Antecedents of preservice music teacher students’ career intention to become music teachers: the roles of demographics, personality traits, and motivations

ABSTRACT

Teacher attrition is a widely recognised problem in music education, having received increasing attention amongst preservice music student teachers over the past few decades. Yet, factors influencing their career intention remain to be fully explored. This study aimed to examine the roles of demographics, personality traits, and motivations in preservice music student teachers’ intention to become music teachers through an integrated psychological decision model. Survey data were collected from 243 preservice music student teachers and analysed using structural equation modelling. The results showed that the integrated model could explain 71% of participants’ career intention. Personality traits exhibited indirect effects through the mediating roles of intrinsic, extrinsic, and social motivations. While all motivations yielded direct effects on career intention, internship experience had a negative impact. The findings provide new insights to develop effective strategies to channel career intention amongst preservice music student teachers for different stakeholders.

KEYWORDS:

• Teacher attrition
• preservice music student teachers
• personality traits
• motivation
• career intention

Introduction

Music teacher attrition and career decision have been prevalent concerns over the past few years (Carver-Thomas and Darling-Hammond 2019; Qin and Tao 2021). Music teacher attrition may negatively impact students, schools, and even educational expenditure (Kersaint et al. 2007; Lin et al. 2012). On the one hand, a high music teacher attrition rate may lead to the hiring of inexperienced or unqualified music teachers, detrimentally impacting the continuity and quality of students’ music learning (Sutcher, Darling-Hammond, and Carver-Thomas 2019). On the other, music teacher attrition is likely to result in a waste of educational investment and expenditure, including that related to recruitment, induction, and unemployment subsidies (Lin et al. 2012). Existing research has shown how attrition gains prominence amongst preservice music student teachers when they make post-graduation career decisions, as they may lack occupational identity and thus career intention to become music teachers (Freer and Bennett 2012). High attrition rates have been widely reported in countries such as China (Zhu et al. 2020), UK (Madigan and Kim 2021), USA (Kloss 2013), Australia (Weldon 2018), and Singapore (Bennett and Chong 2018). In light of this, the identification and understanding of the means to improve preservice music student teachers’ career intention to remain in the profession have received great attention in music education research (Ballantyne, Kerchner, and Aróstegui 2012; Mateos-Moreno 2022). However, the antecedents of career intention remain to be fully explored and deserve further examination.

Attrition amongst preservice music student teachers

Whilst previous studies have predominantly explored music teacher attrition amongst in-service music teachers (Liu 2021; Sutcher, Darling-Hammond, and Carver-Thomas 2019), fewer have examined this issue during their preservice stages (i.e. as preservice music student teachers). Although preservice music student teachers are more likely to develop a career in music teaching (Mateos-Moreno 2022) issues such as inadequate teacher identity (Ballantyne, Kerchner, and Aróstegui 2012) may play a critically deterring role. In contrast, in-service music teachers tend to establish an occupational commitment through their years of teaching experience, becoming less likely to leave the profession (Reeves and Kazelskis 1985). Career intention and its underlying mechanisms may thus differ between preservice and in-service teachers (Bruinsma and Jansen 2010). Therefore, their examination amongst preservice music student teachers may help us understand their career decisions, develop effective measures to promote the success of preservice teacher education programmes, and reduce music teacher attrition.

Factors affecting teacher attrition and career intention

Several studies within and outside the education field have shown the essential influence of demographics, personality traits, and motivations on career intention/decisions (or teacher attrition in other words) amongst in-service teachers and preservice student teachers (Hughes 2012; Pfarrwaller et al. 2022; Qin and Tao 2021). Previous studies have investigated key factors related to teacher attrition and career intention, including age, gender, salary, wage compensation, job stress, and family responsibilities (Farmer 2020; Liu 2021; Robison and Russell 2022). Personality traits may also have an indirect influence on career intention through motivations. For instance, Jugović et al. (2012) used the well-known five-factor personality model to investigate the relationships between personality traits and motivational factors for career intention amongst first-year preservice teachers. They found that, whilst some personality traits (e.g. extraversion and agreeableness) could predict intrinsic motivation, agreeableness showed a positive relationship with social motivation. However, the roles of these factors amongst preservice music student teachers are yet to be fully determined. More specifically, several key points still need to be addressed before developing effective strategies to reduce attrition rates amongst preservice music student teachers.

In the first place, no systematic consensus has been reached despite the significant research on teacher attrition and its determining factors produced over the past two decades. As an example, considerable divergences in the roles of motivations, personality traits, and demographics on career intention and teacher attrition have been reported by different studies (Jugović et al. 2012; Perryman and Calvert 2020; Watt and Richardson 2007; Yang, Hwang, and Song Lin and Professor David Lamond 2014). Methodological limitations such as the lack of systematic frameworks when examining the roles of these factors may contribute to such inconsistencies. Secondly, previous studies have been mostly conducted amongst in-service teachers or preservice teachers in so-called mainstream subjects (e.g. Literature, Sciences, English, Math, Business, and Technology) (Klassen and Chiu 2011; Trent 2019), but only a few in music (Bennett and Chong 2018; Mateos-Moreno 2022). The results obtained in other subject areas might not pertain to the music field, which has unique characteristics such as long-term professional training, fewer employment opportunities, and ambiguous self-occupational identities (Freer and Bennett 2012). Preservice music student teachers may consider their career decisions differently from teachers in other domains. In the third place, the relationships between personality traits and career intention/decision-making might differ between countries, as personality traits are underpinned by a cultural substratum (Heine and Buchtel 2009). This indicates that the specific cultural setting should be considered when examining the roles of personality traits. Nevertheless, most existing research has been undertaken in Western environments with Asia clearly lagging behind. Thus, evidence-based measures extracted from a Western cultural setting might not be applicable to the Chinese context due to differences in educational policies, cultural environment, and employment markets. Lastly, whilst demographics, personality traits, and motivation might interact with each other in determining individuals’ career intention (Jugović et al. 2012), few studies have endeavoured to develop an integrated research framework to examine their roles in determining career intention amongst preservice music student teachers.

The purpose of this study

The purpose of the present study was to examine the role of demographics, personality traits, and motivations in preservice music student teachers’ career. To do so, an integrated psychological decision model was designed to investigate preservice music student teachers’ intention to become music teachers. We applied structural equation modelling analysis to empirically test the integrated model with survey data from 243 Chinese preservice music student teachers. Our findings could not only help us understand the effects that these factors have on preservice music student teachers’ career intention but also aid policymakers, administrators, and educators to develop effective strategies enhancing preservice music student teachers’ intention to remain in the profession and develop personalised educational interventions for the successful implementation of preservice teacher education programmes.

Theoretical foundation and hypotheses development

The present section introduces the background literature and the hypotheses. Figure 1 illustrates our proposed model based on the hypotheses.

Figure 1. The proposed model and hypotheses.

Motivation and career intention

We introduce motivation as a theoretical psychological concept describing rationale behind our performance of, and reaction to, specific goals. Motivation theories have long been used to understand, illuminate, and predict human behaviours and behavioural intention in various settings, including educational environments (Cook and Artino 2016). Amongst the existing plethora of motivation theories, the intrinsic-extrinsic motivation model has been widely used to predict individuals’ behavioural intention and decisions (Vallerand and Ratelle 2002). This model poses that intrinsic motivation can be linked to self-driven rewards (e.g. interest, enjoyment, and inherent satisfaction), whilst extrinsic motivation pertains to behaviours leading to the attainment of external or contingent rewards (Vallerand and Ratelle 2002). Previous studies have showed that students’ motivation could predict and influence their career choices (Bargmann, Thiele, and Kauffeld 2022; Bruinsma and Jansen 2010). For example, preservice teachers showed a greater intrinsic motivation to stay in the profession longer (Bruinsma and Jansen 2010).

Beyond intrinsic and extrinsic motivation, social motivation explores the influence of social or environmental elements on human behaviours and behavioural intention, an approach that has been increasingly adopted to examine human behavioural intention in relevant literature (Hsu and Lin 2008). Social motivation can be identified through conformity, socialisation, peer pressure, and influence from important others (Qin and Tao 2021). For instance, previous evidence has shown the significant role of educators and specialists guiding students towards the adoption of a career path (Eesley and Wang 2017). Accordingly, when making their own career decisions, preservice music student teachers value and prefer to follow suggestions and beliefs from important others (e.g. teachers and peers), taking them as social motivation. Social motivation is thus likely to yield an effect on career intention.

In addition, previous studies indicated that intrinsic motivation could exert an impact on individuals’ behavioural intention indirectly by the roles of extrinsic and social motivation (Qin and Tao 2021). Moreover, intrinsically motivated preservice music student teachers are more likely to comply with beliefs from important others, usually desiring professional recognition. Thus, intrinsic motivation may impact social motivation amongst preservice music student teachers.

Thus, taking the intrinsic-extrinsic model as a basis, this study has integrated social motivation as a third necessary component to examine the role it plays in determining preservice music student teachers’ career intention. Overall, exploring the roles of motivation through such a tripartite framework would allow for a comprehensive understanding of its effects on preservice music students’ career intention. Based on the argument introduced thus far, we proposed that:

H1:

Extrinsic motivation yields a positive impact on preservice music student teachers’ career intention to become music teachers.

H2:

Intrinsic motivation yields a positive impact on preservice music student teachers’ career intention to become music teachers.

H3:

Social motivation yields a positive impact on preservice music student teachers’ career intention to become music teachers.

H4:

Intrinsic motivation yields a positive impact on preservice music student teachers’ extrinsic motivation to become music teachers.

H5:

Intrinsic motivation yields a positive impact on preservice music student teachers’ social motivation to become music teachers.

Personality traits and career intention

Personality traits have been widely recognised as one of the fundamental factors related to an individual’s behavioural intention, particularly in relation to career intention/decisions (Costa and McCrae 1992; Farrukh et al. 2018). Personality traits are usually defined as a series of consistent and stable psychosocial and behavioural patterns underpinning an individual’s thoughts and behaviours (McCrae and Costa 2003). For example, personality traits have been related to students’ career decisions (Mullola et al. 2018) and used to predict job performance and satisfaction (Bui 2017; Yang, Hwang, and Song Lin and Professor David Lamond 2014). In the preservice teacher education field, researchers have explored preservice teachers’ personality traits in their early career stage, finding a significant correlation between extraversion and agreeableness and their career satisfaction (Jugović et al. 2012).

The widely applied Big Five Personality Model (Bui 2017; Farrukh et al. 2018; Jugović et al. 2012; Mullola et al. 2018; Yang, Hwang, and Song Lin and Professor David Lamond 2014) describes an individual’s personality traits through five key characteristics: extraversion, agreeableness, openness to experience, conscientiousness, and neuroticism. Its reliability and validity have been consistently verified by previous studies across a wide range of fields (Bui 2017; Mullola et al. 2018). For instance, Mullola et al. (2018) suggested that four of the five traits (i.e. except neuroticism) are associated with physicians’ career intention. In contrast, Kroencke et al. (2020) demonstrated a negative effect of neuroticism on career intention, given the tendency of highly neurotic individuals to focus on negative emotions. However, current findings on the roles of personality traits in preservice music student teachers’ career intention remain limited. To counter this, our research used the Big Five Personality Model to test their influence on preservice music student teachers’ intention to become music teachers. Considering previous evidence, we proposed the following hypotheses:

H6a:

Agreeableness has a positive impact on preservice music student teachers’ career intention to become music teachers.

H6b:

Conscientiousness has a positive impact on preservice music student teachers’ career intention to become music teachers.

H6c:

Extraversion has a positive impact on preservice music student teachers’ career intention to become music teachers.

H6d:

Openness has a positive impact on preservice music student teachers’ career intention to become music teachers.

H6e:

Neuroticism has a negative impact on preservice music student teachers’ career intention to become music teachers.

Previous studies have also examined the influence of personality traits on motivation (Fuertes et al. 2020) and, more specifically, on students’ intrinsic and extrinsic motivation (Komarraju, Karau, and Schmeck 2009). For example, Jugović et al. (2012) found that personality traits served as better predictors of intrinsic motivation, while extraversion and agreeableness proved to be the most important predictors amongst the five personality traits. Our research assumes the impact of motivation on career intention (Bargmann, Thiele, and Kauffeld 2022; Bruinsma and Jansen 2010) and posits that personality traits, through motivation, could also influence preservice music student teachers’ career intention. Taking such an approach into account, we proposed the following hypotheses:

H7:

Agreeableness (H7a), conscientiousness (H7b), extraversion (H7c), and openness to experience (H7d) have positive impacts on preservice music student teachers’ intrinsic motivation to become music teachers, whilst neuroticism (H7e) has a negative impact.

H8:

Agreeableness (H8a), conscientiousness (H8b), extraversion (H8c), and openness to experience (H8d) have positive impacts on preservice music student teachers’ extrinsic motivation to become music teachers, whilst neuroticism (H8e) has a negative impact.

H9:

Agreeableness (H9a), conscientiousness (H9b), extraversion (H9c), and openness to experience (H9d) have positive impacts on preservice music student teachers’ social motivation to become music teachers, whilst neuroticism (H9e) has a negative impact.

Demographics and career intention

Numerous studies have documented the connections between demographics and an individual’s behavioural intention and decisions through elements such as gender, educational background, experience, and age (Aburumman et al. 2020; Santos, Roomi, and Liñán 2016; Scanlan et al. 2019). For example, Scanlan et al. (2019) found that male medical students were more likely to pursue other career opportunities than their female counterparts. Moreover, males were more likely to consider entrepreneurship as an acceptable career and showed a greater willingness to develop their entrepreneurial skills (Santos, Roomi, and Liñán 2016). In the music education field, prior literature has shown how preservice music teachers are highly likely to develop positive relationships with students during internship periods, develop a stronger occupational identity (Russell 2012), and thus further gravitate towards becoming music teachers. Similarly, sustained professional training influence preservice music teachers’ occupational identity, as their increasing identification as music professionals (e.g. musicians, singers, and performers) (Freer and Bennett 2012) lowers their intention to become music teachers. However, the impact of demographics on preservice music student teachers’ career intention/decisions in relation to personality traits and motivation remains unexplored. To address this, the present study selected three key demographic factors (i.e. internship experience in music teaching, years of professional training, and expertise) to explore their roles in preservice music student teachers’ career intention. The following hypotheses were proposed:

H10a:

Internship experience in music teaching has a positive impact on preservice music student teachers’ career intention to become music teachers.

H10b:

Gender has an impact on preservice music student teachers’ career intention to become music teachers.

H10c:

Professional training has a negative impact on preservice music student teachers’ career intention to become music teachers.

Methods

Participants

This study employed a self-report online questionnaire survey. Preservice music student teachers from several Chinese universities and colleges, enrolled in three- or four-year educational programmes designed to train qualified music teachers for primary and secondary education, were invited to participate. Upon graduation, these students may choose to pursue their career path (i.e. to become a music teacher) or abandon it (e.g. to find other occupations instead of teaching music). Two hundred and eighty participants (280) were invited and two hundred and fifty-five (255) filled out the questionnaire, with a response rate of 91%. We obtained 243 valid samples for data analysis after discarding eight invalid ones. Table 1 summarises demographic information.

Table 1. Statistics for participants’ demographic information.

Variables	Type	Number of participants	Percent
Sex	Male	33		13.6%
	Female	210		86.4%
Expertise of music teaching	Instrumental	51		21.0%
	Vocal	151		62.1%
	Chinese classical dance	41		16.9%
Years of professional music training before the enrolment of current music education programme	None	77		31.7%
	3 years or less	139		57.2%
	4–6 years	22		9.1%
	7 years or more	5		2.0%
Current year in the music education programme	Year one	111		45.7%
	Year two	35		14.4%
	Year three	88		36.2%
	Year four	9		3.7%
Internship experience in music teaching	Presence	88		36.2%
	Absence	155		63.8%

Procedures

An online questionnaire survey was sent to participants in January 2022 through Wenjuanxing, one of the main online survey companies in China. We notified participants of the collection of personal yet anonymous data, such as demographics, personality traits, and career intention. To reduce potential biased or insincere feedback, we stressed the anonymity of their responses, the need to answer the questionnaire carefully and honestly, and the confidentiality of their personal information. Participants provided informed consent when filling out the survey.

Instruments

The present study developed a questionnaire after a broad review of existing literature and consultation with music teachers and students (potential participants). Measurement scales were validated by and adopted from previous studies: three-item scales for intrinsic motivation, extrinsic motivation, and social motivation (Venkatesh and Davis 2000; Watt and Richardson 2007), respectively, and a four-item scale for career intention (Venkatesh and Davis 2000). We adopted Big Five Inventory-10 (BFI-10) (Costa and McCrae 1992) to measure personality traits, each dimension being measured by two items. We chose the briefer BFI-10 over other complex rating instruments (e.g. 60-item Big-Five Inventory, (Costa and McCrae 1992)) that are too lengthy and may thus affect data quality. A BFI-10 guarantees a good compromise between accurate measurements and participants’ time costs (Gosling et al. 2003), introducing an adequate framework to gather and analyse the necessary data. The widely used seven-point Likert scale was adopted to indicate participants’ responses to questionnaire items.

Cronbach’s coefficient was adopted to assess internal consistency reliability for scales with three or more items, whilst Spearman-Brown coefficient was adopted to estimate internal consistency reliability for scales with two items (Eisinga, Grotenhuis, and Pelzer 2013). Cronbach’s coefficient greater than 0.7 and Spearman-Brown coefficients greater than 0.45 were deemed acceptable (Thalmayer, Saucier, and Eigenhuis 2011). All scales showed acceptable consistency reliability, with the only exception of agreeableness (Spearman-Brown coefficient 0.184). We thus removed agreeableness from our proposed model but also conducted sensitivity analysis to check its impact on the relationships proposed in the original framework. The sources and consistency reliability for the questionnaire scales can be seen in Table 2.

Table 2. Questionnaire items and their sources in the examined model.

Construct	Questionnaire Items	Sources	Item loadings	AVE	Composite reliability	Spearman-Brown/Cronbach coefficient
Agreeableness	Agree1 Generally trusting Agree2 Tend to find fault with others*	Costa and McCrae (1992)	0.74 0.74	0.548	0.71	0.184
Conscientiousness	Con1 Tend to be lazy* Con2 Do a thorough job	Costa and McCrae (1992)	0.83 0.83	0.689	0.82	0.533
Extroversion	Extr1 Reserved* Extr2 Outgoing, sociable	Costa and McCrae (1992)	0.87 0.87	0.757	0.86	0.669
Neuroticism	Neu1 Relaxed, handles stress well* Neu2 Get nervous easily	Costa and McCrae (1992)	0.81 0.81	0.656	0.79	0.474
Openness to experience	Open1 Have few artistic interests* Open2 Have an active imagination	Costa and McCrae (1992)	0.83 0.83	0.689	0.82	0.563
Intrinsic motivation	IM1 I find that being a music teacher will be fun. IM2 I will get enjoyment from being a music teacher. IM3 I will enjoy my work as a music teacher.	Watt and Richardson (2007)	0.93 0.96 0.95	0.896	0.96	0.944
Extrinsic motivation	EM1 Working as a music teacher can satisfy my personalised needs. EM2 I choose to work as a teacher as many peers around me work as a music teacher. EM3 Working as a music teacher gives me rewards.	Watt and Richardson (2007)	0.84 0.81 0.85	0.695	0.87	0.776
Social motivation	SM1 Those who influence me think that I should work as a music teacher. SM2 Those who are important to me consider that I should choose music teacher as career. SM3 If most of my classmates choose to work as a music teacher, I will do so as well.	Venkatesh and Davis (2000)	0.90 0.89 0.67	0.684	0.86	0.755
Career intention	CI1 I will recommend music teacher as the first career to my peers. CI2 I am willing to work as a music teacher in future. CI3 I will make an effort to work as a music teacher. CI4 I intend to work as a music teacher in future.	Davis (1989)^‡	0.85 0.96 0.90 0.95	0.839	0.95	0.933

AVE, Average variance extracted.

*.means that the item should be reversely coded.

^‡.The reliability of personality traits was assessed with Spearman-Brown coefficient, while the reliability for other constructs were assessed with Cronbach’s coefficient.

Once we drafted the questionnaire, we invited in-service educators (with a background in psychology) and students to provide feedback to refine its quality and validity. We provided a Chinese translation to guarantee the accuracy of item selection and the correctness of the writing and invited two bilingual specialists to back-translate it. Both English versions were compared, showing no significant differences. The questionnaire began with a brief description of the study, followed by items to collect participants’ demographic information, and by items measuring constructs in the proposed model.

Data analysis

Inter-correlations amongst major variables were assessed by bivariate correlation analyses. The measurement model was verified through the assessment of the constructs’ convergent and discriminant validity. Convergent validity was verified by three criteria widely used in previous studies (Fornell and Larcker 1981): composite reliability, item reliability, and the average variance extracted (AVE) per construct. Composite reliability qualified as valid for values greater than 0.70 (DeVellis and Thorpe 2021). We assessed the item reliability by verifying that all items’ factor loadings were significant and larger than 0.50 (Hair et al. 2010). Adequate AVE value was also confirmed for values that exceeded 0.50. For discriminant validity, a larger AVE value of the square root versus all the bivariate correlations in any specific construct was verified.

The hypothesised structural model was examined with structural equation modelling (SEM) in AMOS 21, adopting maximum likelihood estimates to assess path coefficients in the examined model. Several widely used goodness-of-fit metrics were adopted to verify model-to-data fitness, including the Tucker-Lewis index (TLI ≥ 0.9), the ratio of the Chi-square statistic to the degree of freedom (χ2/d.f. < 3), the comparative fit index (CFI ≥ 0.9), the incremental fit index (IFI ≥ 0.9), the adjusted goodness-of-fit index (AGFI ≥ 0.8), and the root mean square error of approximation (RMSEA < 0.08) (Rao, Miller, and Rao 2011).

Results

Correlations amongst tested variables

The correlations and means of tested variables can be seen in Table 3. Correlations amongst most variables were moderate. Both personality traits and motivation factors were significantly correlated with career intention, indicating their importance in shaping preservice music student teachers’ career intention.

Table 3. Descriptive statistics of and correlations amongst the examined variables.

Variables	Agreeableness	Conscientiousness	Extroversion	Neuroticism	Openness to Experience	Intrinsic motivation	Extrinsic motivation	Social motivation	Career intention
(1) Agreeableness	0.740
(2) Conscientiousness	0.265**	0.830
(3) Extroversion	0.211**	0.421**	0.870
(4) Neuroticism	−0.160*	−0.354**	−0.532**	0.810
(5) Openness to Experience	0.243**	0.481**	0.495**	−0.364**	0.830
(6) Intrinsic motivation	0.198**	0.441**	0.242**	−0.176**	0.473**	0.947
(7) Extrinsic motivation	0.118	0.303**	0.157*	−0.277**	0.259**	0.405**	0.834
(8) Social motivation	0.090	0.286**	0.328**	−0.201**	0.403**	0.595**	0.456**	0.827
(9) Career intention	0.186**	0.449**	0.329**	−0.243**	0.466**	0.761**	0.463**	0.636**	0.916
Mean (Range: 1–7)	4.0	4.5	4.5	4.0	5.0	5.0	4.3	4.3	5.0
Standard deviation (SD)	0.8	0.8	1.1	1.0	0.9	1.0	1.0	0.9	0.9

Diagonal bold numbers are the square root of average variance extracted (AVE).

*p < 0.05; **p < 0.01.

Measurement model results

The results showed that factor loadings and the AVE for all the constructs exceeded 0.5 and that all composite reliabilities were above 0.7 (Table 2), exhibiting adequate convergent validity. Each construct’ square root of the AVE was larger than any of its bivariate correlations (Table 3), indicating desired discriminant validity. It was thus appropriate for further assessment of the structural model.

The structural model

As agreeableness showed less satisfactory reliability (see Table 2), two structural models, with and without the construct, were examined to check its impact on the relationships under examination. Figure 2 illustrates results with significant paths for the original model, whilst Figure 3 shows results from sensitivity analysis where agreeableness had been excluded from the tested model. The comparison between both showed no significant differences. This grounded our decision to remove agreeableness from the final model (Figure 3) reported hereinafter.

Figure 2. The model with the unqualified variable and significant standardised path coefficients. * p < 0.05; ** p < 0.01; *** p < 0.001.

Figure 3. The final model and significant standardised path coefficients. * p < 0.05; ** p < 0.01; *** p < 0.001.

The results of the goodness-of-fit metrics indicate an adequate match between the proposed model and data (χ2/d.f. = 2.41, AGFI = 0.82, TLI = 0.91, CFI = 0.93, IFI = 0.94, RMSEA = 0.076). Table 4 includes results of hypothesis testing in the structural model. Extrinsic motivation (β = 0.13, p = 0.027), intrinsic motivation (β = 0.55, p < 0.001), and social motivation (β = 0.34, p = 0.004) positively impacted career intention, supporting H1, H2 and H3. In addition, intrinsic motivation positively influenced extrinsic motivation (β = 0.43, p < 0.001), and social motivation (β = 0.30, p < 0.001) therefore supporting H4 and H5. H6b, H6c, H6d, and H6e were not supported as all personality traits exerted no direct impact on career intention.

Table 4. Results of hypothesis testing.

Hypotheses	Coefficients of the examined path	t values	p values	Hypothesis supported?
H1: EM → CI	0.13	2.21	0.027	Yes
H2: IM → CI	0.55	8.36	<0.001	Yes
H3: SM →CI	0.34	2.89	0.004	Yes
H4: IM → EM	0.43	5.97	<0.001	Yes
H5: IM →SM	0.30	5.69	<0.001	Yes
H6a: Agreeableness→ CI	-	-	-	-
H6b: Conscientiousness → CI	0.09	1.54	0.123	No
H6c: Extroversion → CI	0.03	0.75	0.456	No
H6d: Openness to experience →CI	0.03	0.47	0.637	No
H6e: Neuroticism →CI	−0.01	−0.14	0.891	No
H7a: Agreeableness → IM	-	-	-	-
H7b: Conscientiousness → IM	0.37	4.76	<0.001	Yes
H7c: Extroversion → IM	−0.03	−0.49	0.627	No
H7d: Openness to experience → IM	0.41	5.62	<0.001	Yes
H7e: Neuroticism → IM	0.06	0.86	0.390	No
H8a: Agreeableness → EM	-	-	-
H8b: Conscientiousness → EM	0.14	1.75	0.080	No
H8c: Extroversion → EM	−0.10	−1.60	0.110	No
H8d: Openness to experience → EM	0.05	0.57	0.569	No
H8e: Neuroticism → EM	−0.18	−2.56	0.010	Yes
H9a: Agreeableness → SM	-	-	-	-
H9b: Conscientiousness → SM	−0.05	−1.12	0.265	No
H9c: Extroversion → SM	0.11	2.99	0.003	Yes
H9d: Openness to experience → SM	0.08	1.82	0.069	No
H9e: Neuroticism → SM	0.01	0.27	0.791	No
H10a: IEMT → CI	−0.11	−2.13	0.033	No
H10b: Gender → CI	0.05	0.43	0.665	No
H10c: PTY → CI	0.04	0.87	0.384	No

CI, Career intention; IM, Intrinsic motivation; EM, Extrinsic motivation; SM, Social motivation; IEMT, Internship experience in music teaching; PTY, Professional training years.

It should be noted that agreeableness was not examined in the final model, as it had unacceptable reliability. Thus, results for hypotheses involving agreeableness were unavailable.

Two personality dimensions (i.e. conscientiousness (β = 0.37, p < 0.001) and openness (β = 0.41, p < 0.001)) yielded positive effects on intrinsic motivation (supporting H7b and H7d). Extroversion (β = 0.11, p = 0.003) had a positive impact on social motivation (supporting H9c), whilst neuroticism (β = −0.18, p = 0.010) negatively impacted extrinsic motivation (supporting H8e). No other significant relationships between personality dimensions and motivations were detected. Regarding demographics, only internship experience in music teaching (β = −0.11, p = 0.033) showed a negative impact on career intention. Therefore, H10a, H10b, and H10c were not supported.

Concerning motivations: two personality dimensions (i.e. conscientiousness and openness) contributed to 32% of the variance in intrinsic motivation, 47% of the variance in social motivation accounted for extroversion and intrinsic motivation, and 35% of the variance in extrinsic motivation was explained by neuroticism and intrinsic motivation. Overall, antecedents of personality traits, motivations, and internship experience in music teaching contributed to 71% of the variance in career intention.

Discussion

Our study proposed and examined a model aimed at understanding preservice music student teachers’ career intention to become music teachers in Mainland China. The proposed analytical framework considered the roles of key aspects such as demographics, personality traits, and motivations. Our research opens new paths to investigate key factors influencing preservice music student teachers’ career intention to become music teachers.

Primary findings

According to our results, the proposed model fits the analysed data and could explain 71% variance in preservice music student teachers’ intention to become music teachers, a percentage that is equal or greater to that reported by similar research (e.g. 71% by (Aburumman et al. 2020) and 60% by (Dunn, Hattie, and Bowles 2018)). Our merging of personality traits with the motivation theory framework, which enhances the integrated model’s predictability, accounts for this. Overall, the results verified the predicted roles of extrinsic motivation, intrinsic motivation, social motivation, and music teaching internship experience on preservice music student teachers’ career intention to become music teachers.

In particular, intrinsic motivation was found to positively influence career intention. Such results were in line with existing studies on career and professional training intention amongst preservice teachers (Qin and Tao 2021; Tang et al. 2020) showing how the more highly intrinsically motivated preservice music student teachers choose to teach music after graduation.

Extrinsic motivation had a direct impact on career intention. This is consistent with previous research, demonstrating both the direct and indirect influence of extrinsic motivation on career intention (Oliveira, Barbeitos, and Calado 2021; Qin and Tao 2021). In our study, preservice music student teachers choose to enrol in music education programmes and to become music teachers after their graduation due to either intrinsic desired (e.g. vocational) or extrinsic appeal (e.g. high salaries or the linked social status). This reinforces Mateos-Moreno’s 2022, demonstrating the crucial role of external aspects (e.g. school funding, workload, and salary) in preservice music student teachers’ career concerns.

Moreover, social motivation plays a crucial role in predicting career intention. Preservice music student teachers tend to consider the suggestions of professionally qualified and recognised individuals when making career choices. Qin and Tao (2021) proved that preservice music student teachers may internalise important others’ expectations as their own, a fact arguably related to the collectivist culture in China and to Chinese Confucianism. Whilst the younger generation prefers to follow family beliefs (e.g. parents and seniors) (Wang et al. 2016), both teachers and parents have a profound influence on the students’ decision-making (Liu and Morgan 2016). Moreover, since preservice music student teachers may not be prepared to make a fully informed independent decision (Dewberry and Jackson 2018), they are more likely to take into account suggestions from relevant others when choosing future career paths.

In addition, our research showed the direct and indirect impact of intrinsic motivation on career intention via both extrinsic and social motivations. On the one hand, it suggested that preservice music student teachers’ intrinsic motivation influences their extrinsic motivation to become music teachers. Vallerand and Ratelle (2002) found that intrinsic motivation may be transformed into external motivation by an extrinsic force. In our study, most preservice music student teachers enrolled in educational programmes for intrinsic reasons. Eventually, a greater understanding of the external rewards of a teaching career led to the emergence of extrinsic motivation to choose such a career path. On the other hand, intrinsic motivation can also impact social motivation. When preservice music student teachers are intrinsically motivated to become music teachers, their desire may be reinforced by an agreement with their parents’ and teachers’ supportive suggestions, eventually taking these suggestions as their own. Thus, we argue that intrinsic, extrinsic, and social motivation coexist (Lemos and Veríssimo 2014) and interact to impact preservice music student teachers’ career intention to become music teachers.

Unexpectedly, our research found limited direct effects of personality traits on career intention, a finding that was inconsistent with previous research (Budaev and Brown 2011; Farrukh et al. 2018). This may be due to their lesser methodological significance in our exploration of preservice music student teachers’ career intention. Interestingly, this unexpected finding appears to support Omar and Dequan’s (2020), showing the greater impact of motivational over personality traits on an individual’s behavioural intention. However, since some personality traits yielded indirect effects on career intention – through motivations – their connection remains relevant. Firstly, both openness and conscientiousness had a significant positive influence on intrinsic motivation. Our findings, consistent with previous research, suggest that preservice music student teachers with greater conscientiousness and openness are more likely to choose teaching as future career, thus conscientiousness and openness are more important predictors for intrinsic motivation amongst personality traits (Tlili et al. 2019). Secondly, neuroticism is a negatively influential predictor of extrinsic motivation. Highly neurotic individuals tend to focus on their negative emotions (e.g. threats and emotional pressures) paying more attention to, and being more concerned about, the potential negative consequences (Kroencke et al. 2020). Thus, preservice music student teachers with high neuroticism may pay greater attention to the negative ramifications of a music teaching career (e.g. workload and job stress). Thirdly, extroversion positively influences social motivation. Highly extroverted students will be more likely influenced by their parents, teachers, and relevant others. Previous studies have identified a strong link between parent-child relationships and the development of extroversion (Fonseca 2021), suggesting that positive and closer father-child relationships are more prone to foster extroverted personalities. Our research appears to echo this finding, highlighting the influence of important others on career intention for extroverted students.

Moreover, amongst the demographic factors, only internship experience in music teaching had an impact on preservice music student teachers’ career intention while gender and professional training years did not. Whilst we initially hypothesised the positive influence of internship experience in music teaching on career intention due to its contribution towards preservice teachers’ occupational identify (Russell 2012), our results countered the conclusions reached by previous studies. We argue that such a negative influence may relate to the stressful working conditions linked to low internship satisfaction, as considered by Mensah et al. (2021).

Implications

The findings from this study have clear theoretical and practical implications. Theoretically, they demonstrate the sufficiency and efficacy of the proposed model, based on motivation theory and personality traits, to predict and understand preservice music student teachers’ career intention to become music teachers. In particular, our research enriched previous literature by testing the impact of a comprehensive set of demographics, personality traits, and motivational elements. In addition, we have quantified the direction and magnitude of the interrelations between those factors and career intention.

On a practical level, policymakers, educators, and administrators responsible for the development of music teacher education programmes could also use our findings to advance effective measures increasing music teacher retention rates. In particular, the examination of the motivations underpinning career intention stresses the need to develop measures ensuring the adequate intrinsic motivation of preservice music student teachers and the attractiveness of the extrinsic professional rewards and benefits. This reinforces related discussions introduced in previous literature (Whitaker and Valtierra 2018). For example, several studies have linked music teachers’ career choices (Mateos-Moreno 2022) to specific external concerns (e.g. working hours, workload, and salary) that should be taken into account by policymakers in order to improve extrinsic motivation (e.g. increasing salaries, rationalising work hours, promoting the legitimacy of music as a subject). Whilst previous studies explored the significance of intrinsic and extrinsic motivation, our findings revealed the tantamount role of social motivation in the implementation of educational programmes for music teacher students. In view of this, educators should engage important others (e.g. parents and previous teachers) in the advertisement of educational programmes and obtain their recognition and support to recommend music teaching as a future career.

In addition, we should also value the significance of preservice music student teachers’ personality traits, which should be examined in detail by administrators and educators when enrolling new students into preservice music teacher education programmes. Moreover, educators should design teaching activities and course contents aimed at cultivating enrolled students’ conscientiousness and openness personalities, as these will impact intrinsic motivation and career intention. Educators should also convey their own experiences to students as this could be a highly influential social motivational tool impacting career intention. Overall, policymakers should optimally allocate educational resources in preservice music student teachers’ educational programmes according to the diverse roles of antecedents of career intention to decrease teacher attrition rates.

Limitations

Whilst our study represents a significant contribution to music education, we acknowledge its limitations and argue that they could and should be addressed in future research. In the first place, whilst we obtained a statistically adequate sample size (243), according to widely recognised rules of thumb for SEM sample size determination (Hair, Ringle, and Sarstedt 2011; Kline 2015; Weston and Gore 2006), its representativeness of China’s total population remains questionable. As such, our research could be seen as a pilot study providing a framework for future large-scale research involving participants from a greater range of universities and regions, increasing the representativeness of sample size and allowing us to draw more solidly-grounded conclusions. Secondly, our participants were limited to preservice music student teachers from Mainland China. Future studies could incorporate samples from different cultural backgrounds and other types of preservice music teacher education programmes. Thirdly, a longitudinal study would be necessary to clarify the contradiction between our examination of the direct influence of extrinsic motivation on career intention and previous research (Qin and Tao 2021). One potential explanation would be that extrinsic motivation may only elicit temporary compliance with an individual’s behavioural intention (Olatokun and Irene Nwafor 2012). Finally, as an arguable result of the limited sample and questionnaire items, one of the personality traits (i.e. agreeableness) did not pass our item reliability test: a long instrument with further items would be thus required to assess personality traits.

Conclusions

Our study proposed and tested an integrated psychological decision model to understand preservice music student teachers’ intention to become music teachers after graduation. The results indicated the sufficiency and efficacy of the proposed model, helping us identify several important antecedents of career intention, such as all three motivation types (e.g. intrinsic, extrinsic, and social motivation), for preservice music student teachers. Our findings could help policymakers, administrators, and educators develop more attractive strategies and policies for the analysed demographics. In addition, this pilot investigation could work as the basis for future research exploring the changing roles of the examined antecedents in career intention amongst preservice music student teachers through a longitudinal approach involving different socio-cultural contexts.

Ethics Declarations

After consultation with the local ethics committee, ethical review and approval were waived for this study, as it is just a subjective evaluation not involving any potentially harmful experimentation. However, we adhered to the ethical standards of informed consent, confidentiality, and anonymity (informed consent was obtained from the participants prior to filling out the survey), and the data were collected anonymously and securely stored.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Funding

This study was not supported by any grant or external funding.

Notes on contributors

Mingfu Qin

Mingfu Qin is a PhD: Her research interests lie in music education

Roberto Alonso Trillo

Roberto Alonso Trillo: He has research interests covering areas relating to music education.