Students' strongly positive STEM interest and identity predict their future study and career choices in a STEM field. STEM education studies addressing multiple disciplines together are insufficient, as they have produced mixed findings and inadequate direction for advancing integrated STEM education. Self-determination theory (SDT) provides an…

Background: Consistent with self-determination theory (SDT), teachers may differ in the motivating style used to motivate students in physical education (PE). When relying on need-supportive behaviors, teachers attempt to provide students with opportunities for choices and initiative (autonomy support), valuable information and feedback…

Students' adaptive motivation to study tends to decrease over time. However, the reasons for this decline are not fully understood. Drawing on self-determination theory (SDT), we investigated whether changes in teachers' motivating style and students' associated need-based experiences could explain the motivational decline documented in the…

Due to the growing number of students enrolling as homeless in American public schools, a quantitative design was applied to determine if students in an Illinois suburban, kindergarten through eighth grade school district (District A), who are enrolled under the McKinney-Vento Act and are receiving resources of food, shelter, clothing, and…

This study examined moderate-to-vigorous physical activity (MVPA) trends in physical education (PE) classes and beyond school hours in children's need satisfaction profiles over 3 years. Participants were 445 (girls 256, boys 189) Finnish schoolchildren (M[subscript age] = 11.26 ± 0.32 years). Need satisfaction self-reports and accelerometer-based…

This study explores students' perspectives on the satisfaction of basic psychological needs in the classroom and the potential effects on their learning growth in a summer reading program. The summer reading program was free for students in grades 1-8 and was designed to prevent reading-level losses during the summer for students from lower-income…

Student motivation research seeks to uncover greater understanding of when, how, and why students succeed or fail in school settings. Self-determination theory has been at the forefront of helping educational stakeholders answer questions on student motivation. This study investigates the motivation mediation model proposed by self-determination…

The present study investigated whether an autonomy-supportive intervention influenced students' need satisfaction, achievement emotions, and strategies of self-regulated learning differently depending on several student characteristics. The study was conducted with a sample of 345 9th-grade students in 17 physics classrooms who were randomly…

The purpose of the current study was to provide a greater depth of knowledge about teachers' psychological functioning at work-including the contextual, basic psychological need satisfaction and personal factors relevant to this. We examined the extent to which perceived autonomy support predicts basic psychological need satisfaction and, in turn,…

Self-determination theory posits that satisfaction of the needs for autonomy, competence and relatedness represents the basic nutriments for humans' optimal functioning. It also postulates that with greater the degree to which these three needs are equally satisfied, the quality of motivation is further enhanced. Yet, this premise has remained…

According to self-determination theory, the satisfaction of the basic needs for autonomy, competence, and relatedness influences achievement emotions and situational interest. The present study investigated whether domain-specific explicit need strength moderated the impact of need satisfaction/dissatisfaction on the outcomes achievement emotions…

The present study examined the efficacy of autonomy-supportive teaching during elementary school physical education (PE) in influencing pupils' enjoyment, fear of failure, boredom and effort. A sample of 54 pupils attending fifth and sixth grades comprised the control group (typical instruction; n = 27) and the experimental group…