Students' Academic Motivations in Allied Health Classes

Presented at SoTL Virtual Expo

This session will describe a two-semester research project investigating students’ intrinsic and extrinsic motivations for taking large, introductory anatomy and physiology classes. These classes enroll students from many different majors, each of which require the course for different reasons. This provides an excellent opportunity to study differential student motivation and the impact of those differences on student academic behaviors and performance. Session objectives include discussing the results of this project and its implications for faculty in understanding student motivations as contributing factors to student success. Attendees can expect to learn about the Student Learning Theory of Motivation, ways to operationalize the Academic Motivation Scale, and the relationship between students’ motivations and academic behaviors and performance.