This dissertation presents two studies exploring the development of mastery motivation in the child's first six years of life. Study 1 examines potential sources of variation in children's levels of mastery motivation in the first three years. Study 2 focused on the role of mastery motivation in children's subsequent development, especially executive function skills in the first grade. Study 1 revealed that early maternal depressive symptoms affected child's later mastery motivation and related domains including self-regulation and general cognitive skills. However, direct negative effect of early maternal depressive symptoms on children's later mastery motivation was not significant when considering maternal parenting at 24 months. In particular, maternal sensitivity mediated the effects of early maternal depressive symptoms on child's later mastery motivation. The results of chapter 2 also showed that boys were more vulnerable to the effects of maternal depression. Boys whose mothers had more early depressive symptoms displayed poor general cognitive skills at 36 months. However, boys' mastery motivation and self-regulation were not predicted by early maternal depressive symptoms directly but that was mediated by maternal sensitivity. In chapter 3, mastery motivation played the unique role in the development of executive function skills. Children's mastery motivation at 54 months predicted the development of a set of executive function skills including short- and long-term memory abilities and problem-solving skills in the first grade. However, mastery motivation did not mediate the effects of children's early emotional regulation abilities and maternal sensitivity on later executive function skills. Instead, mastery motivation predicted three of the executive function skills, while emotion regulation predicted another one. This finding confirmed that mastery motivation and emotional regulation are separate constructs, each with a unique role in the development of executive function skills.This dissertation extends our current knowledge about children's mastery motivation. Mastery motivation is influenced by positive maternal behaviors rather than negative behaviors and there are no gender differences in the effects of early maternal depression on later mastery motivation. In addition, mastery motivation improves children's later executive function skills and plays a different role from emotion regulation ability in fostering of children's executive function skills. It implies that mastery motivation is a separate and unique construct. These two studies contribute to understanding more clearly the relations between mastery motivation and maternal behavior and the mechanism by which children's mastery motivation affects their cognitive outcomes.
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