Motivational processes in college freshmen’s exercise participation: A goal content theory perspective

Abstract

Objective: Grounded in goal content theory, this study tested two mediation models that examined the direct and indirect effects of intrinsic and extrinsic goals on exercise participation and subjective vitality in college freshmen. Methods: Participants were 181 college freshmen (M_age = 18.12 years) who completed an online survey that assessed their goal content, psychological need satisfaction, motivational regulations, exercise participation, and subjective vitality in the context of exercise. Results: Path analysis revealed an acceptable model fit for the hypothesized model, indicating that psychological need satisfaction mediated the positive relationships between intrinsic goals and, relative autonomy index (RAI), exercise participation, and subjective vitality, while RAI mediated the negative relationships between extrinsic goals and, exercise participation and subjective vitality. Conclusions: Findings expand current knowledge of goal content, indicating that emphasizing social affiliation, health management, and skill development is conducive to exercise participation, whereas focusing on appearance and social recognition could be detrimental.

Keywords:

• Extrinsic goals
• intrinsic goals
• psychological need satisfaction
• self-determination theory
• subjective vitality

Acknowledgments

We would like to acknowledge (1) Dr. Teresa McKinney, Past Assistant Vice President for Student Affairs at the University of North Texas, for assisting us with participant recruitment; (2) the college freshman participants for their willingness to participate in the study; and (3) Mr. Matthew Kersting for assisting us with literature review.

Conflict of interest disclosure

The authors have no conflicts of interest to report. The authors confirm that the research presented in this article met the ethical guidelines, including adherence to the legal requirements, of the United States and received approval from the IRB of the university.

Funding

No funding was used to support this research and/or the preparation of the manuscript.

Notes

1 Integrated regulation is considered the most self-determined form of extrinsic motivation. In addition to intrinsic and extrinsic motivations, SDT defines amotivation as a form of motivation that represents an absence of internalization and intention for a behavior.¹¹ In line with the exercise goal content literature,^6,8,9,15,19 and due to insufficient validation of newer measures during planning of this study, we did not measure integrated regulation.

2 Based on the reviewers’ comments, we conducted path analyses for two additional models, using autonomous motivation and controlled in place of RAI, and three separate psychological need satisfaction variables in place of one. Yet, both models produced a poor fit.

3 Although the modification index did not suggest direct paths from intrinsic goals and extrinsic goals to exercise participation, we tested an additional modified hypothesized model with these direct paths that were shown to be nonsignificant (p > .05) and contributed to a worse fit to the data: χ²/df = 3.18; CFI = .97; TLI = .89; RMSEA (90% CI) = .11 (.04, .18).