Relational Analysis of Intrinsic Motivation, Achievement Goals, Learning Strategies and Academic Achievement for Hong Kong Secondary Students

This paper reports the relational analysis of intrinsic motivation, achievement goals, learning strategies and academic achievement by means of structural equation modeling. A questionnaire was conducted with 1381 Hong Kong secondary students to measure their intrinsic motivation (challenge, curiosity and independent mastery), achievement goals (mastery, performance- approach and performance-avoidance goals), learning strategies (surface and deep) and academic achievement. The results showed that intrinsic motivation and achievement goals had predictive effects on learning strategies and academic achievement, and that mastery goal mediated the effect of intrinsic motivation on learning strategies and academic achievement. The results were discussed with respect to previous research findings and implications were drawn for enhancing students’ motivation to learn.