The concept of autonomy has received considerable attention in both –philosophy and psychology. From the perspective of philosophy, autonomy refers to self-governance of one’s actions. In psychological theory, the focus has been more on human beings striving to experience autonomy and self-determination. In this entry, we will examine the elusive concept of autonomy from different theoretical angels and focus in particular on how autonomy emerges through social interactions and how it develops over the course of the lifespan. We will pay special attention to the role autonomy plays in creativity and the exploration of the possible.
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Introduction: The notion of autonomy in Self-Determination Theory is at the core of intrinsically motivated learning, and fulfilment of the need for autonomy is essential for thriving at school. Therefore teacher-provided autonomy support has grown into a key concern in educational research. In the present study into primary school music education, the notion of creative autonomy support is introduced. Research into autonomy support is typically focused on verbal interaction. However, from an enactive perspective, teachers’ gesturing, bodily movement, facial expression, and musical action form an integral part of the socially situated interaction in music lessons, inherently involving autonomy support. In the present study, a distinction is made between creative verbal autonomy support and creative musical and non-verbal autonomy support.Methods: Applying a process-based time-serial methodology, rooted in a Complex Dynamic Systems and Enactive perspective, the effects of an intervention with Video Feedback Coaching for teachers were investigated. Video data of 105 music lessons of 18 teachers (intervention and control condition) from six primary schools was gathered, to examine teachers’ creative autonomy support at both the individual and group level.Results: The findings show that teachers in the intervention condition, compared to the control group, achieved a meaningful increase in their ability to offer creative autonomy support verbally. Teachers also showed development for the non-verbal and musical aspects of offering creative autonomy support. However, particularly for offering higher-level creative autonomy support in the non-verbal and musical mode, significant results were found for less than half of the intervention teachers.Discussion: These results underline the importance of embracing and studying the bodily dimension as an integral part of teacher autonomy support, aimed at emergence of students’ musical creativity, in primary school music education and in teacher training. We explain how these results might be relevant for autonomy enhancing musical activities in vulnerable groups.
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In primary music education a key question is what teachers can do to stimulate students’ musical creativity. For the answer, delving into teacher-student interaction during the creative processes in the naturalistic setting of primary music lessons is required. Twenty-six music lessons from thirteen teachers and their classes of seven Dutch schools were recorded to explore the relation between teachers’ autonomy support and students’ divergent and convergent thought & action. Quantitative sequential analysis and thematic analysis were combined to examine this relation, using a framework offered by Complex Dynamic Systems theory and Enaction theory. In contrast to classical correla-tional analysis, sequential analysis focuses on the dynamics, and thus on the temporal relation in classroom interaction. The results show that mostly lower-level autonomy support was offered. Es-pecially in creative lessons, higher-level autonomy support is more likely to lead to higher-level student divergent thought and action. For convergent thought and action, the results were less con-clusive. An implication of the findings is that (research into) music education could benefit from interventions aimed at enhancing autonomy support in primary school music.
