Scholarship Status and Gender Differences in Motivation among U.S. Collegiate Track and Field Athletes

Abstract

The purpose of the current study was to determine differences in motivation between scholarship and non-scholarship collegiate male and female athletes. Participants ( n = 162) were collegiate track and field athletes in the U.S.A. The Sport Motivation Scale (SMS) was used to assess participant's intrinsic and extrinsic motivation as well as amotivation. A 2 × 2 factorial MANOVA was used to determine scholarship status and gender differences. Significant main effects were found for scholarship status ( p < .01) and gender ( p < .01). A significant interaction effect was found for scholarship status by gender ( p < .05). This study further supports cognitive evaluation theory (CET) in understanding sport motivation and results indicate that external rewards are related to lower levels of intrinsic motivation and higher levels of extrinsic motivation and slightly lower levels of amotivation. In addition, the study supports that gender is an important factor to understand motivation among athletes.