title: Characterizing the motivational orientation of students in higher education: a naturalistic study in three Hong Kong universities.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  Consideration of motivation in higher education has often been drawn upon theories and research that were based upon school or workplace studies.
  
  
  OBJECTIVE
  This paper reports an open naturalistic study to better characterize the motivational orientation of students in higher education.
  
  
  METHODS
  Open semi-structured individual interviews were conducted with 36 students from three universities in Hong Kong. The analysis used an exploratory grounded theory approach.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Motivation was characterized as a framework with six continua with positive and negative poles. On enrolment, students had positions on the six facets of motivation, which shifted as they progressed through their degree, according to perceptions of their teaching and learning environment. The positive poles of the six continua were given labels: compliance, individual goal setting, interest, career, sense of belonging and university lifestyle.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  The formulation of motivational orientation is consistent with contemporary social cognitive theories of motivation in that it has been characterized as a multifaceted phenomenon, with students expressing context-dependent multiple motives.
authors.affiliation: Centre for Learning Enhancement and Research, Chinese University of Hong Kong, Shatin, Hong Kong. david.kember@cuhk.edu.hk
authors.forename: David
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Kember
authors.forename: Celina
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Hong
authors.forename: Amber
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Ho
mesh_terms: D000124:Achievement; D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D001240:Aspirations, Psychological; D002321:Career Choice; D003299:Cooperative Behavior; D005260:Female; D006040:Goals; D006723:Hong Kong; D006801:Humans; D007206:Individuality; D007389:Internal-External Control; D008297:Male; D009042:Motivation; D012931:Social Environment; D012933:Social Identification; D013334:Students / Q000523:psychology*; D014495:Universities