I did not get answer to my question. Can you help with some more information regarding this ?

Hi,

just a short answer:

For assuming extrinsic/intrinsic motivation -> refer to Deci & Ryan's theory and questionaires. There is plenty material/questions for questionaires in their books and articles. (To my knowledge there are no 'standardized' motivation scales)

Most motivation research is research on performance (2 measure points) or self-reporting questionaires - tight interwoven with interest.

hope this helps.

thank you Christopher Frank. I will go thro' the reference suggested by you.

another reference: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/262581837_Motivation_in_learning_contexts_theoretical_advances_and_methodological_implications

Book Motivation in Learning Contexts. Theoretical Advances and Me...

this reference may give specific answer to my question. thank you

It might be better to rephrase your question if you are dealing with medical students to what motivates a students to learn a subject?  This sounds like it would make a good qualitative study.  We all hope students are motivated to learn because of the nature of the subject and their interest.  However, students often are motivated to learn because they want to graduate or they want an A in the course.  Or in the case of medical students, they want to get into a good residency program.  

Thank you Madeaine for coming into subject. There are many subjects like anatomy , Physiology,Pathology Microbiology in medical course in India. these subjects are studied as preclinical and paraclinical subjects. All the subjects are not equally interesting to medical student. Here most of the suject will be taught in lectures and practicals. Here they do not have bed side teaching like clinical subjects. to make these subjects more interesting we try to give case studies and some other interactive sessions. I want to measure the motivation in these students after case studies compared to conventional lectures.This is to improve the teaching method for quality learning. 

One measure that we are looking at in medical trainees is the Academic Motivation Scale. It has been used before and measures intrinsic/extrinsic motivation (as well as amotivation). It is not subject specific and focuses on general academic motivation. Not sure if this is helpful.

thank you sir . Can  I  have some resources for evaluating motivation?

Happy to address your question:

Can we measure motivation in students?

Yes, we can measure motivation in students: The first step I would suggest for you to accomplish this task will be to define the problem. What type of motivation are you interested in measuring? I would assume you want to measure academic motivation. More specifically academic Intrinsic motivation. Again I am just assuming what you are trying to do.  If you want to distinguish whether students are intrinsically motivated to learn a particular subject you may want to consider the attached instrument which is an intrinsic motivation self assessment. You can find the instrument at: French, F.B. & Oakes, W. (2003). Measuring academic intrinsic motivation in the first year of college: Reliability and validity evidence for a new instrument. Journal of the First Year Experience, 15(1),83-102.

a) How will we know that a student is motivated to learn the subject ?

One way to find out whether a student is motivated to learn the subject would be to help him/her be aware of how they are motivated rather than how motivated they are. This we do by helping them assess their own motivation whether is intrinsic or extrinsic. Help them recognize the real reasons why they attend college. Students may almost need to take a class related to learning about motivation. Often times students are not aware of the concept motivation and how it applies to them.

b) Is it intrinsic motivation or extrinsic motivation? Again help your students recognize the difference between intrinsic and extrinsic motivation. Often times, as educators we are not interested in knowing whether they know about these concepts but helping students understand about these concepts may have a greater impact on the quality of data you collect.

Happy to help:)

Dr Kondapaneni,

This question conceals an implicit theory of motivation. Which theory is in favour in your institution? 

In practice, the behaviours that we observe are prompted by diverse beliefs, attitudes, and situations.

Are students learning the subject because the knowledge is beautiful or intriguing, or useful in their current practice, or necessary in future practice, or foundational for other studies, or something they are required to do, or preparation for a mandatory examination, or social participation in a community, or proof-to-self of their competence, or identification with a respected other, or in defiance of some opposition, or for payment, or...? 

For any individual, the effect of these drivers will vary over time.

We can measure performance (behaviour) objectively, but any other instrument will undervalue some of these motivators.

There are two ethical dimensions to this question that will restrict our choice of instrument.

1. When they enrol, students accept the goals we set; but they might not consent to our prioritisation of their values and motivations.

2. Do we certify their motivation or their performance? i.e. Should we reject a student who performs well even with poor motivation? Should we graduate a student who is highly motivated but unsuccessful? 

Quality of learning will be better with intrinsic motivation. If it is only extrinsic motivation like examination they may not able to remember when they actually require to apply their knowledge in their profession or job. I want to use a teaching method which will improve quality of their learning 

Saileela, another complication is that students cn be on a spectrum from comletely extrinsic to completely intrinsic, with various shades in between. The extremes are often easy to test for using questionnaires, however the shades are more complex but also more interesting. Look up Intrinsic and Extrinsic Motivations: Classic Definitions and New Directions, Richard M. Ryan and Edward L. Deci

I have read about an instrument entitled Motivated Strategies for Learning Questionnaire (MSLQ) in an article entitled: Evidence for the Latent Factor Structure of the MSLQ: A New Conceptualization of an Established Questionnaire (Hilpert J.C., et al., 2013).  It has subscales including both Intrinsic and Extrinsic goals amongst others.  I hope this would be of some help.

thank you Mark .E. Gould and Camilleri. I will go thro' the reference  ' Hilpert J.C., et al., 2013'  and   'Intrinsic and Extrinsic Motivations: Classic Definitions and New Directions, Richard M. Ryan and Edward L. Deci'

Hi Saileela

I'm going to encourage you to take a different approach. Intrinsic versus extrinsic motivation has some ongoing relevance but there are better ways to address motivation in education. To see what I mean, look at the very thorough review of psychological factors that contribute learning and academic performance was published by Richardson et al. (2012), especially the table on page 366. That indicates that rather than focusing on intrinsic motivation, you would do better to assess goal-orientation (especially, whether students have a strategic approach to learning), effort regulation, and self-efficacy. Even better - these factors are much easier to directly address in your educational practice.

Cheers

Arthur

Richardson, M., Abraham, C., & Bond, R. (2012). Psychological correlates of university students' academic performance: A systematic review and meta-analysis. Psychological Bulletin, 138(2), 363-387. doi: 10.1037/a0026838

A controversial issue, give that motivation is itself located in the cognitive domain. It seems to me that what is empirically measurable is the impact of motivation. Having said this, I once read a paper by Tuan et al (2005) describing an instrument for measuring motivation of learnerss in science learning. It might e of interest. The link below should take you to the paper

http://www.ntcu.edu.tw/chin/file/29.pdf

thank you. It is very useful in my work.

I am very interested in this topic. I could participate in a research project if you want to start it.

thank you for your interest.  I am not aware of the curriculum in your medical school.

my work is regarding -how much case studies can influence the motivation in students in learning medical Microbiology?

Case studies may influence motivation of students as they may assimilate more what is being stated.  From experience in teaching nursing students I found out that case studies do help students to learn to care for patients holistically.  

As already mentioned by some colleagues,  the intrinsic and extrinsic motivation is at the level of the theory of self-determination of Deci and Ryan. The authors have a very comprehensive website with loads of information,  organized by area, with studies developed using the SDT.

Effectively, if you want to understand what types of motivation (intrinsic vs. extrinsic) you have innumerable information on this site.

See also taxonomy of human motivation. The SDT is organized according to four mini-theories. The first is the Cognitive Evaluation Theory - which analyzes the motivation according to three types: amotivation, extrinsic and intrinsic motivation. But the second mini-theory, the organismic, mentions a continuum underlying the various types of autonomous motivation, extrinsic motivation structuring according to regulatory styles. It seems to me that according to what you want you may be extremely useful. If you need clarification on this approach say.

Dear All,

Students’ motivation is difficult to recognise and classify. However, to recognise the lack of motivation may be easier. Practically, I feel but - fortunately – I can survive the unlimited indifference of students. I have hoped – of course in vain – I can a bit improve students’ motivation toward a subject showing them the interestingness, imagination, the horizon of opportunity of a given subject as well as their touching points with culture (art, Belles-lettres, music , their historical development etc.). Unfortunately, I teach such prosaic subjects like entomology, ecology, biological control. Last year I have prepared a test in order to measure the knowledge of my students compared with the comprehension of Maria Sibylla Merian, the well known artist entomologist of the 17th century.

https://www.researchgate.net/post/Would_you_like_to_try_the_Merian_test

I planned to get an international comparative material but I have not known in that time how difficult is it to persuade RG members on a tiny extra work. Thus, my result was a normal but disappointing fiasco. I consider that indifference of teachers (burnout) is even more unacceptable.

Intrinsic motivation cannot be planted into students but can be increased and cared. To form extrinsic motivation inside of a student would be a great challenge for teachers.

During my about 30 years of carrier I have met only one or two students who had some intrinsic motivation toward entomology. As to my success to convince students on the beauty of entomology, the number of persuaded student was 3 or 4.

Regarding ecology, the rate is much worse.

thank you for sharing your experience. .

Hi Saileela Kondapaneni; Please go through the following links they may be helpful for you in finalizing the questionnaire. 

http://epm.sagepub.com/content/53/3/801.short

http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/02701367.2000.10608907

http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1348/000709901158497/abstract

http://psycnet.apa.org/journals/apl/54/4/353/

Regards

Hi Saileela Kondapaneni; Information on motivation in students learning medical microbiology is given in following links. They are quite interesting and you will certainly like them and use them.

http://informahealthcare.com/doi/abs/10.1080/01421590701601550

http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S036013150400079X

http://www.annualreviews.org/doi/abs/10.1146/annurev.psych.56.091103.070258

regards

Thank you

ACT has a test for motivation

http://www.act.org/engage/

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3414248/

thank you Lohyd Terrier

Dear all,

I am an applied linguistics student. I am now doing for my research about immigrant workers motivation learning English. I have problems in collecting the data. My Professor asked me to collect the data by using 3 instruments because my research is qualitative research. Actually I have already 2 instruments such as questionnaire and interview. I think about observation, but it is impossible because I am teaching them by online. Do you have suggestions for me? Please help me. Thank you

Saileela Kondapaneni Hi. There are some standard questionnaires available for measuring motivation at http://selfdeterminationtheory.org/questionnaires/

Good luck

Hi all!

As an after school program evaluator I would say the measurements of the student motivation can be predicted from an attendance data, test scores, class engagement of students. However for accurate measurements it is useful to do survey with specific questions on. For example what they like about the program? to evaluate the programs of different schools the same programs can also help to recognize the encouraging factors of student to attend this programs.

Best regards.