Charting the field of Agentic Engagement: a scoping review of the literature

Background
Agentic engagement is a practice describing students’ constructive and influencing contributions toward optimizing their learning processes (Reeve & Tseng, 2011). Agentic engagement relies on students' active learning and their interaction with their teachers, study materials and/or their peers. Although agentic engagement seems a core component of health professions education (HPE), this construct has mainly been studied in a secondary school context, and thus is still fragmented. The aim of this review was to identify and map the literature on how agentic engagement is conceptualized across different educational levels.

Summary of work
We conducted a scoping review using database searches in Academic Search Premier, APA PsycINFO, CINAHL, ERIC, Psychology and Behavioral Sciences Collection, Scopus, Web of Science, PubMed and Google Scholar for articles published until August 2023. We hand-searched gray literature using Google’s search engine and supplemented the search by reviewing reference lists of included studies to identify additional useful publications. Using specific selection criteria, two researchers independently screened titles and abstracts and, subsequently, full texts for eligibility. The focus on studies’ agentic engagement description, or agentic engagement operationalization (including measure development papers) was mapped and analyzed across the studies included.

Summary of results
Of the initial 359 hits, 17 additional articles were identified through searching the listed references. After removing duplicates and screening abstracts, we reviewed 154 full-text articles, of which 33 were selected for the review. 84% of them were published within the past 8 years. Papers measuring agentic engagement often lacked integration of agentic engagement theory. Quantitative studies represented 75% of the studies, with a higher frequency of cross-sectional designs and the use of self-reports.

In primary and secondary education studies, we observed that agentic engagement was investigated in relation to three subconstructs: mastery of school-related learning outcomes, academic competence and autonomous learning. At a tertiary educational level, students' agentic engagement was mainly related to pursuing personal skill development, professional identity, developing resilience, cultivating socialization techniques and creating a more desirable learning environment for the classroom community.

Discussion (and conclusion)
Literature suggests that outcome measures related to agentic engagement change as students progress in schooling, something that can be modified by the context of education and practice.