The Academic Motivation Scale: A Measure of Intrinsic, Extrinsic, and Amotivation in Education

Abstract

A new measure of motivation toward education has been developed in French, namely the Echelle de Motivation en Education (EME). The EME is based on the tenets of self-determination theory and is composed of 28 items subdivided into seven sub-scales assessing three types of intrinsic motivation (intrinsic motivation to know, to accomplish things, and to experience stimulation), three types of extrinsic motivation (external, introjected, and identified regulation), and a motivation. The purpose of this investigation was to cross-culturally validate in English the EME. The EME was translated in English through appropriate methodological procedures and completed by university students. Results revealed that the English version of the scale renamed the Academic Motivation Scale (AMS), has satisfactory levels of internal consistency (mean alpha value = .81) and temporal stability over a one-month period (mean test-retest correlation = .79). In addition, results of a confirmatory factor analysis (LISREL) confirmed the seven-factor structure of the AMS. Finally, gender differences obtained with the EME were basically replicated with the AMS. In sum, the present findings provide adequate support for the factorial validity and reliability of the AMS and support its use in educational research on motivation.

Cross-cultural comparative examination of the Academic Motivation Scale using exploratory structural equation modeling

“…Regarding the psychometric properties of the AMS, previous results are mostly consistent. The originally hypothesized seven-factor structure was confirmed in the original (Vallerand et al, 1989) and the adaptation studies (Vallerand et al, 1992(Vallerand et al, , 1993 as well. Moreover, this seven-factor solution has been supported in most of the adaptations (for more details, see Supplementary Material 1).…”

“…The original version was created by Vallerand, Blais, Brière and Pelletier (1989) and was adapted to English (Vallerand et al 1992(Vallerand et al , 1993. It includes seven dimensions 1 : three forms of intrinsic motivation, three forms of extrinsic motivation and an amotivation subscale.…”

“…First, intrinsic motivation (IM) suggests that one engages in a behavior or activity for internal reasons (enjoyment, pleasure). Three forms of IM can be distinguished (Vallerand et al, 1992): intrinsic motivation to know (IMTK) refers to gaining new knowledge about a certain topic. Intrinsic motivation toward accomplishment (IMTA) is related to the aim of overcoming goals or surpassing oneself.…”

Measuring student motivation for physical education: Examining the psychometric properties of the Perceived Locus of Causality Questionnaire and the Situational Motivation Scale

“…Goudas et al (1994) developed this scale by adapting items from the Self-Regulation Questionnaire (Ryan & Connell, 1989) to reflect intrinsic motivation, identified regulation, introjected regulation, and external regulation, as well as items from the amotivation subscale of the Academic Motivation Scale (Vallerand, et al, 1992). The PLOCQ does not include a measure of integrated regulation.…”

Board # 17 : A Three-Year Study of Adult Undergraduate Engineering Students

“…The large scale survey included six different measures based on previous research [8]: The Appraisal Scale [9], The Stressor Scale [18], the Work-Family-School Role Conflict Scale [19], the Academic Motivation Scale [20], and multiple questions included from the semistructured and design protocol phases; these questions were devised to measure how the adult learner identifies as engineer (e.g., do you, family members or peers see you as an engineering person).…”