Achievement-oriented beliefs and their relation to academic expectations and school achievement among Qatari students

Abstract

This study investigated the relation between motivational goals and university intentions, school valuing and school achievement. The premise of this study is that motivational goals play a key role in academic values and achievement. Confirmatory factor analysis was conducted to establish the construct validity of the motivational measures drawn from the Inventory of School Motivation (ISM): mastery (effort and task), performance (competition and social power), social solidarity (social concern and affiliation), extrinsic (praise and token). A set of eight regression analyses was conducted to examine the relations among these eight motivational measures, future goals to attend college, the value of school and six school subjects. Eight regression equations revealed that effort and task were the most significant predictors of the dependent variables of university intention, valuing school and school achievement scores. Students in Qatar exhibited ‘effort and task’ in goal motivation in relation to students’ beliefs regarding future academic goals and achievement scores in school subjects. As Qatar is a highly gender-segregated society, analyses were also conducted by gender.

Keywords:

• goal motivation
• future goals
• school achievement
• inventory of school motivation
• Qatar

Acknowledgement

This work was supported by Qatar National Research Fund (a member of The Qatar Foundation) [NPRP 09-302-5-052]. The statements made herein are solely the responsibility of the author(s).