Unpacking Motivational Culture: Diverging Emphasis on Communality and Agency Across STEM Domains.

ABSTRACT: The current research examined whether life sciences vs. engineering/physical sciences vary in the visibility and value of communality and agency. Overall, we find an emphasis on agency in engineering/physical sciences and a greater balance between communality and agency in the life sciences. We examine motivational culture as represented in environmental structures (Study 1), in signals sent and received in academic displays (Studies 2A-B), and in individual-level motives and cognitions (Studies 3-4). Study 1 analyzed archival course data to find that courses (N=11,222) in engineering/physical sciences included fewer collaborative assignments than courses in life sciences. Study 2A's content analysis documented that bulletin boards (N=68) in engineering/physical sciences academic buildings

SUBMITTER: Joshi MP 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC10162795 | biostudies-literature | 2022 Dec

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature