Individual Differences in Interest and Narrative Writing

Abstract

Two hundred twenty-four undergraduate students wrote about one-half of an inning of a baseball game and about one-half of a soccer game, counterbalanced, for 20 min each. Students then completed two six-item interest inventories—one each on the topics of baseball and soccer—and tests of baseball knowledge and soccer knowledge. Hierarchical regression analyses revealed that individual interest in baseball was significantly related to the proportions of game actions and irrelevant-nongame actions, controlling for gender, discourse knowledge, and topic knowledge. Topic knowledge was significantly related to thematic maturity, controlling for gender and discourse knowledge. Students wrote more topic-relevant information on the baseball story—a relatively high-interest topic—than on the soccer story, a relatively low-interest topic. Implications for the Flower and Hayes (1981) writing model and for assigning students writing topics are discussed.