Council for Research in Music Education

An Exploratory Study of Musicians’ Self-Efficacy to Maintain Practice Schedules

Author(s): Joanne Rojas and D. Gregory Springer
Source: Bulletin of the Council for Research in Music Education , No. 199 (Winter 2014),
pp. 39-52
Published by: University of Illinois Press on behalf of the Council for Research in
Music Education

Stable URL: https://www.jstor.org/stable/10.5406/bulcouresmusedu.199.0039

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 Bulletin of the Council for Research in Music Education © 2014 Board of Trustees
Winter 2014 No.  199 University of Illinois

An Exploratory Study
of Musicians’ Self-Efficacy
to Maintain Practice Schedules
Joanne P. Rojas
University of Kentucky
Lexington, KY
D. Gregory Springer
Boise State University
Boise, ID

A bstract
The purpose of this exploratory study was to investigate musicians’ self-efficacy to maintain practice
schedules in the face of adverse situations and conditions. Respondents (N = 159) were gradu-
ate student musicians, sampled from a national music organization in the United States. They
completed the Self-Efficacy to Maintain Practice Schedules Scale (SEMPSS), a survey instru-
ment designed by the researchers. The scale demonstrated high internal consistency (α = .93) and
was found to measure a single latent construct through factor analysis. Among different types of
adversity, respondents reported that internal situations provided more challenge to maintaining a
practice schedule than environmental or social situations. Music-performance majors reported sig-
nificantly higher levels of self-efficacy to maintain practice schedules than nonperformance majors,
but no significant differences were found between instrumentalists and vocalists in the sample.
Hierarchical regression analysis demonstrated that age, number of days practiced per week, and
hours of practice per week significantly predicted musicians’ self-efficacy to maintain a practice
schedule in adverse situations.

Many musicians and their teachers have pointed to practice as the cornerstone of musi-
cal accomplishment. Seminal psychological research supports the essential role of prac-
tice, indicating that expertise in any domain occurs only after 10 years of careful practice
(Ericsson & Charness, 1994; Ericsson, Krampe, & Tesch-Römer, 1993). This concept
was popularized by Gladwell (2008) as the “10,000 hour rule.” However, it is not only
the hours of accumulated experience that matter. It is also the quality of the hours and
the intensity of the focus, as deliberate and consistent practice has been demonstrated
to be influential in achieving domain expertise (Ericsson et al., 1993).
The question remains, however, how does one maintain the discipline to practice?
Within a theoretical framework of social cognitive theory, the ability to maintain a
practice schedule is a form of self-regulation, or the control of one’s own behavior.

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 Bulletin of the Council for Research in Music Education Winter 2014 No.  199

According to Bandura (2001), people are not solely products of their environments;
instead, they are agents who are capable of shaping and selecting their environments to
accomplish personal goals. Self-efficacy for self-regulation (confidence in one’s ability to
be able to control one’s own behavior) is a strong predictor of whether a person will be
able to manage the complex interactions required to create the necessary environment
for future success (Bandura, 1991). According to Bandura (1991), self-regulation is an
ongoing process of self-influence consisting of three main subfunctions: self-monitor-
ing, self-judgment, and self-reaction. These interacting systems mediate the influence of
the environment and chart the path for future actions. Individuals who want to acquire
a skill need more than just desire; they must also have the self-regulatory skills to moti-
vate themselves to accomplish their goals.
Self-regulation is a skill that can be developed (Bandura, 1991). Although novices
may need external motivators to practice, such as a parent’s urging or a teacher’s praise,
as the cycle of self-regulatory processes develops, the individual becomes more internally
guided than externally. Self-belief, self-discipline, and perseverance are the heart of self-
regulation, which Zimmerman and Kitsantas (2005) refer to as the “hidden dimension
of personal competence” (p. 509). When circumstances are unfavorable or when there
are distractions, self-regulatory processes take over and the individual perseveres. In
addition, environments that are supportive of competence and autonomy promote the
development of self-regulation (Ryan & Deci, 2000). The music practice room, when
it is a place of regular and deliberate practice, can be one such environment.
In the context of music, practicing is “individually oriented self-study directed,
no matter how strictly, toward attaining musical proficiency on an instrument or the
voice” (Miksza, 2011, p. 52). Several studies have examined musical practice behaviors
as a function of cognitive factors, such as self-regulated learning strategies (McPherson
& Renwick, 2001; Nielsen, 2001) and self-efficacy (McCormick & McPherson, 2003;
McPherson & McCormick, 2006).
Self-regulated learning occurs when individuals actively engage in cognitions,
affect, and behaviors that enable them to attain personal learning goals (Zimmerman
& Schunk, 2011). In a music practice setting, some examples of self-regulated learn-
ing include musicians’ purposeful selection of a practice method or task to accomplish
an intended goal, their modification of the practice environment as a method of tak-
ing control of learning, and their management of time use during practice sessions
(McPherson & Zimmerman, 2002). Young musicians and beginners typically demon-
strate few self-regulated behaviors in their practice sessions (Hallam, 1997a; McPherson
& Renwick, 2001; Miksza, Prichard, & Sorbo, 2012; Rohwer & Polk, 2006), while
expert musicians tend to use sound self-regulation strategies (Hallam, 2001; Nielsen,
1997, 1999). Analysis of written narratives has shown that intermediate instrumental
musicians between the ages of eleven and twelve vary in their use of self-regulated prac-
tice behaviors (Austin & Berg, 2006). Self-regulation has been found to predict amount
of practice time (McPherson & McCormick, 1999), improvement in sophisticated skills

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 Rojas,Springer Self-Efficacy to Maintain Practice Schedules

such as improvisation and playing by ear (McPherson, 1997), and future performance
achievement (McPherson & McCormick, 2000). These findings intimate the vital role
that self-regulation plays in the development of musical expertise.
Musicians of all levels face situations that threaten the maintenance of their practice
schedules. Adhering to a regular practice schedule, like maintaining an exercise routine
or dietary regimen, requires perseverance in spite of challenging situations and circum-
stances. In these cases, it is the individual’s self-efficacy to self-regulate that is critical.
Bandura (2006) elaborates:
Many areas of functioning are primarily concerned with self-regulatory efficacy to
guide and motivate oneself to get things done that one knows how to do. In such
instances, self-regulation is the capability of interest. The issue is not whether one
can do the activities occasionally, but whether one has the efficacy to get oneself to
do them regularly in the face of different types of dissuading conditions. (p. 311,
emphasis added)
The purpose of this exploratory study was to examine graduate student musicians’
self-efficacy to maintain practice schedules in the face of adverse situations and condi-
tions. For this study, adversity was defined as any situation that could make it difficult
to practice, and it was delimited to three types of challenges—internal situations,
environmental situations, and social situations. The study was guided by the following
research questions: (a) What types of adversity (internal, environmental, or social situ-
ations) do college musicians report to be the most difficult in maintaining a practice
schedule? (b) What types of adversity (internal, environmental, or social situations) do
college musicians report to be the least difficult in maintaining a practice schedule? (c)
Are there differences between music-performance majors and nonperformance majors
in terms of their self-efficacy to maintain practice schedules? (d) Are there differences
between instrumentalists and vocalists in terms of their self-efficacy to maintain practice
schedules? (e) What factors are predictive of self-efficacy to maintain practice schedules
while controlling for targeted demographic factors?

M ethod
Instrumentation
For the purposes of this study, we designed an instrument called the Self-Efficacy to
Maintain Practice Schedules Scale (SEMPSS), which was informed by a review of prior
research (e.g., Barry & Hallam, 2002; Hallam, 1997b; Jørgensen, 2004; McPherson &
Zimmerman, 2002) and by a guide for constructing self-efficacy scales (Bandura, 2006).
Professors and graduate students from two universities who had expertise in music per-
formance, music education, and research methodology reviewed a draft of the SEMPSS.
Comments from these individuals were used to revise the survey.
The final version of the SEMPSS contained three sections and was constructed
with SurveyMonkey to be distributed to respondents by email. The first section of the

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 Bulletin of the Council for Research in Music Education Winter 2014 No.  199

survey collected demographic information and data describing respondents’ musical

background (primary major, primary instrument or voice type, secondary instrument
experience, and number of years of private lessons) and practice schedule (average num-
ber of days per week practiced and average number of hours per week practiced).
The second section of the SEMPSS was a 22-item scale that measured respondents’
self-efficacy to maintain practice schedules, and these items are displayed in Table 1. In
this section, the following instructions were given: “A number of situations are described
below that can make it hard to stick to a regular practice schedule. How certain are
you that you can get yourself to practice your major instrument or voice in each of
these situations?” Eighteen adverse situations followed, which represented three types
of challenges to the individual—internal situations (e.g., “when I am feeling sick”),

Table 1
Means and Standard Deviations of Adverse and Favorable Practice Situations
M (SD) 95% CI
Adverse internal situations
1. When I am feeling tired or fatigued. 3.21 (1.53) [2.97, 3.45]
2. When I have too much schoolwork. 3.25 (1.63) [2.99, 3.50]
3. After recovering from an illness or injury that 3.73 (1.64) [3.47, 3.99]
   caused me to stop practicing.
4. When I am feeling angry. 3.87 (1.59) [3.63, 4.12]
5. When I am feeling sick. 2.82 (1.43) [2.59, 3.04]
6. When I am hungry. 3.53 (1.54) [3.29, 3.78]
Adverse environmental situations
7. During bad weather. 4.96 (1.18) [4.78, 5.15]
8. During a vacation. 3.48 (1.73) [3.21, 3.75]
9. During school holidays. 4.62 (1.50) [4.38, 4.86]
10. When I can’t find a quiet place. 3.72 (1.51) [3.48, 3.95]
11. When I can’t find a private space. 3.26 (1.62) [3.01, 3.52]
Adverse social situations
12. After an argument with a close friend. 3.73 (1.55) [3.49, 3.98]
13. When people can hear me. 4.32 (1.45) [4.10, 4.55]
14. When too many people are around. 3.58 (1.62) [3.33, 3.84]
15. When no one else is practicing. 5.20 (1.22) [5.00, 5.39]
16. When out-of-town guests are visiting. 3.14 (1.55) [2.90, 3.38]
17. When my friends want to do something else. 4.10 (1.46) [3.87, 4.33]
18. When others expect me to be perfect. 4.68 (1.38) [4.47, 4.90]
Favorable situations
19. When I am happy. 5.34 (1.04) [5.17, 5.50]
20. When I find the perfect place to practice. 5.44 (1.07) [5.27, 5.61]
21. When my friends want to practice at the same time. 4.87 (1.38) [4.65, 5.09]
22. When I am energized. 5.45 (.95) [5.30, 5.60]
Note: The rating scale was anchored by 1 (“totally uncertain”) and 6 (“totally certain”). Confidence
intervals are reported in accordance with best practice recommendations for statistical reporting
(American Psychological Association, 2010, p. 34)

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 Rojas,Springer Self-Efficacy to Maintain Practice Schedules

environmental situations (e.g., “when I can’t find a private space”), and social situations
(e.g., “when my friends want to do something else”). Using a 6-point Likert-type scale
anchored by 1 (“totally uncertain”) and 6 (“totally certain”), respondents responded
how certain they were that they could practice throughout each of these situations. As
advised by Bandura (2006), the adverse situations comprising this self-efficacy scale
were intentionally chosen to represent varied levels of challenge.
As an additional validity measure, four favorable situations were included in the
scale as well (e.g., “when I feel energized” or “when I find the perfect place to practice”).
Each respondent viewed the adverse and favorable items in a unique random order
assigned by SurveyMonkey. The final section of the SEMPSS included one open-ended
item (“Please list any other challenges to maintaining a practice schedule that we have
not already asked”).

Respondents and Procedure

For this preliminary investigation, we selected graduate student musicians as the target
population for several reasons. First, because they were enrolled in graduate music pro-
grams, they were relatively homogeneous in terms of academic status. Second, they rep-
resented an experienced sample of musicians who would have likely accumulated more
years of performing experience than other populations of formally trained musicians.
Finally, given the varied performance requirements among different graduate degrees
in music (e.g., performance majors versus nonperformance majors), some amount of
variability in self-efficacy was expected. For these reasons, graduate student musicians
were deemed an ideal population for this exploratory study and for the preliminary
administration of the SEMPSS.
Respondents (N = 159) were sampled from the student membership of the College
Music Society. Because membership in this national organization represents a variety
of music specialties (e.g., music performance, music theory, music education, music
technology, ethnomusicology), the membership of this organization provided an appro-
priately diverse sample of graduate students for the purposes of this study. All 1,536
student members of the College Music Society received an invitation to complete an
online survey, most of whom were graduate students. Two reminder emails were sent
after two-week intervals in an effort to solicit further participation. We received 201
responses, which is a 13.09% response rate. Only those graduate students who pro-
vided complete data on the self-efficacy scale were included in the sample, resulting
in a final sample of 159. The mean age of the sample was 32.94 years (SD = 8.39),
and there were slightly more females (52.2%) than males (47.8%). The respondents
were predominantly European American (83%), followed by Asian American (6.9%),
Hispanic/Latino (5%), African American (2.5%), and less than 3% from other races.
The sample was drawn from 40 different US states with representation in the following
geographic regions (US Census Bureau, n.d.): South (49.4%), West (19.6%), Midwest

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 Bulletin of the Council for Research in Music Education Winter 2014 No.  199

(19.0%), and Northeast (12.0%). Doctoral students comprised the majority of the
sample (81.8%), and the remaining were students pursuing master’s degrees.

R esults
First, we examined the psychometric properties of the SEMPSS using classical test
theory. Because we sought to create a unidimensional instrument, our analyses focused
on measures of internal consistency and unidimensionality. Analysis of internal consis-
tency resulted in a robust Cronbach’s alpha for the scale (α = .93), with Pearson product
moment correlations among all items significant at p ≤ .01. We then examined whether
the scale was suitable for a factor analysis. The sample size (N = 159) exceeds the mini-
mum sample size (N > 100) suggested by Hair, Anderson, Tatham, & Black (1998).
Bartlett’s Test of Sphericity was significant (p < .001), indicating that the correlation of
all survey items formed an identity matrix (Bartlett, 1950). The Kaiser-Meyer-Olkin
(KMO) value of .92 indicated an adequate sampling distribution because this ratio
of the observed correlation and partial correlation coefficients was close to 1 (Kaiser,
1970, 1974). Having met these assumptions of suitability for factor analysis, we ran an
unrotated common factor analysis on the scale. We interpreted a one-factor extraction
following a visual examination of the scree plot and an inspection of the eigenvalues.
Although there were three eigenvalues greater than one (8.24, 1.46, 1.20), we chose
a one-factor extraction because the value of the first eigenvalue was more than three
times the value of the second eigenvalue (as recommended by Gorsuch, 1983). These
results provided evidence for the unidimensionality of the scale, suggesting the scale
adequately measures the presence of the latent construct of self-efficacy to maintain a
practice schedule.
The first two research questions were concerned with the types of adverse situa-
tions that respondents rated as most difficult and least difficult in maintaining a regular
practice schedule, respectively. Category mean responses were calculated by adding
all responses in each category (internal adversity, environmental adversity, and social
diversity) and dividing by the number of responses in that category. Category mean
responses were lowest for situations that provided internal adversity (M = 3.40, SD =
1.18), followed by situations that provided environmental adversity (M = 4.01, SD =
1.10), and situations that provided social adversity (M = 4.10, SD = 1.02). Means and
standard deviations for each of the adverse and favorable situations are summarized in
Table 1.
To examine mean differences in responses among the three types of adversity, we
conducted a repeated-measures analysis of variance (ANOVA). Mauchly’s test indicated
that the assumption of sphericity was not tenable, W = .90, χ2(2) = 15.81, p < .001.
Because the ε value of .92 exceeded the threshold of .75 (Barcikowski & Robey, 1984;
Huynh & Feldt, 1976), we applied a Huynh-Feldt correction to the degrees of freedom
for the within-subjects effect. Results of the omnibus ANOVA indicated that respon-

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 Rojas,Springer Self-Efficacy to Maintain Practice Schedules

dents’ mean responses differed significantly among these three types of adversity, F(1.85,
291.57) = 80.77, p < .001, partial η2 = .34. Follow-up pairwise comparisons (with a
Bonferroni correction) revealed that respondents rated internal situations significantly
lower than environmental and social situations (p < .001). No significant differences
were observed in respondents’ ratings of environmental and social situations (p = .21).
The third and fourth research questions were concerned with the differences in
self-efficacy to maintain practice schedule scores between performance and nonper-
formance majors and between instrumentalists and vocalists, respectively. These scores
were calculated as the mean of respondents’ responses to the 18 adverse situations
with higher scores representing higher self-efficacy. Independent t-tests were used to
compare group means. Because these groups were not balanced in size, the t-tests were
conducted without the assumption of equal variances. Significant mean differences
were found between the self-efficacy scores of performance majors (n = 98, M = 4.15,
SD = .84) and non-performance majors (n = 55, M = 3.34, SD = 1.14) with a large
effect size (Cohen, 1988), t(83.58) = 4.54, p < .001, d = .83. For this analysis, perfor-
mance majors included respondents who majored in instrumental performance, vocal
performance, or conducting. Nonperformance majors included respondents from all
other majors (e.g., music education, music theory, musicology, ethnomusicology). No
significant differences were found between the scores of instrumentalists’ (n = 134, M
= 3.91, SD = 1.05) and vocalists’ (n = 23, M = 3.60, SD = .86) self-efficacy to main-
tain a practice schedule (p = .18).
To address the fifth research question, we conducted a two-stage hierarchical regres-
sion analysis to examine significant predictors of self-efficacy to maintain a practice
schedule while statistically controlling for selected demographic variables. The hierar-
chical design of each block was guided by theory in that demographic variables expected
to predict self-efficacy to maintain practice schedules were included in the first block
as covariates. The primary variables of interest (i.e., those related to musicians’ practice
schedules) were included in the second block. Correlations among these variables are
displayed in Table 2. As shown in the table, the three variables that correlated most
strongly with the self-efficacy to maintain practice schedules criterion variable were
major, days per week of practice, and hours per week of practice; these correlations were
significant at the p < .001 level. The results of the hierarchical regression analysis are
presented in Table 3.
The following predictors were entered into Model 1 as control variables: (1) age,
(2) gender (3) performance area (instrumental or vocal), and (4) major (performance
or nonperformance). This model accounted for 22% of the variance in self-efficacy to
maintain a practice schedule and functioned as a statistically significant covariate, F(4,
144) = 10.31, p < .001, R2 = .22, Adjusted R2 = .20. As expected, all demographic pre-
dictors significantly predicted self-efficacy scores. As shown by the beta coefficients in
Table 3, older musicians, instrumentalists, performance majors, and men were predicted
to report higher self-efficacy to maintain practice schedule scores in this model.

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 Table 2
Zero-Order Correlations among Variables
1 2 3 4 5 6 7
1. Age —
2. Gender 0.05 —
3. Performance area 0.20* –0.01 —
4. Major –0.12 –0.05 0.08 —
5. Days/week practice –0.01 –0.17* –0.10 0.58*** —
6. Hours/week practice –0.11 0.04 –0.20* 0.47*** 0.71*** —
7. Self-efficacy practice 0.11 –.17* –.11 0.38*** 0.63*** 0.52*** —
M 32.94 — — — 4.63 11.83 3.86
SD 8.39 — — — 2.18 9.79 1.02
Note: Correlations expressed as a Pearson product-moment correlation coefficient. Means and standard
deviations provided for continuous variables only. Age = age in years; Gender (male [coded as 0] or
female [coded as 1]); Performance area (instrumental [0] or vocal [1]); Major (music-nonperformance
major [0] or music-performance major [1]); Days/week practice = average number of days of reported
practice per week; Hours/week practice = average number of hours of reported practice per week;
Self-efficacy practice = mean score on the 18 adverse items of the SEMPSS
*p < .05 ***p < .001

Table 3
Hierarchical Regression Predicting Self-Efficacy to Maintain Practice Schedules
Block R2 ∆R2 Model b 95% CI ϐ r rst
1 .22 .22*** Constant 2.74 [2.06, 3.42]
Age** 0.03 [0.01, 0.04] 0.20
Gender* –.32 [–.62, –.02] –.16
Performance area* –.52 [–.95, –.09] –.18
Major*** .87 [.56, 1.18] .41
2 .44 .22*** Constant 2.09 [1.48, 2.70]
Age* 0.02 [.00, .04] 0.16 .11 .16
Gender –.21 [–.47, .05] –.10 –.17 –.25
Performance area –.18 [–.56, .20] –.06 –.11 –.16
Major .11 [–.23, .44] .05 .38 .57
Days/week practice*** .21 [.12, .31] .45 .63 .95
Hours/week practice* .02 [.00, .04] .19 .52 .78
Note: N = 159. Structure coefficients (rst) were calculated as the bivariate correlation between the predictor and
the criterion divided by the multiple correlation coefficient (Courville & Thompson, 2001). Age = age in years;
Gender (male [coded as 0] or female [coded as 1]); Performance area (instrumental [0] or vocal [1]); Major
(music non-performance major [0] or music performance major [1]); Days/week practice = average number of
days of reported practice per week; Hours/week practice = average number of hours of reported practice per
week.
*p < .05 **p < .01 ***p < .001

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 Rojas,Springer Self-Efficacy to Maintain Practice Schedules

In Model 2 the following variables of interest were added: (5) days per week of
practice, and (6) hours per week of practice. This model significantly increased in predic-
tive power (p < .001), accounting for 44% of the variance in scores of self-efficacy, F(6,
142) = 18.75, p < .001, R2 = .44, Adjusted R2 = .42. The only variable from Model 1 that
remained significant was age (ϐ = .16, p < .05). Among the new variables in the second
model, both days per week of practice (ϐ = .45, p < .001) and hours per week of practice
(ϐ = .19, p < .05) were significant predictors of self-efficacy scores. An examination of the
beta coefficients indicated that musicians who reported more days and hours per week
of practice were more likely to report higher scores of self-efficacy to maintain practice
schedules. Due to the relative problems of using beta weights as the sole index of vari-
ables’ predictive contributions to a model (Courville & Thompson, 2001; Thompson &
Borrello, 1985), we also examined structure coefficients for each of the predictors in the
model, and these coefficients are provided in Table 3. Based on the structure coefficients,
the days per week of practice variable provided the most substantial contribution as a
predictor in this model (rst = .95), followed by hours per week of practice (rst = .78), and
this finding is supported by the beta coefficients associated with these predictors.
Seventy-one students responded to the open-ended item (“Please list any other
challenges to maintaining a practice schedule that we have not already asked”), and
these responses were coded by theme into categories with the following proportions:
36.62% were challenges due to time demands of busy schedules, 23.94% were chal-
lenges due to personal motivation, 15.49% were challenges due to family or significant
relationship obligations, 11.27% were challenges due to issues with practice space or
available resources, 8.45% were challenges due to personal health, and 4.23% were
responses that were unrelated to the question (e.g., “I really liked this survey”). All
responses were also coded by a trained reliability observer, who was an assistant profes-
sor of music education at another university with a research background, applied music
teaching experience, and experience teaching graduate music courses. Interrater reli-
ability, calculated as the number of agreements divided by the sum of agreements and
disagreements, was .92.

D iscussion
Practice builds musical expertise (Sloboda, Davidson, Howe, & Moore, 1996), and
instrumentalists and vocalists who are committed to performance achievement at the
expert level must maintain their practice schedules consistently over many years, even
when conditions are unfavorable. As expected, adverse situations produced lower mean
scores in self-efficacy to maintain a practice schedule than favorable situations in the
present study. Among this sample, internal situations were the biggest challenge to
self-regulation. The daily discipline of musical practice is largely a solo enterprise, and
the personal situations such as feeling sick, tired, hungry, and having too much school-
work to do had the strongest negative effect on the maintenance of practice schedules.

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 Bulletin of the Council for Research in Music Education Winter 2014 No.  199

Environmental situations such as not finding a private space to practice or bad weather
were less likely than personal situations to bring down scores on self-efficacy, and social
situations, such as friends wanting to do something else or others’ expectations of
perfection, were the easiest challenges to overcome. Among this experienced sample of
graduate students, a certain accomplishment in self-regulation would be expected based
on results of prior research (Hallam, 1997a). Their relative ease at overcoming external
challenges may be a result of this experience, while the salience of personal situations
remains a strong challenge even for those with years of practice.
Responses to the open-ended item provided additional challenges to the maintenance
of practice schedules. The most prevalent type of challenge that respondents described was
time demands due to busy schedules. One respondent noted, “When I am extremely busy,
there is just no time to practice regularly.” Another type of challenge that was commonly
cited by respondents dealt with personal motivation, including a lack of clear goals, want-
ing to do something else, or simply not wanting to practice. Among the challenges due to
personal motivation, the presence or absence of an impending performance was described
as a deterrent to the maintenance of practice schedules. In fact, one respondent claimed,
“it is all dependent on what I have coming up. Obviously, if I have a big performance
coming up, it doesn’t much matter the situation or how I feel—I will practice. If I don’t,
then I tend to be more flexible or succumb to outside challenges.” Other types of chal-
lenges included family or significant relationship obligations (e.g., caring for children or
other family members), challenges due to issues with practice space and available resources
(e.g., poor practice room temperature, lack of available instrument such as piano or organ,
and lack of available music stand), and challenges to personal health (e.g., physical or
mental health issues, sleep deprivation).
Differences were explored between performance and nonperformance majors and
between instrumentalists and vocalists. Performance majors reported that they felt
significantly better able to maintain their practice schedules in adverse situations than
nonperformance majors. This result is not surprising since the expectations for hours
of practice among performance majors are often higher. In addition, those who achieve
sufficient expertise to choose a major in performance would likely have many more
hours of practice accrued over their lifetimes, which would result in higher levels of
expertise (Ericsson & Charness, 1994; Ericsson et al., 1993). There was no significant
difference between instrumentalists and vocalists in terms of self-efficacy to maintain
a practice schedule, which likely indicates a similar commitment to practice between
individuals in each performance area.
Finally, three significant predictors of self-efficacy to maintain a practice schedule
were identified: days per week of practice, hours per week of practice, and age. Increases
in each of these predictors were associated with higher self-efficacy to maintain practice
schedule scores. Both the days and hours of reported practice per week were statistically
significant predictors, even while controlling for gender, performance area, and major.
This finding presents additional evidence for the validity of the scale, since self-efficacy

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 Rojas,Springer Self-Efficacy to Maintain Practice Schedules

to maintain a practice schedule would be expected to positively and significantly corre-

late with the number of days and hours practiced per week. In addition, it demonstrates
that those who report high self-efficacy to overcome challenges to maintain a practice
schedule are more likely to accomplish more frequent practice sessions. This finding
echoes prior self-regulation research (McPherson & McCormick, 1999) and suggests
a potential reciprocal relationship between frequency of practicing and self-efficacy to
maintain a practice schedule. Additionally, as explained in prior research (Ericsson &
Charness, 1994; Ericsson et al., 1993), those musicians who accomplish more frequent
practice sessions are more likely to achieve expertise.
Some limitations of this study should be considered that affect the generaliz-
ability of its findings. First, because the response rate from the Internet survey was
low, the applicability of these findings toward nonrespondents is unknown. In spite
of this response rate, however, the sample was considered adequate for the purposes
of this exploratory study due to the preliminary nature of the study and due to the
sample’s geographic distribution across one country, including respondents from 40
states distributed among the major divisions of the United States. Second, because the
sample was delimited to an experienced sample of graduate students, these results may
not directly apply to other populations of musicians, such as beginner or intermediate
musicians (as suggested by Hallam, 1997a; Miksza et al., 2012). Although the use of a
sample of graduate student musicians may limit the generalizability of the findings, the
sample represented a stable population of formally trained musicians for this prelimi-
nary field test of the SEMPSS.
Future investigations should consider these limitations and examine samples with
different demographic characteristics, such as level of performing experience (e.g.,
beginner, intermediate, or advanced musicians). Also, because age was found to be a
significant predictor in this study, future studies are needed examining musicians of
various age groups. Longitudinal studies of the development of musicians’ self-efficacy
to maintain practice schedules over extended periods would prove to be especially
beneficial to music educators. Other interesting avenues for future research could com-
pare self-efficacy to maintain practice schedules of expert musicians with experts in
other practice-dependent fields (e.g., professional athletes). Also, while the preliminary
evidence suggests that the SEMPSS is psychometrically sound, further validation and
refinement of the scale is needed using advanced psychometric and latent trait models.
Results of this study have implications for college-level musicians and their instruc-
tors. The positive relationship between the amount of practice and music performance
achievement, evidenced both anecdotally and through published research (e.g., Sloboda
et al., 1996), highlights the critical role of practice in developing musical expertise.
While self-regulation has been acknowledged as a beneficial cognitive skill during prac-
tice sessions (e.g., McPherson & McCormick, 1999; McPherson & Renwick, 2001;
Nielsen, 2001), respondents reported that maintaining practice schedules is challenging
in certain situations.

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 Bulletin of the Council for Research in Music Education Winter 2014 No.  199

Although the focus of this study was on one facet of self-regulation only (i.e., self-
efficacy to maintain a practice schedule in adverse situations), these findings provide
a tentative perspective of how self-regulation works with experienced musicians in a
broader sense. The number of days of practice per week served as the most robust pre-
dictor of self-efficacy in the present study, suggesting that the discipline of day-to-day
practice schedule maintenance provides the internal, propelling force needed to perse-
vere in the face of challenging situations and conditions. Ultimately, over the course
of many years, this commitment to maintaining a consistent practice schedule and the
effort to overcome these challenges would result in many more accumulated hours of
practice. Not surprisingly, the number of hours practiced per week was also a significant
predictor of self-efficacy in this study, which is consistent with the results and conclu-
sions of prior psychological research (e.g., Ericsson & Charness, 1994; Ericsson et al.,
1993). The ability to persist through practice sessions, even in the face of adversity, is
one that all musicians committed to excellence should strive to attain.

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