Abstract
BackgroundSeveral studies have focused on the assessment of students’ motivation because this construct is very important to understand students’ learning and how to enhance it. The Academic Self-Regulation Questionnaire (SRQ-A), based on the self-determination theory is a self-report instrument developed to access the reasons why students do their school work. However, there is no Portuguese version of this questionnaire for late elementary students. The primary goal of this research was to analyze the psychometric properties of a Portuguese version of SRQ-A in the domain of Mathematics with elementary school children.MethodsParticipants were 341 elementary school children ranging from 8 to 11 years old from the third and fourth grades. The Portuguese version of the SRQ-A included 24 items assessing four regulatory styles (external, introjected, identified, and intrinsic) in three behavioral categories (homework, classwork, and answering questions in mathematics lessons). To examine the psychometric properties of the instrument, we conducted an exploratory structural equation modeling (ESEM), measured gender and grade invariance, and calculated internal consistency indexes and temporal stability.ResultsESEM analyses supported the original multidimensional structure of the measure with four regulatory styles using a reduced version of the instrument with 16 items. Correlations between the four regulatory styles revealed a simplex pattern consistent with the continuum of self-determination theory. Results showed adequate internal consistency for all regulatory styles (α ≥ .73; CR ≥ .76) and temporal stability (4-month test-retest ≥ .43). The questionnaire showed measurement and structural invariance across gender and grade. Finally, some gender differences were observed; on average, boys scored higher than girls in external regulation. No differences were observed between grades.ConclusionsOur findings suggest that the Portuguese version of the SRQ-A has good psychometric properties providing adequate support for its use in educational research on motivational styles, including studies concerning gender and grade differences in self-regulation.
Highlights
Several studies have focused on the assessment of students’ motivation because this construct is very important to understand students’ learning and how to enhance it
These results showed that the fit values of Tucker-Lewis index (TLI) and root mean square error of approximation (RMSEA) for the two-factor model did not meet the standards that are currently recommended (Schreiber, 2017; the two-factor model estimates can be observed in the Additional file 2 - Table 1)
Our study supported that the Portuguese version of the Self-Regulation Questionnaire (SRQ-A) for mathematics has good psychometric properties and can be a useful tool both for research and for educational interventions at the elementary school level
Summary
Several studies have focused on the assessment of students’ motivation because this construct is very important to understand students’ learning and how to enhance it. Individuals differ in their level of interest, persistence, and engagement when performing different tasks. Self-determination theory (SDT, Deci & Ryan, 1985, 2000; Ryan & Deci, 2000a) addresses central questions concerning what people do and why do they do it. This theoretical framework provides definitions for intrinsic motivation and varied forms of extrinsic motivation, representing the dynamics of human motivation and the benefits and costs of different styles of behavioral regulation. If intrinsic motivation is the prototype of self-determined activity, some forms of extrinsic motivation are more controlled while others are more autonomous (Deci & Ryan, 2000; Ryan & Deci, 2000b)
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