Medical students’ motivation and academic performance: the mediating roles of self-efficacy and learning engagement

Figures & data

Table 1. Exploratory factor analysis

Scales	Items	Component		KMO
Enrollment motivation	Items	IM	EM
	I maintain good academic records in natural sciences subjects such as biology in high school	.784	.086	0.73
	I have a strong interest in medicine.	.881	.070
	I am confident I can succeed in the medicine filed.	.789	.219
	I believe medicine improves my career prospects.	.295	.720
	My family or friends strongly encourage or require me to choose medicine.	−.105	.788
	I anticipate that I can get a good salary in future.	.232	.761
Self-efficacy	Items	SE
	If I try my best, I can always solve the problems.	.856		0.72
	When I meet with difficulties, I can usually think of some ways to deal with them.	.886
	I can calmly face the difficulties, because I trust in my ability	.860
	Items	LE
Learning engagement	I feel vigorous and energetic when pursuing content knowledge about medicine.	.878		0.72
	Learning medicine has inspired me.	.910
	Sometimes I am so involved in my learning that I forget everything around me.	.857

IM = Intrinsic Motivation, EM = Extrinsic Motivation, SE = Self-efficacy, LE = Learning Engagement, KMO = the result of Kaiser-Meyer-Olkin analysis. Principal component factor extraction with varimax rotation for Enrollment Motivation Scale, and principal component factor extraction for Self-efficacy Scale and Learning engagement Scale. A total of the variance of the three scales were 65.8%, 75.2% and 77.8% respectively.

Table 2. Sample distribution and characteristics of the individual respondents

Variables	N (% of 1,930)
Gender
Male	573 (29.7)
Female	1,357 (70.3)
Grade
Freshmen (Year 1)	502 (26.0)
Sophomores (Year 2)	590 (30.6)
Juniors (Year 3)	357 (18.5)
Seniors (Year 4)	481 (24.9)
Method of admission
Medicine as the first choice (FC)	1,304 (67.6)
Medicine not the first choice (NFC)	626 (32.4)
Types of universities and colleges
Key universities and colleges (KUC)	702 (36.7)
Non-key universities and colleges (NKUC)	1,228 (63.6)
Home location
Rural areas	1,078 (55.9)
Urban areas	852 (44.1)

Table 3. Results of t tests

	Female (1,357)		Male (573)
Variables	M	SD	M	SD	Difference	t	p
IM	−0.04	0.99	0.08	1.02	−0.12	−2.41	0.02
EM	0.00	0.99	0.01	1.02	−0.01	−0.22	0.83
SE	0.01	0.98	−0.03	1.06	0.04	0.87	0.39
LE	−0.03	0.98	0.07	1.05	−0.09	−1.87	0.06
AP	78.44	10.24	76.81	10.75	1.63	3.15	0.002
	KUC (702)		NKUC (1,228)
	M	SD	M	SD	Difference	t	p
IM	0.15	1.01	−0.09	0.99	0.24	5.15	0.00
EM	−0.11	1.11	0.07	0.93	−0.18	−3.81	0.00
SE	0.02	1.04	−0.01	0.98	0.03	0.70	0.48
LE	−0.04	1.05	0.02	0.97	−0.07	−1.37	0.07
AP	78.83	12.90	77.46	8.65	1.37	2.78	0.005

IM = Intrinsic Motivation, EM = Extrinsic Motivation, SE = Self-efficacy, LE = Learning Engagement, AP = Academic Performance. KUC, Key universities and colleges; NKUC, Non-key universities and colleges. M = mean, SD = standard deviation.

Table 4. Pearson correlation between the variables (N = 1,930)

	IM	EM	SE	LE
EM	-	-
SE	0.34**	0.21**	-
LE	.42**	0.18**	0.60**	-
AP	0.11**	0.002	0.12**	0.14**

IM = intrinsic motivation, EM = extrinsic motivation, SE = self-efficacy, LE = learning engagement, AP = academic performance. ** p < 0.01.

Table 5. Overview of goodness-of-fit measures for structural equation modeling

Models	df	χ2	P (>0.05)	CFI (>0.9)	NFI (>0.9)	TLI (>0.9)	RMSEA (<0.05)
Initial Model (the whole sample)	3	7.78	0.08	1.00	1.00	0.99	0.03
Model for Multiple-group analysis (Gender)	6	15.13	0.19	0.99	0.99	0.97	0.03
Model for Multiple-group analysis (Type of universities and colleges)	6	5.46	0.47	1.00	1.00	0.98	0.00

Note: df indicates degrees of freedom; P, Probability level; CFI, comparative fit index; NFI, Normal fit index; TLI, Tucker-Lewin index; RMSEA, Root Mean Square Error of Approximation.

Figure 1. Structural equation model depicting the relationship between motivation, learning engagement, self-efficacy and academic performance. The total effects of intrinsic motivation and extrinsic motivation on academic performance were.06 and .03, respectively. Note: *p < .05, **p < .01

Table 6. Results of structural equation model analyses

The whole sample (Part A)	Standardized estimates			S.E.	p
IM on SE	0.34			0.02	0.00
EM on SE	0.20			0.02	0.00
IM on LE	0.25			0.02	0.00
EM on LE	0.08			0.02	0.00
SE on LE	0.50			0.02	0.00
LE on AP	0.12			0.30	0.00
SE on AP	0.04			0.30	0.12
Total effect of IM on AP	0.06
Total effect of EM on AP	0.03
	Gender		Type of university or college
Multiple-group (Part B)	Males	Females	KUCs		NKUCs
IM on SE	0.38***	0.32***	0.34***		0.33***
EM on SE	0.24***	0.19***	0.14***		0.25***
IM on LE	0.24***	0.25***	0.17***		0.31***
EM on LE	0.05	0.09***	0.06**		0.09***
SE on LE	0.56***	0.49***	0.59***		0.44***
LE on AP	0.16***	0.11***	0.05		0.19***
SE on AP	0.01	0.05	0.03		0.05
Total effect of IM on AP	0.08	0.06	0.03		0.10
Total effect of EM on AP	0.03	0.03	0.01		0.05

IM = intrinsic motivation, EM = extrinsic motivation, SE = self-efficacy, LE = learning engagement, AP = academic performance. ** p < 0.05 and *** p < 0.01. Total effects are standardized total effects.