Academic motivation decreases across adolescence for youth with and without attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder: Effects of motivation on academic success.

BACKGROUND: This longitudinal study examined growth trajectories of academic motivation in youth with and without attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) across the important developmental transition from middle school to high school, and associations with academic success. Consistent with self-determination theory (SDT) of motivation, trajectories of amotivation, extrinsic motivation, and intrinsic motivation were modeled. METHODS: The study included a robust multi-method, multi-source assessment of academic outcomes, including homework performance ratings; reading and mathematics standardized test scores; and grade point average (GPA) obtained from school records. Participants included 302 adolescents (ages 12-14; Mage = 13.20) in eighth grade who were specifically recruited so that approximately half (n = 162) were diagnosed with ADHD and 140 adolescents comprising a comparison sample without ADHD. The sample was predominantly White (81.80%), with 7.90% identifying as bi/multiracial, 5.30% identifying as Black/African American, 4.60% identifying as Asian, and 0.30% identifying as Indigenous/Alaskan. RESULTS: Adolescents with ADHD had worse academic motivation at all timepoints. Growth curve analyses indicated the academic motivation of adolescents without ADHD decreased at faster rates across the transition to high school compared to adolescents with ADHD. However, for adolescents with ADHD, amotivation, extrinsic motivation, and intrinsic motivation each predicted GPA, with higher extrinsic and intrinsic motivation also predicting better homework performance and different aspects of math performance, whereas for youth without ADHD, only amotivation and extrinsic motivation predicted GPA. CONCLUSIONS: Intervention and school policy implications are discussed, including the importance of fostering autonomy and internal motivation, and consideration of whether current ADHD interventions primarily foster extrinsic motivation.

Evaluation of a new intrinsic and extrinsic motivation scale in youth with psychosis spectrum symptoms.

BACKGROUND: Impairment in intrinsic motivation (IM), the drive to satisfy internal desires like mastery, may play a key role in disability in psychosis. However, we have limited knowledge regarding relative impairments in IM compared to extrinsic motivation (EM) or general motivation (GM), in part due to limitations in existing measures. METHODS: Here we address this gap using a novel Trait Intrinsic and Extrinsic Motivation self-report scale in a sample of n = 243 participants including those with schizophrenia, psychosis-risk, and healthy controls. Each of the 7 IM and 6 EM items used a 7-point Likert scale assessing endorsement of dispositional statements. Bifactor analyses of these items yielded distinct IM, EM, and GM factor scores. Convergent and discriminant validity were examined in relation to General Causality Orientation Scale (GCOS-CP) and Quality of Life 3-item IM measure (QLS-IM). Utility was assessed in relation to psychosis-spectrum (PS) status and CAINS clinical amotivation. RESULTS: IM and EM showed acceptable inter-item consistency (IM: α = 0.88; EM: α = 0.66); the bifactor model exhibited fit that varied from good to borderline to inadequate depending on the specific fit metric (SRMR = 0.038, CFI = 0.94, RMSEA = 0.106 ± 0.014). IM scores correlated with established IM measures: GCOS-CP Autonomy (rho = 0.38, p < 0.01) and QLS-IM (rho = 0.29, p < 0.01). Supporting discriminant validity, IM did not correlate with GCOS-CP Control (rho = -0.14, p > 0.05). Two-year stability in an available longitudinal subset (n = 35) was strong (IM: rho = 0.64, p < 0.01; EM: rho = 0.55, p < 0.01). Trait IM was lower in PS youth (t = 4.24, p < 0.01), and correlated with clinical amotivation (rho = -0.36, p < 0.01); EM did not show significant clinical associations. CONCLUSIONS: These results demonstrate the clinical relevance of IM in psychosis risk. They also provide preliminary support for the reliability, validity and utility of this new Trait IM-EM scale, which addresses a measurement gap and can facilitate identification of neurobehavioral and clinical correlates of IM deficits.

The profit motive: Implications for children's reasoning about merit-based resource distribution.

How to distribute resources in a fair way is a fundamental source of conflict in human societies. A central dilemma that people begin to grapple with during childhood is the extent to which individuals should be rewarded based on merit at the expense of equality. The current study examined children's reasoning about this dilemma by testing whether they are sensitive to information about the motives of highly productive people when determining whether they should receive extra compensation. Across two studies, children (6- to 11-year-olds, total N = 143) judged high performers to be less deserving of extra resources when they were motivated by profit rather than being intrinsically motivated, and this pattern was more pronounced among the older children. The findings demonstrate that, with age, children increasingly consider motives when deciding whether productivity should be rewarded and that the tendency of adults to view profit motives as problematic has origins during childhood.

Material incentive motivation and working memory performance of kindergartners: A large-scale randomized controlled trial.

This study investigated the effect of material incentive motivation on the working memory performance of kindergartners using a large-scale randomized controlled trial covering 7123 children aged 50 to 144 months (M = 75.85 months) from 19 provinces in Thailand. This study measured the working memory of young children using the digit span task. The first finding is that material incentive motivation raised the working memory performance of young children by 4% of the mean of the control group. The second finding is that young children with different background characteristics responded to material incentive motivation uniformly except for the children's age. The third finding is that school readiness was the most predictive variable for the working memory performance of young children.

Contemporary american literature in Online Learning: fostering Reading Motivation and Student Engagement.

Reading is one of the crucial aspects of the learning process. The learning efficiency depends on the motivation and involvement of students. The paper aims to determine whether the developed online course enhances student motivation and engagement in contemporary American literature. For this purpose, questionnaires were used. The sample consisted of 126 students enrolled in Yulin Gaoxin Secondary School, who had English proficiency at a high enough level to read English literature in the original language. Before and after the course, the Reading Motivation Questionnaires test was administered, with its scores validated using Student's t-test for dependent samples. Significant progress is observed in the internal and social components of motivation (23-25%), as well as in the Engagement category (31%). The course also positively affected learning effectiveness. None of the participants scored less than half of the possible points for the course assignments. Most children obtained high (95-119 points) and very high scores (120-140 points). This finding demonstrates the suitability of the tools used (videoconferencing, learning management systems, discussion forums, and interactive exercises) in online learning when studying modern literature. The research findings are of interest, first of all, to instructors who adopt technological innovations in their lessons or want to motivate students to read. Second, school administrators and education sector officials can draw information from the findings for corrective action. Third, software developers may be inspired by the data and create new technology solutions.

Understanding college students' continuous usage intention of asynchronous online courses through extended technology acceptance model.

Asynchronous online learning has gained great popularity in higher education, especially due to the recent COVID-19 pandemic. However, few studies have investigated how to maintain students' continuous usage intention of asynchronous online courses in the context of higher education. This study incorporated four key factors (intrinsic motivation, extrinsic motivation, perception of multiple sources, and cognitive engagement) associated with students' continuous usage intention of asynchronous online courses into technology acceptance model (TAM) to identify the influencing factors on students' continuous usage intention. A survey with 325 college students was conducted to explore their continuous usage intention of asynchronous online courses and structural equation modeling analysis was carried out to analyze the relationships between the key influencing factors and students' continuous usage intention. The results showed that cognitive engagement was the only factor that directly related to continuous usage intention. Intrinsic motivation, extrinsic motivation, and perception of multiple sources indirectly correlated with students' continuous usage intention through different pathways. The results of the study have several theoretical and practical implications. Theoretically, the study verified what key learning factors incorporated into TAM and in what way they relate to the continuous usage intention of asynchronous online courses. Practically, the present study indicated that it is required to take intrinsic motivation, extrinsic motivation, perception of multiple sources, cognitive engagement and TAM into consideration when designing and conducting asynchronous online learning courses to ensure college students' continuous usage intention of asynchronous online courses.

On what motivates us: a detailed review of intrinsic v. extrinsic motivation.

Motivational processes underlie behaviors that enrich the human experience, and impairments in motivation are commonly observed in psychiatric illness. While motivated behavior is often examined with respect to extrinsic reinforcers, not all actions are driven by reactions to external stimuli; some are driven by 'intrinsic' motivation. Intrinsically motivated behaviors are computationally similar to extrinsically motivated behaviors, in that they strive to maximize reward value and minimize punishment. However, our understanding of the neurocognitive mechanisms that underlie intrinsically motivated behavior remains limited. Dysfunction in intrinsic motivation represents an important trans-diagnostic facet of psychiatric symptomology, but due to a lack of clear consensus, the contribution of intrinsic motivation to psychopathology remains poorly understood. This review aims to provide an overview of the conceptualization, measurement, and neurobiology of intrinsic motivation, providing a framework for understanding its potential contributions to psychopathology and its treatment. Distinctions between intrinsic and extrinsic motivation are discussed, including divergence in the types of associated rewards or outcomes that drive behavioral action and choice. A useful framework for understanding intrinsic motivation, and thus separating it from extrinsic motivation, is developed and suggestions for optimization of paradigms to measure intrinsic motivation are proposed.

Mental fatigue correlates with depression of task-related network and augmented DMN activity but spares the reward circuit.

Long-lasting and demanding cognitive activity typically leads to mental fatigue (MF). Indirect evidence suggests that MF may be caused by altered motivational processes. Here, we hypothesized that if MF consists in an alteration of motivational states, brain functional changes induced by MF could specifically affect the brain motivation circuit. In order to test this hypothesis, we devised a functional neuroimaging protocol to detect altered brain activity in reward-related brain regions in relation to cognitively induced mental fatigue. Twenty-five healthy participants underwent a FATIGUE and a CONTROL session on different days. In the FATIGUE session, MF was induced by performing a demanding cognitive task (adapted Stroop task) during 90 min, whereas in the CONTROL session, participants were asked to read magazines for the same period of time. We measured the neural consequences of the MF induction during a working memory task (Missing Number task) while modulating extrinsic motivation with block-wise variations in monetary reward. We also tracked participants' momentary fatigue, anxiety state and intrinsic motivation prior to and following the MF inducement and measurement. Accuracy on the Missing Number Task was lower in the FATIGUE than in the CONTROL condition. Furthermore, subjective MF, but not its behavioral manifestations, was associated with hypoactivity of the task-evoked neural responses. Importantly, activity in regions modulated by reward showed no differences between FATIGUE and CONTROL sessions. In parallel, subjective MF correlated with increased on-task activity and resting-state functional connectivity in the default mode network. These results indicate that subjective mental fatigue is not associated with altered activity in the brain motivation circuit but rather with hypoactivity in task-specific brain regions as well as relative increases of activity and connectivity in the default mode network during and after the task.

Multiplicative effect of intrinsic and extrinsic motivation on academic performance: A longitudinal study of Chinese students.

OBJECTIVE: For Chinese students, learning is seen as their duty and obligation to the society and their parents. Thus, in contrast to the Western students, the effects of extrinsic motivation on academic performance may not necessarily be always negative. The present study examined the effects of intrinsic and extrinsic motivation, as well as their multiplicative effect among Chinese students. METHOD: A total of 13,799 students in China were followed longitudinally in three waves (Grade 10, beginning of school year, midyear, and end-of-year; 5-month interval each). The main and multiplicative effects of intrinsic and extrinsic motivations were used to predict academic growth in a latent growth model. RESULTS: The multiplicative effect between intrinsic and extrinsic motivations showed that extrinsic motivation was detrimental to academic performance for students with high intrinsic motivation. For students with low intrinsic motivation, however, the extrinsic motivation helped to improve academic performance. Worth noting, intrinsic motivation also had a moderate positive effect on academic performance. CONCLUSIONS: For Chinese learners, interest is not the only key motive to learn. Extrinsic reasons could facilitate students' learning when they are not interested in the subject. Extrinsic motivation harms only for highly intrinsically motivated students.

Lebanese students' motivation in medical school: does it change throughout the years? A cross-sectional study.

BACKGROUND: Students entering medical school are driven by different types of motivation: autonomous motivation, controlled motivation, or amotivation. Motivation types can influence students' performance, outcome and well-being. To our knowledge, this topic has never been studied in Lebanese medical students. This study aims to identify students' motivation types in the first 5 years of medical school at two Lebanese universities (USJ and USEK). It also aims to determine the predominant motivation type of the whole sample. Results may be the first step towards raising awareness about this topic and implementing actions that enhance autonomous motivation. METHODS: A cross-sectional study was performed between January and June 2017. A questionnaire was sent to medical students by e-mail. The students' academic motivation was assessed using the Academic Motivation Scale. RESULTS: A higher mean autonomous motivation score was found in each academic year, as compared to the mean controlled motivation and amotivation scores. The highest mean autonomous motivation score was seen among second year students, whereas the lowest score was noted in fifth year students. The highest scores for controlled motivation and amotivation belonged to the fourth-year students, and the lowest to the first-year students. Students who were still satisfied with medical studies had a higher autonomous motivation score. Finally, USJ students who were satisfied with their second year training had a higher mean autonomous motivation score than those who were not. CONCLUSION: This study showed high levels of autonomous motivation in the first five years of medical school. Autonomous motivation was the predominant type in the whole sample. The highest scores of controlled motivation and amotivation were noted in the fourth year. Moreover, high levels of self-determination were seen in students who enjoyed their early contacts with patients through trainings. Actions should be implemented in medical schools to enhance and maintain autonomous motivation, and consequently students' outcome and health-care quality.

The psychological appeal of owning private land for conservation.

Continued threats to global biodiversity have stimulated interest in the private purchase of land for conservation. Though not a new phenomenon, private land conservation appears to be on the rise, and its ambiguous position between philanthropy and financial investment leads to questions about the nature of landowner motives. To examine these motives, we used grounded theory techniques to analyze transcripts of narrative interviews with the owners of privately conserved areas (PCAs) and assessed what landowners had in common across a variety of cultural and policy contexts. The result was a model of PCA engagement in which landowners became personally invested in the management of PCAs and in the nature they protected. We found that PCAs can be conceptualized not merely as philanthropic endeavors or investments, but also as meaningful projects in which their owners engage. We integrated our findings with literature indicating that fundamental psychological drives for autonomy, efficacy, and social connection facilitate the engagement process, regardless of whether conservation motivation is intrinsic or extrinsic. Our findings suggest that land conservation programs might benefit from allowing landowner autonomy to the maximum extent possible, developing best practice standards against which landowners can assess their efficacy, and facilitating the development of landowner networks.

Atractivo Psicológico de la Posesión de Tierras Privadas para la Conservación Resumen Las continuas amenazas para la biodiversidad mundial han estimulado el interés por la compra privada de suelo para su conservación. Aunque no es un fenómeno novedoso, la conservación en suelo privado parece estar en aumento, y su posición ambigua entre la filantropía y la inversión financiera nos lleva a cuestionar la naturaleza tras los motivos de los terratenientes. Para examinar estos motivos usamos técnicas de teoría fundamentada para analizar las transcripciones de las entrevistas narrativas realizadas a los dueños de áreas de conservación privadas (ACP) y evaluamos lo que los terratenientes tuvieron en común a lo largo de una variedad de contextos culturales y políticos. El resultado fue un modelo de participación de ACP en el cual los terratenientes se interesaron personalmente por el manejo de las ACP y por la naturaleza a la cual protegen. Descubrimos que las ACP pueden conceptualizarse no sólo como esfuerzos filantrópicos o inversiones, sino también como proyectos significativos en los que participan sus dueños. Integramos nuestros hallazgos con la literatura que indica que los conductores psicológicos fundamentales de la autonomía, la eficiencia, y la conexión social facilitan el proceso de participación, sin importar si la motivación para la conservación es intrínseca o extrínseca. Nuestros hallazgos sugieren que los programas de conservación de suelo pueden considerar permitirles a los terratenientes tener autonomía a la máxima extensión, desarrollar los mejores estándares de práctica con los cuales los terratenientes pueden evaluar su eficiencia, y facilitar el desarrollo de redes de terratenientes.

Does public service motivation matter in Moroccan public hospitals? A multiple embedded case study.

BACKGROUND: The motivation of health workers is a key concern of policy makers, practitioners and researchers. Public Service Motivation (PSM), defined as the altruistic desire to serve the common interest, to serve others and to help patients and their families regardless of financial or external rewards, has been shown to be key to the performance of public servants. Yet, limited attention has been paid to this kind of motivation in health care settings in low- and middle-income countries. Little is known about PSM and its contextual specificity in the Moroccan health system. We set out to qualitatively explore the meaning of PSM and its expression among health workers in four public hospitals. METHODS: We adopted a multiple embedded case study design to explore PSM in two well-performing and two poor-performing hospitals. We carried out 68 individual interviews, eight focus group discussions and 11 group discussions with different cadres (doctors, administrators and nurses). We carried out thematic analysis using NVivo 10. RESULTS: Our analysis shows that public service motivation is a notion that seems natural to the health workers we interviewed. Daily interactions with patients catalysed health providers' affective motives (compassion and self- sacrifice), a central element of PSM. It also provided them with job satisfaction aligned with their intrinsic motivation. Managers and administrative personnel express other PSM components: attraction to public policy making and commitment to public values. A striking result is that health workers expressed strong religious beliefs about expected rewards from God when properly serving patients. CONCLUSION: This study highlights the presence of PSM as a driver of motivation among health workers in four Moroccon hospitals, and the prominence of intrinsic motivation and compassion in the motivation of frontline health workers. Religious beliefs were found to shape the expression of PSM in Morocco.

Using photo-elicitation to explore perceptions of physical activity among young people with cystic fibrosis.

BACKGROUND: Physical activity is recommended in the management of cystic fibrosis (CF). The aim of this study was to explore motives, barriers and enablers to physical activity among this population. METHODS: Twelve participants (12-18 years) were recruited via convenience sampling. Photo-elicitation alongside semi-structured interviews were used to explore participants' views and experiences of physical activity. RESULTS: Our findings revealed motives for physical activity including health, enjoyment and autonomy. Those with families who valued physical activity tended to have positive attitudes towards physical activity, and valued and integrated it into their lives. Moreover, they were likely to be intrinsically motivated to be active. Several factors enable and act as barriers to physical activity. Whilst CF influenced physical activity, the majority of enablers and barriers raised where congruent with the general populations. CONCLUSION: This study provides support that healthcare providers should encourage both young people with CF and their families to be active, and subsequently informs the development of clinical interventions to support physical activity among young people with CF and their families.

Distinguishing subtypes of extrinsic motivation among people with mild to borderline intellectual disability.

BACKGROUND: According to self-determination theory, motivation is ordered in types, including amotivation, extrinsic motivation and intrinsic motivation. Self-determination theory defines four subtypes of extrinsic motivation: external motivation, introjected motivation, identified motivation and integrated motivation. Although it has been argued theoretically that the different types of motivation are universally applicable, Reid et al. () proposed a dichotomy of broad subtypes of extrinsic motivation for people with intellectual disability (ID) due to their cognitive limitations. The current study challenges this proposal by testing whether the four subtypes of extrinsic motivation can be differentiated among people with ID as well. METHOD: The subtypes of extrinsic motivation were measured using two adapted versions of the Self-Regulation Questionnaire, one regarding exercise and one regarding support. In total, 186 adults with mild to borderline ID participated in the study. RESULTS: Results supported the distinction between the four subtypes of extrinsic motivation regarding both exercise and support. In addition, the correlation coefficients supported a quasi-simplex pattern of correlations among the subtypes, indicating that adjacent subtypes were more closely related than non-adjacent subtypes. Moreover, the study showed sufficient Cronbach's alphas and test-retest reliabilities for early stage research. CONCLUSIONS: Overall, the results of the current study provide initial evidence for the universality of the four subtypes of extrinsic motivation across populations with and without ID.

Medical student changes in self-regulated learning during the transition to the clinical environment.

BACKGROUND: Self-regulated learning (SRL), which is learners' ability to proactively select and use different strategies to reach learning goals, is associated with academic and clinical success and life-long learning. SRL does not develop automatically in the clinical environment and its development during the preclinical to clinical learning transition has not been quantitatively studied. Our study aims to fill this gap by measuring SRL in medical students during the transitional period and examining its contributing factors. METHODS: Medical students were invited to complete a questionnaire at the commencement of their first clinical year (T0), and 10 weeks later (T1). The questionnaire included the Motivated Strategies for Learning Questionnaire (MSLQ) and asked about previous clinical experience. Information about the student's background, demographic characteristics and first clinical rotation were also gathered. RESULTS: Of 118 students invited to participate, complete paired responses were obtained from 72 medical students (response rate 61%). At T1, extrinsic goal orientation increased and was associated with gender (males were more likely to increase extrinsic goal orientation) and type of first attachment (critical care and community based attachments, compared to hospital ward based attachments). Metacognitive self-regulation decreased at T1 and was negatively associated with previous clinical experience. CONCLUSIONS: Measurable changes in self-regulated learning occur during the transition from preclinical learning to clinical immersion, particularly in the domains of extrinsic goal orientation and metacognitive self-regulation. Self-determination theory offers possible explanations for this finding which have practical implications and point the way to future research. In addition, interventions to promote metacognition before the clinical immersion may assist in preserving SRL during the transition and thus promote life-long learning skills in preparation for real-world practice.

What's in a name? Group fitness class names and women's reasons for exercising.

The benefits of intrinsic exercise motivation are well recognized, yet extrinsically focused group-fitness class names/descriptions dominate the fitness industry. To explore the impact of how fitness classes are marketed, women (N = 389) were asked to indicate their preference for either intrinsically or extrinsically focused fitness classes based on title/description. Participants who favored intrinsic class names/descriptions were more likely to report greater interest/enjoyment, perceived competence, and greater effort and report exercising for health/fitness-related reasons. Those favoring extrinsic class names/descriptions were more likely to experience tension/pressure when exercising and report exercising for appearance/weight-related reasons. The results demonstrate the importance of wording when marketing fitness classes.

Financial incentives enhance adaptation to a sensorimotor transformation.

Adaptation to sensorimotor transformations has received much attention in recent years. However, the role of motivation and its relation to the implicit and explicit processes underlying adaptation has been neglected thus far. Here, we examine the influence of extrinsic motivation on adaptation to a visuomotor rotation by way of providing financial incentives for accurate movements. Participants in the experimental group "bonus" received a defined amount of money for high end-point accuracy in a visuomotor rotation task; participants in the control group "no bonus" did not receive a financial incentive. Results showed better overall adaptation to the visuomotor transformation in participants who were extrinsically motivated. However, there was no beneficial effect of financial incentives on the implicit component, as assessed by the after-effects, and on separately assessed explicit knowledge. These findings suggest that the positive influence of financial incentives on adaptation is due to a component which cannot be measured by after-effects or by our test of explicit knowledge. A likely candidate is model-free learning based on reward-prediction errors, which could be enhanced by the financial bonuses.

Psychosocial Factors of Overtime Work in Relation to Work-Nonwork Balance: a Multilevel Structural Equation Modeling Analysis of Nurses Working in Hospitals.

PURPOSE: Few studies have investigated the impact of psychosocial factors on overwork and employee well-being while taking into account the complex relationships between such factors and the effect of workplace. The present study aimed to examine the association between psychosocial factors of overtime work and work-nonwork balance using a multilevel structural equation modeling (SEM) technique. METHODS: A survey was conducted among nurses working in three hospitals (n = 603) in Japan. After confirming the constructs of the factors by confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) and exploratory factor analysis (EFA), a multilevel SEM was conducted to investigate the direct and indirect effects of involuntary and voluntary overtime work on work-nonwork balance at both individual and workplace levels. RESULTS: Both involuntary and voluntary overtime work factors were further differentiated into two factors (four factors in total). Involuntary overtime work directly decreased work-nonwork balance on both levels; voluntary overtime work had a direct positive effect. However, voluntary overtime work had a negative indirect effect on work-nonwork balance satisfaction. CONCLUSIONS: The use of multilevel SEM techniques to evaluate the association of clinical factors with work-nonwork balance demonstrated that involuntary overtime work has a negative effect on work-nonwork balance and voluntary overtime work had a positive direct effect but a negative indirect effect.

A multilevel latent growth modelling of the longitudinal changes in motivation regulations in physical education.

The purpose of this study was to examine individual- and classroom-level differences in the longitudinal change in motivational regulations during physical education students' transition from elementary (Grade 6) across middle school (Grades 7 to 9). A sample of 757 Finnish adolescents (M = 12.71, SD = 0.23) participated in this study. Participants of the study responded to questionnaires collected six times. A multilevel latent growth modelling approach was used to analyze the data. Results showed that motivational regulations in physical education developed at different rates during middle school. More specifically, students': (a) identified regulation increased across Grades 6 to 9; (b) amotivation increased during middle school transition from Grade 6 to 7; and (c) introjected regulation declined from Grade 8 to 9. Other motivational regulations remained stable across time. The changes in amotivation and introjected regulation were largely due to individual factors, whereas the changes in identified regulation were due to environmental factors. Key pointsStudents' identified regulation increased across Grades 6 to 9.Students' amotivation increased across middle school transition from Grade 6 to 7.Students' introjected regulation declined from Grade 8 to 9.Other motivational regulations remained stable across time.

Motives for physical activity among active and inactive persons in their mid-30s.

The purpose of this study was to examine the motives for leisure-time physical activity among active and inactive men and women in their mid-30s. We used both cross-sectional and longitudinal designs. Altogether, 2308 participants (mean age 33.9 years, 53.4% women) were identified from the population-based FinnTwin16 Cohort. Physically active and inactive individuals were identified on the basis of their leisure-time MET h/day. We evaluated participants' physical activity motivation with a modified version of the Recreational Exercise Motivation Measure. Comparisons between active and inactive individuals were analysed using the Wald test for equality of means, and effect sizes were calculated as Cohen's d. Motives related to mastery, physical fitness, social aspect of physical activity, psychological state, enjoyment, willingness to be fitter/look better than others, and appearance were significantly more important for the active than inactive participants. Conforming to others' expectations was the only item on which the inactive persons scored higher than active persons. The longitudinal results for physical activity were parallel to the cross-sectional results. This study supports the view that motivation factors differ between active and inactive persons, and that intrinsic motives are associated with consistent leisure-time physical activity.