Revisiting control-value theory: A network analysis of parental aspirations, students' control-value appraisals, and their homework emotions

Emotions experienced in academic settings play a crucial role in students’ motivation, learning, and overall well-being. Among these, achievement emotions (such as boredom, anxiety, and enjoyment) are particularly relevant as they directly relate to students’ engagement with learning tasks and academic outcomes. Achievement emotions have largely been assessed in the context of the classroom. However, there are less studies focusing on homework emotions. In this work, we are interested in how subjective control and value are related to achievement emotions during homework. We are further interested in assessing how parental aspirations may intervene during the emergence of homework emotions. Using a theory-informed exploratory approach, we aim to uncover the links between emotions, appraisals and parental aspirations and provide new insights for homework achievement emotions literature. 392 students from 7th and 8th grade completed self-reported questionnaires focusing on homework achievement emotions, subjective control, subjective value and parental aspirations. To capture the complexity of these interactions, we perform network analysis, an analytical approach that models the structure of interrelated psychological constructs rather than assuming unidirectional causal chains. Results from the network analysis emphasize that enjoyment and boredom are close to each other despite being negatively related, that control is close and negatively related to anxiety, and that parental aspirations are positively related to anxiety and boredom but not to enjoyment. We discuss the relevance of including parental aspirations to better understand the emergence of achievement homework emotions.