Predicting Intrinsic Motivation

Intrinsic motivation can be predicted from participants’ perceptions of the social environment and the task environment (Ryan & Deci, 2000)in terms of control, relatedness and competence. To determine the degree of independence of these factors 251 students in higher vocational education (physiotherapy and hotel management) indicated the extent to which they perceived control, relatedness, and competence in different types of education, their motivation to learn, and their study behaviors. Principal component analysis showed that the perceptions of control, relatedness and competence are so strongly related that when students rate one of the constructs negatively, such as their perception of the task control, they will also rate the others (relatedness and perception of competence) more negatively. These results were confirmed by analyses of two additional data sets. Consequences for measurement issues and motivational science are discussed. Predicting Intrinsic Motivation In the past two decades there has been a strongly renewed interest in the study of motivation in relation to learning. Simon (1995), for example, noted that it “is imperative for progress in instructional methods that we deal simultaneously with cognition and motivation in our research... We already have too much medicine that is (cognitively) good for the patient – who will not take it and medicine that patients find delicious – but that contributes little to their cognitive abilities”(p. 508). Pintrich (2003) described this as a motivation science coming into being. This interest has much to do with a new view on education. Simons, van der Linden, and Duffy (2000) for example stress new instructional methods (in their words “new learning”) such as independent learning, discovery learning, experiential learning, self-directed learning, problem-oriented education, simulations, and work-based learning. To a large extent, these methods are based on constructivism in which, according to Reiser (2001), learners are responsible for their own learning process. Such self-regulated learners are motivated, independent, and metacognitively active participants in their own learning (e.g., Bastiaens & Martens, 2000; Dalgarno, 1998; Duffy, Herrington & Oliver, 2000; Lowyck & Jonassen, 1993; Pierce & Jones, 1998; Wolters, 1998). All of these instructional methods hold that stimulating motivation is crucial in learning, but while an increasing number of researchers are trying to link instructional strategies, motivational processes and learning outcomes (Ellinger, 2004; Garris, Ahlers & Driskell, 2002), the research evidence is still “embryonic” (Garris et al., p. 442). Motivation is not an easy concept to define because it is related to many partly overlapping theoretical constructs (Norwich, 1999). On the one hand it is be seen as a relatively stable personality trait (e.g., Sheldon, Ryan, & Reis, 1996), while on the other hand it is seen to vary from situation to situation (e.g., Boekaerts & Minnaert, 2003). This article sees motivation as the latter case and finds its roots in the work of Ryan and Deci (2000) who distinguish between extrinsic motivation, which refers to the performance of an activity in order to attain a certain outcome, and intrinsic motivation, which refers to doing an activity for the inherent satisfaction of the activity itself. The effort or motivation on which constructivist learning environments try to rely is typically intrinsic motivation, with its associated features as curiosity, deep level learning, explorative behavior and self regulation (Martens, Gulikers, & Bastiaens, in press). Research has shown that intrinsically motivated students exhibit study behaviors that can be described as explorative, reflective, self-regulated, and aimed at deep level processing (e.g., Boekaerts & Minnaert, 2003; Martens et al, in press; Ryan & Deci, 2000). Ryan and Deci developed a model to explain and predict the persistence of intrinsic motivation. They state : “...our theory of motivation does not concern what causes intrinsic motivation (which we see as an