An examination of Singaporean teacher-coaches' perceived motivational climate in an after-school physical activity program: A case study using self-determination theory.

Mohamed Aris (2011). An examination of Singaporean teacher-coaches' perceived motivational climate in an after-school physical activity program: A case study using self-determination theory. PhD Thesis, School of Human Movement Studies, The University of Queensland.

       
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Author Mohamed Aris
Thesis Title An examination of Singaporean teacher-coaches' perceived motivational climate in an after-school physical activity program: A case study using self-determination theory.
School, Centre or Institute School of Human Movement Studies
Institution The University of Queensland
Publication date 2011-03
Thesis type PhD Thesis
Supervisor A/Prof Clifford John Mallett
Dr Masato Kawabata
Total pages 202
Total colour pages 18
Total black and white pages 184
Language eng
Subjects 11 Medical and Health Sciences
Abstract/Summary There are two main purposes of this project. The first purpose was to understand Singapore secondary schools PE teacher-coaches' motivational profiles and the climate they created in the Singapore school context. The second purpose was to examine the psycho-social effects of an intervention programme aimed at PE teacher-coaches adopting an autonomous supportive climate in a co-curricular sporting activity (CCA) setting. Specifically, the impact of the intervention on the participants (student-athletes) behaviours was examined. This project used self-determination theory (SDT) and achievement goal theory (AGT) as theoretical frameworks for examining the motivations of actors and the motivational climates in the physical activity settings. According to self-determination theory, human flourishment is facilitated by the satisfaction of three fundamental psychological needs, which are the needs for autonomy, competence, and relatedness. The major theoretical tenet of achievement goal theory is that individuals strive to demonstrate ability and avoid showing incompetence and has been successful in explaining and predicting beliefs, affects, responses, and behaviours in achievement settings. In Singapore, PE teachers perform inter-related roles such as teaching PE and sports coaching (CCA). The Singapore Education Ministry's policies provide guidelines for PE teachers to engage students to be more physically active in school. Nevertheless, there is a possible mismatch between policies and the practices of PE teacher-coaches in schools due to external pressures (e.g., winning) which might influences pedagogical practices. The present investigations were conducted to enhance understanding of the dual roles of PE teacher-coaches in Singapore secondary schools; that is teaching and coaching. In pursuit of this aim, the following two studies were conducted. In Study 1, the motivational profiles and the motivational climates created by the PE teacher-coaches in Singapore secondary schools were investigated. Employing a quantitative methodology, 98 PE teacher-coaches and 882 student-athletes from 32 Singapore secondary schools took part in this study. Results from a mixed-model analysis of variance (ANOVA) to investigate role and gender differences in the motivational profile of the PE teacher-coaches revealed there were significant main effects for role and types of motivations as well as for the interaction effect between role and types of motivations. However, there was no significant main effect for gender differences among the PE teacher-coaches. A significant interaction indicated that amotivation (AM) in teaching role was lower than that in coaching role, whereas non-self-determine extrinsic motivation (non-SDEM) in the teaching role was higher than that in coaching role. Nonetheless, a significant interaction revealed that self-determined motivation (SDM) in the teaching role was higher than in the coaching role. Contrary to the proposed hypothesis, it was found that the PE teacher-coaches in Singapore secondary schools generally present a significantly higher levels of SDM than non-SDEM and AM in both contexts. In this study, a key retention and motivational strategy used by the Ministry of Education (Singapore) is to reward teachers based on performance of schools with monetary incentives (e.g., connect plan, monetary performance bonus); however, these rewards did not appear to influence the SDM of PE teacher-coaches. Moreover, similar patterns were found where PE teacher-coaches and student-athletes alike reported a higher form of mastery climate than performance climate in both settings. However, student-athletes perceived a stronger performance climate compared to that reported by the PE teacher-coaches in both settings. Study 2 involved an intervention programme in the development of an autonomy-supportive learning environment in the coaching context to examine whether a change in teacher-coaches' behaviours (i.e., employing the seven pedagogical behaviours proposed by Mageau & Vallenrand, 2003) produced satisfaction of the psychological needs, adaptive forms of motivations and subsequent positive motivational outcomes. PE teacher-coaches (n=3) and the student-athletes under their responsibility (n=70) participated in this second study. Two PE teacher-coaches and 54 student-athletes, from two schools, were involved in the intervention programme while the remaining participants were in the control group setting. After a 24-week intervention programme, the study found that student-athletes' perceptions of their coaches' autonomy-supportive behaviours were significantly increased through the intervention program. Furthermore, compared with the control group, student-athletes' in the intervention group indicated that their perceptions of SDM and motivational consequences (reduced boredom and reduced effort) were significantly improved over the intervention period. Further evaluation using path analysis assessed the motivational sequence described by Mageau and Vallerand (2003) and Ntoumais (2001). Changes in scores pre- to post- intervention revealed that an autonomy-supportive environment was positively related to two of the three basic psychological needs (i.e., perceived autonomy and perceived relatedness) but not perceived competence for both intervention schools in comparison with the control school. However, the model showed that perceived competence was positively associated with SDM and non-SDEM at the post intervention data. Perceived autonomy was highly correlated with the three broad forms of motivations: positive associations with SDM and non-SDEM and negative associations with AM. Importantly, the indirect effects of autonomy-supportive environment on perceived effort via to the satisfaction of autonomy need and SDM (i.e., autonomy-supportive environment -> autonomy -> SDM -> effort) were tenable in the model based on the intervention groups' data at post intervention, whereas the same indirect effects were untenable in the model based on the both groups at baseline data. In conclusion, this research has contributed to our understanding of the motivational process of the PE teacher-coaches, and the motivational climate they created in teaching and coaching contexts in Singapore schools. The key findings revealed that an autonomy supportive environment had a positive effect on student-athletes' satisfaction of psychological needs. Perceived autonomy and competence and was found to be a significant predictor of SDM and non-SDEM, thus ultimately, enhanced their perceived effort towards their participation in the CCA. The results from this research project support previous argument by Ryan and Deci (2002) which suggested that relatedness may be a more distal determinate of SDM relative to perceived competence and autonomy. Moreover, the findings of this project also support previous research (Biddle, 1994; Feltz, 1988) that showed, perceive competence plays a central role in all forms of physical activity and thus play an important role in determining SDM.
Keyword PE teacher-coaches
student-athletes
self-determination theory
motivational profile
motivational climate
psychological needs
Additional Notes Colour pages: 81, 83, 85-86, 108-114, 116-117, 156-157, 162, 181, 187 Landscape pages: 76-79, 99-101, 103-106, 167-176, 178-181, 192-202

 
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