The profile of the student who most often completes a doctorate

"Often, the idea of a PhD student is someone who is driven by a passion, who is very curious about their research subject and who wants to learn more. We think that these are the reasons that motivate them to continue their studies. But when we look at the profiles, that's not exactly what we see",

Frédéric Guay and his colleagues David Litalien, István Tóth-Király and Alexandre J. S. Morin recently published the study "PhD students' motivation profiles: A self-determination theory perspective".

The study involved 2266 PhD students. Students' motivations and reasons for pursuing their doctorate were grouped into four profiles.

• highly self-determined - driven by keen interest and personal investment - 21% of the sample;
• identified, give great importance to their studies, without being passionate about their research - 22% of the sample;
  
• introjected, pursue doctoral studies due to internal or external pressure. Sensitive to the prestige of the doctorate - 34% of the sample;
• weakly self-determined, disengaged from doctoral studies - 23% of the sample.

The highly self-determined profile generally shows better perseverance, greater satisfaction with studies and lower intentions to drop out, followed in succession by the identified, introjected and weakly self-determined profiles. Logical, but self-determination can be greatly affected by the study context.

Three psychological needs must be met.

"The student must feel competent, with adequate feedback to help him progress. He must feel autonomous, able to make choices in his project. They must also feel a sense of belonging, by forging links with their thesis supervisor, faculty staff and other students."

According to Professor Éric Guay, if we create a context in which all three needs are met, students develop their full potential.

For the full article: Motivation profiles linked to perseverance in doctoral studies

Illustration : Wavebreakmedia - DepositPhotos

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