Motivation in college - Understanding Norwegian college students' performance on the LASSI Motivation Subscale and their beliefs about academic motivation

Norwegian college students have been found to score remarkably low on the M otivation subscale of the Learning and Study Strategies Inventory (LASSI) i n relation to American norms. In this study, we first administered the LASS I Motivation subscale to a sample of 15 Norwegian college students and then interviewed the students about their responses to the scale items and thei r beliefs about academic motivation. Only the students having the highest s cores on the Motivation scale seemed to wholeheartedly value the activities described by the scale items and conceive of motivation in the self-discip line and duty-oriented way reflected by the scale. In contrast, the student s having the lowest scores did not seem to value the activities described b y the scale items and clearly defined academic motivation in terms of inter est, enjoyment, and excitement. It is suggested that one important reason w hy so many Norwegian students score low on the LASSI Motivation scale might be that they have a strong sense of autonomy and are intrinsically rather than extrinsically motivated. In conclusion, possible contextual difference s between American students and our Norwegian participants are also discuss ed. (C) 2001 Elsevier Science Inc. All rights reserved.