Self-Regulation, Coregulation, and Socially Shared Regulation: Exploring Perspectives of Social in Self-Regulated Learning Theory

Background/Context Models of self-regulated learning (SRL) have increasingly acknowledged aspects of social context influence in its process; however, great diversity exists in the theoretical positioning of “social” in these models. Purpose/Objective/Research Question/Focus of Study The purpose of this review article is to introduce and contrast social aspects across three perspectives: self-regulated learning, coregulated learning, and socially shared regulation of learning. Research Design The kind of research design taken in this review paper is an analytic essay. The article contrasts self-regulated, coregulated, and socially shared regulation of learning in terms of theory, operational definition, and research approaches. Data Collection and Analysis Chapters and articles were collected through search engines (e.g., EBSCOhost, PsycINFO, PsycARTICLES, ERIC). Findings/Results Three different perspectives are summarized: self-regulation, coregulation, and socially shared regulation of learning. Conclusions/Recommendations In this article, we contrasted three different perspectives of social in each model, as well as research based on each model. In doing so, the article introduces a language for describing various bodies of work that strive to consider roles of individual and social context in the regulation of learning. We hope to provide a frame for considering multimethodological approaches to study SRL in future research.