Building relationships in higher education to support students’ motivation

ABSTRACT

Student-teacher relationships in higher education take place in two embedded social contexts: the in-class environment and the educational institute in which the in-class environment is situated. The interplay between the two contexts and their association with students’ motivation was studied in the current study. In a broad sample (N=597), perceptions of student-staff relationship quality, need-supportive teaching in class, and autonomous and controlled motivation were measured. Perceptions of in-class teacher involvement were associated with autonomous motivation, while perceptions of in-class teacher structure were associated with controlled motivation. The association of perceptions of in-class teacher involvement and autonomy support with autonomous motivation seemed to be suppressed by perceptions of trust in benevolence. This indicates that students can get a ‘just tell me what to do’- attitude when trust in benevolence makes them shift from being supported to depending on support. Studying both embedded contexts in one analysis, resulted in a more fine-grained insight.

KEYWORDS:

• Student-staff interactions
• need-supportive teaching
• relationship quality
• motivation
• self-determination theory

Disclosure statement

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

Additional information

Funding

The second author received funding for this study by the Netherlands Organization for Scientific Research (NWO) under Grant Number 023.006.035 (Snijders). Nederlandse Organisatie voor Wetenschappelijk Onderzoek.