Influencing Academic Motivation: The Effects of Student–Faculty Interaction

Using data from the Wabash National Study of Liberal Arts Education, we examined the influence of student–faculty interactions on student academic motivation over 4 years of college. Results suggest that several forms of student–faculty interaction, such as quality of faculty contact, frequency of faculty contact, research with faculty, personal discussion with faculty, and out-of-class interactions with faculty, have a positive influence on academic motivation, even when controlling for a host of student background characteristics and institutional characteristics, including a precollege measure of academic motivation.