analyzed the influence of volitional abilities in terms of action control on secondary education grading. Their results indicate that action orientation after failure (AOF) and decision-related action orientation (AOD) are associated with secondary school achievement. Furthermore, a multiple regression analysis revealed that AOF and AOD make unique contributions toward predicting final grade, beyond the effects of prominent influencing factors as fluid intelligence, conscientiousness, and sex. Remarkably, the predictive value of conscientiousness did not prove to be unique in nature but was mediated by AOD. The same applies to sex differences in academic achievement. Thus, the influence of sex on final grade was mediated by AOF and AOD. In summary, the study suggests that volition is an essential predictor of achievement in secondary education. Therefore, it's highly recommendable to include measures of volition into future studies investigating the noncognitive correlates of school achievement.

Schlüter, C., Fraenz, C., Pinnow, M., Voelkle, M. C., Güntürkün, O., & Genç, E. (2017, November 16). Volition and Academic Achievement: Interindividual Differences in Action Control Mediate the Effects of Conscientiousness and Sex on Secondary School Grading. Motivation Science.Advance online publication. http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/mot0000083