Thematic Issue: Autonomy, Volitional Motivation, and Wellness

Abstract

Autonomy is the experience of being the author and origin of one’s behavior—the subjective experience that one’s moment-to-moment activity authentically expresses the self and its needs, desires, and intentions. This experience matters in people’s lives, and it matters in important and far-reaching ways, as autonomy functions as motivational support to people’s positive functioning (e.g., engagement, learning, performance, intrinsic motivation) and well-being (e.g., positive affect, vitality, self-esteem, mental health; Ryan & Deci, 2000). Hence, autonomy is now recognized as a core theoretical concept in the study of human motivation and emotion. This special issue of Motivation and Emotion reflects the ascendancy of autonomy as a core theoretical concept, and it continues a 35-year tradition which essentially began with the birth of self-determination theory and Deci’s (1971) publication on how extrinsic rewards affect intrinsic motivational processes. This issue is comprised of a thematic collection of papers drawn from submissions over the past year. They build on this research tradition, and do so by conceptualizing autonomy either as a psychological need, a state-like experience, a marker of high-quality motivation, or an outcome in its own right. What the papers all have in common is their documentation of the fundamental role that autonomy plays in people’s volitional motivation and psychological, emotional, and physical wellness. The first set of papers investigates autonomy as a psychological need to show how its pursuit and satisfaction promotes volition and wellness. Miquelon and Vallerand show how the pursuit of autonomous goals in academic life is associated with both happiness and self-realization, particularly when academic life turns stressful. Vansteenkiste and his coauthors show how autonomy need satisfaction in the