Students’ Academic Motivations in Allied Health Classes

Abstract

Purpose: Human Anatomy & Physiology [HAP] courses are considered “difficult” by both faculty and students, and many students fail to pass the courses. An attempt was made to understand how students’ academic motivations may contribute to their success or failure in these courses. Method: The project used a non-experimental design with a convenience sample. Students in five sections of HAP I and HAP II were invited to complete an anonymous 42-item questionnaire that included an adapted version of the Academic Motivation Scale [AMS], six demographic questions, and eight questions about their academic behaviors in and perceptions of their HAP course. A total of 461 students (69% response rate) completed the questionnaire. Analyses included 1) reliability for the seven AMS subscales, 2) correlations among the subscales, among the eight questions about their behaviors and perceptions, and between the subscales and the behavior and perception questions, and 3) a multivariate multiple regression with the AMS subscales as independent variables and the behavior and perception questions as dependent variables. Results: The AMS was successfully adapted to apply to HAP courses with reliabilities comparable to previously published data. Students’ levels of intrinsic motivation and amotivation, but not extrinsic motivation, were significantly related to their academic behaviors and perceptions of the courses. Conclusions and Recommendations: Despite high levels of extrinsic motivation, extrinsic motivation did not appear related to students’ academic behaviors. HAP instructors may need to consider alternate routes to influencing students’ academic success behaviors, as it appears that attempts to influence their extrinsic motivations may not essentially translate to changes in academic behavior.

Predictors and Components in the Academic Motivation of Nursing Students during the Covid-19 Pandemic in Jordan

“…Aside from these findings, Khalaila [14] studied the academic motivation of undergraduate nursing students and reported students perceiving themselves as academically competent with higher GPAs. The literature has reported a positive correlation between academic motivation and academic success, as reflected by the GPA [13,[15][16]. However, no similar finding was found in the present study.…”

“…It also examined the relationships between student characteristics and academic motivation, including sex, academic year, and GPA, which pointed out predictors as shown in the results. The results revealed that academic motivation among students in Jordanian universities is below reported levels in many international literature [5,13]. These results include the AMS and its seven subscales, constituting three domains (i.e., intrinsic, extrinsic motivation, and motivation).…”

“…Understanding that students may be extrinsically motivated, educators must focus on students' need for support and consider redesigning courses provided during the first year to strengthen their learning and motivation. In another study, Maurer et al [13] explored the intrinsic and extrinsic motivations of undergraduate students enrolled in three different courses (human anatomy and physiology, physics, and nutrition). They showed that sophomore students achieved higher mean scores on the external motivation subscales, while more advanced students achieved higher mean scores on the internal motivation subscales.…”

Academic major satisfaction and regret of students in different majors: Perspectives from Self‐Determination Theory

“…Behaviors motivated by external regulation occur because of an external acting influence, such as satisfying an external demand or obtaining an externally imposed reward contingency. SDT has been used to understand the correlation between academic motivation and other variables such as curiosity, academic persistence, learning attitude, and academic performance in the education field (Maurer et al, 2013; Vasconcellos et al, 2020). Systematic review and meta‐analysis research (e.g., Locke & Schattke, 2019; Richardson et al, 2012) highlighted the significant influences of intrinsic motivation and extrinsic motivation on academic performance.…”

Developing a gamified system and a questionnaire for the future study of students’ motivation through gamification for learning Spanish as a foreign language in the university context

“…As Silva et al show (2018), since 1989, the year in which the AMS was developed, it has been applied with all kinds of audiences, including university students (Núñez Alonso et al, 2005;Guay et al, 2015) in courses in different areas, such as psychology (Cokley et al, 2001;Ramos, 2013), business (Smith et al, 2010), dentistry (Orsini, Evans, Binnie, Ledezma & Fuentes, 2016), physical education (Spittle et al, 2009), mathematics, physics and nutrition (Sturges, Maurer, Allen, Gatch & Shankar, 2016;Maurer et al, 2012;Lim & Chapman, 2015), among others. From all these evidences, it might be assumed that this scale is adaptable to any field of knowledge (Silva et al, 2018).…”