Exploring the Relationship Between Immediacy Behaviors and Student Motivation in Engineering Classrooms: Immediacy as a Cause of Motivation

<p>Instructor immediacy is an essential characteristic of effective instructors. Although instructional communication has done extensive research on the impact of immediacy behaviors on students, there is little available research observing immediacy behaviors as predictors of motivation on engineering students. As a result, this study examined the impact of engineering instructors’ use of immediacy behaviors on engineering students’ motivation. The results indicated that verbal immediacy predicted engineering student motivation. The thematic analysis revealed that when students perceived their instructors as helpful, students’ motivation to learn and ask more questions increased. The thematic analysis also observed that when instructors seemed unapproachable, students were less likely to engage with them. These findings present valuable insight for engineering educators on how their immediacy behaviors can both positively and negative affect student motivation and possible retention.</p>

Name thesis:degree_name

Master of Science (MS)

Level thesis:degree_level

Thesis - Open Access

Discipline thesis:degree_discipline

Communication Studies and Theatre

Year dc:date.available

2017

Author dc:creator

• Barahona Guerrero, Andrea N.

Contributors dc:contributor

• Joshua Westwick

• engineering education
• engineering students
• immediacy
• instructional communication
• motivation
• self-determination
• Communication
• Education

Licence

• http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/

Language dc:language

en

Repository record dc:identifier

https://openprairie.sdstate.edu/etd/1212

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:openprairie.sdstate.edu:etd-2199