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Thesis (M. A.)--University of Hong Kong, 2006. / Title proper from title frame. Also available in printed format.

This study examines the relationship between exercise adherence and several factors: self-motivation; attitudinal commitment; predisposing, enabling, and reinforcing (PER) factors; and barriers related to exercise. The sample (N=431) consists of employees at Texas Instruments, Incorporated in Dallas, Texas. The sample was placed into six comparison groups: high adherers, low adherers, nonparticipants who exercise, nonparticipants who do not exercise, dropouts who exercise and dropouts who do not exercise. Using a one-way ANOVA, the results show significance (p<.01) among the groups for: self-motivation and barriers. Attitudinal commitment and PER factors did not show significance. The results can be applied to worksite health programs to increase exercise adherence among employee populations.

This is a case study in a Norwegian junior high school where pupils and teachers have been interviewed about the pupils’ school motivation. The purpose of this study is to find out how the pupils and the teachers experience how the pupils’ motivation for learning is affected by moving the education and teaching from the school building to a farm nearby. The recorded interviews were analyzed by qualitative thematic analysis. The pupils express that their motivation mostly is promoted by external motivational factors, such as the farm itself, supportive relations and practical work. Teachers’ experience show that pupils’ motivation is affected by both external and internal factors and they mean that the biggest outcome is the fact that it helps the pupils strengthen their school identity, personal development and become better citizens in the future. Important effects that promote motivation are adapting the education to the students’ proximal development zone, scaffolding support at the farm and close holistic collaboration around the pupils. Challenges with using a farm are financial and organizational. The results show that pupils and teachers are over all convinced that the farm as an alternative educational arena promotes pupils’ motivation for learning.

Experiential learning in adult education is on the rise. A small private college in the southeast United States initiated a program that required 3 experiential learning projects to be completed in addition to coursework. The problem was that less than 8% of students had independently developed their first project. Instead, they completed a project proposed by faculty. This situation resulted in student dependency on faculty rather than promoting self-directed learning. The purpose of this study was to gain an understanding about how to help students develop independent projects for the self-directed learning program. Experiential and self-directed learning theories formed the conceptual framework. The guiding question focused on how a select group of students described their ability to conduct a self-directed learning project. For this case study, individual interviews and documents were collected from 7 participants in the self-directed learning program. Analysis of the data by coding individual units of meaning revealed these 5 themes, which formed the basis of the findings: characteristics, self-motivation, lack of assistance received, personal gain, and advice for others. The commonly held major theme was personal gain. The second theme, goal setting, was discrepant. These were the major findings, which formed the basis for a proposed professional development training program for faculty facilitating the self-directed learning program. The implication for social change include emphasizing the importance of self-directed learning, supporting faculty for self-directed learning, and promoting lifelong learning. As a result of participating in this training, faculty will be better able to mentor students in the self-directed learning program.

Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis (IUPUI) / One of the main educational discourses in the era of globalization is lifelong learning. Self-regulated learning and learner autonomy are considered to be cornerstones of lifelong learning and are currently topics of main discussion and interest in the teaching of English to speakers of other languages in Colombia and other countries around the world. Although previous research has suggested different teaching alternatives to promote self-regulated learning (SRL) in English instruction in Colombia, what actually happens in the classroom and its impact on the development of SRL have received little attention. This study aimed to identify what Colombian university English instructors know about language teaching methods, approaches, principles, and strategies to promote SRL and to understand to what extent their teaching practices help to promote SRL. Using a survey questionnaire and in-depth interviews, this study was developed based on a mixed-methods approach to understand how the processes involved in SRL, as proposed by Zimmerman (2002), are promoted implicitly or explicitly in the university English classroom. Consistently, most university English instructors are not familiar with the construct of SRL, and their teaching practices mainly focus on teaching, evaluating, and giving feedback on language use and task completion, but not on the processes involved in SRL. Nevertheless, SRL-related aspects, such as learner motivation and the learning of strategies, are part of some instructors' teaching agendas. It is suggested, among others, that university English course programs should incorporate SRL education initiatives such as pre-academic courses on SRL, as well as on how successful language learning takes place. This is to help learners be more prepared for successful and lifelong learning, not only in the English classroom, but beyond.

In this study, the author provided a discussion of international cross-cultural validation studies which reported low internal consistency reliabilities for the self-motivation facet of the Trait Emotional Intelligence Questionnaire (TEIQue). A review of salient models of emotional intelligence (EI) revealed that self-motivation was consistently conceptualised as part of the sampling domain of trait and mixed models of EI, but not ability-based conceptualisations of the construct. The author provided a qualitative evaluation of the ten self-motivation test items as they appeared in the TEIQue with the purpose of exploring the operationalisation of the construct in a multi-cultural South African sample. The exploratory-descriptive research was conducted amongst permanent employees who have all completed the TEIQue as part of on-going employee assessments. The present study found limited support for a satisfactory operationalisation of the self-motivation facet of the TEIQue as it related to a multi-cultural South African research sample. / Psychology / M.A. (Psychology)

The present study examined Garland's cognitive mediation theory of goal setting in a three-minute basketball shooting task. The effects of different goal conditions were also investigated along with achievement motivation and self-motivation as mediating constructs of performance. Subjects (N=150) were males and females, assigned to one of five goal conditions: "do your best", easy, moderate, hard, and improbable. Results indicated no performance differences between the different goal conditions, with subjects in the "do your best" condition performing as well as subjects in the other goal conditions. Results also yielded partial support for Garland's cognitive mediation theory with task goals influencing performance through its influence on performance expectancy. Furthermore, a negative correlation between achievement motivation and performance was found for females in the improbable goal condition and a positive correlation was found between self-motivation and performance for females in the easy goal condition.

In this study, the author provided a discussion of international cross-cultural validation studies which reported low internal consistency reliabilities for the self-motivation facet of the Trait Emotional Intelligence Questionnaire (TEIQue). A review of salient models of emotional intelligence (EI) revealed that self-motivation was consistently conceptualised as part of the sampling domain of trait and mixed models of EI, but not ability-based conceptualisations of the construct. The author provided a qualitative evaluation of the ten self-motivation test items as they appeared in the TEIQue with the purpose of exploring the operationalisation of the construct in a multi-cultural South African sample. The exploratory-descriptive research was conducted amongst permanent employees who have all completed the TEIQue as part of on-going employee assessments. The present study found limited support for a satisfactory operationalisation of the self-motivation facet of the TEIQue as it related to a multi-cultural South African research sample. / Psychology / M.A. (Psychology, with specialisation in Research Consultation)

Studien syftar till att undersöka orsakerna till kvinnors karriärbyten genom akademiska studier. Med undersökningen försöker vi ge ett nytt perspektiv på samhällsvetenskaplig forskning om kvinnors karriärvalsprocesser. I studien används både en kvantitativ och en kvalitativ metod i syfte att besvara våra forskningsfrågor. Den kvantitativa metoden med enkätundersökningar riktas till kvinnliga studenter vid Stockholms universitet. Den kvalitativa studien baseras på intervjuer med sex respondenter från enkätstudien. Analys och slutsats baseras på de resultat vi fått från enkätundersökningen och de enskilda intervjuerna med stöd i lämpliga karriärvalsmetoder och teorier. Resultatet visar att orsakerna till kvinnornas karriärbyte är brytpunkter av såväl frivillig som påtvingad karaktär. Kvinnornas handlingshorisont och de brytpunkter och rutiner som de utsätts är påverkade av kvinnornas habitus, tidigare erfarenheter och var i livscykeln de befinner sig vilka styr deras beslut och deras handlingar. Vår slutsats är att kvinnornas studie- och yrkesval framför allt är ett intresse och en karriärstrategi samt en strävan att öka livskvaliteten. / The study aims to investigate the reasons underlying women's career changes through academic studies. We try to give a new perspective on women’s career choice processes in social science research. Both a quantitative and a qualitative method were used in order to answer our research questions. The two methods complement and reinforce each other while providing a more nuanced picture of the problem area. The quantitative method consisting of a questionnaire addressed a number of selected female students at StockholmUniversity. The qualitative study is based on interviews with six respondents selected from the survey. Processing and analysis are based on the results from the survey and the individual interviews with the support of appropriate career choice methods and theories. The results show that the causes of women's career changes are the turning points of either a volunteer or forced character. Women's action horizon, the turnings points and routines are influenced by their habitus, previous experiences and were they are in life. Our conclusion is that women's educational and career choices primarily are an interest and a career strategy as well an effort to increase the quality of life.