The article I choose to read was titled “Fostering Self-Efficacy through Time Management in an Online Learning Environment”.  This article was written by Krista P. Terry and Peter E. Doolittle.  The authors were interested in the self efficacy and self regulation skills of high level learners.  They wanted to determine if a study could be conducted where participants in the study could use feedback as a form of reinforcement to enhance their self efficacy and self regulatory abilities.  It was very important to the authors to use high performing students for the study.  Thus of the 64 students involved in the study 55 of them were graduate students.  The participants of the survey were asked to document how much time they had planned to spend sleeping, studying, working, and for personal matters.  Then once, the allotted day had passed that the participants had planned for they had to document whether or not they had met this goal.  As the participants documented their progress they received feedback concerning how well they had served their goal. 

As the study progressed the participants did report that the use of their time became more easy to manage and they began to track very closely to the predetermined goals they had established for themselves.  The study did not conclude that the feedback offered by the authors had assisted these students in a positive way.  Thus the feedback provided in the study did not change the way the students felt about themselves or their performance even though the students did achieve growth in their time management skills. 

I believe that it was perhaps a mistake to involve graduate level participants in the study as the majority.  If I were conducting a study on self efficacy I would want to include secondary and beginning post secondary students in my study.  The authors reported that the average age of survey participants was roughly 31 years old.  Students who have reached graduate school and have reached this age are typically very aware of their self image. If the study were to use younger participants who are perhaps more susceptible to feedback and criticism, I believe that the feedback would have been more influential on the student’s self image.