Latent Profiles of High School Academic Intrinsic Motivation: Relations to Educational Attainment, Curiosity, and Work and Leadership Motivation in Adulthood

Academic intrinsic motivation (AIM), the enjoyment of school learning in which pleasure is inherent in the activity itself, provided the theoretical foundation for this research. A person-centered approach using latent profile analysis (LPA) was applied to the AIM subject areas of English, math, history, science, and for school in general at ages 16 and 17 years measured with the Children's Academic Intrinsic Motivation Inventory-High School. The students (N = 112) were participants of the Fullerton Longitudinal Study (blinded for review). Three distinct AIM profiles emerged labeled strong, moderate, and weak. Specific predictions were advanced pertaining to a differential relation of AIM profiles to an array of theoretically relevant distal outcomes assessed over two decades later (age 38 years, N = 107). These included educational attainment, curiosity, intrinsic motivation for work (IMW), and aspects of the motivation to lead. Predictions were supported in that results revealed significant, conceptually meaningful temporal connections between the profiles and outcomes across the 22-year interval. Students in the strong, in contrast to weak AIM profile, consistently and significantly had, at 38 years, more advanced levels of educational attainment, greater curiosity, stronger IMW, and greater enjoyment of leadership. Students in the moderate AIM profile placed ordinally between those in the other two profiles with respect to outcomes. Covariates of sex and IQ were controlled. The findings furnish evidence for predictive and construct validity of high school AIM profiles. Implications are advanced.