Intrinsic and Extrinsic Motivators for Learning

Some years ago, at a meeting with a student advisory committee for the provost office, I playfully asked the students to discuss whether Georgetown should abolish grades for completed courses. At first, there was loud enthusiastic support. Then one student admitted, “You know, I’m not sure I’d go to class or do the full work of the class, without the reminder of grading.”

There is a many-decade history of studying the effects of intrinsic versus extrinsic rewards on human behavior. In the mid-20th century psychologists became more intrigued with different motivators to act. Extrinsic motivators identify social or material benefits to participating in some behavior; they appear to be effective in increasing the speed of a targeted task and compliance to social norms in the situation. Intrinsic motivators emerge from the enjoyment of performing the behavior; behavior change appears to take longer than extrinsically rewarded behavior. However, a consistent finding is that when the extrinsic reward is removed, the target behavior tends to decline much more than when the behavior is motivated by intrinsic rewards.

During parts of the COVID epidemic, students were permitted much more liberal use of pass-fail options for classes that they took. Average GPA rose rather noticeably in that time period. This might be viewed as an indirect effect of allocation of effort on courses for which the student expected higher grades. As the student in the advisory committee noted, without the extrinsic motivator of grades, it isn’t clear that attentional resources would be paid to courses at the same level.

The contrast to scholarly activities of faculty and those of students is sharp on the dimension of intrinsic-extrinsic motivation. Any discussion with an academic scholar about their research reveals motivational sources. Often their eyes light up, their bodies reveal a level of energy about challenges. It becomes crystal clear that they gain deep pleasure from conducting their scholarly work – so much that it is baffling to someone outside their field (often including their students).

A colleague of mine told me a story about his daughter in her first year of college. He, a political scientist, noted his daughter’s report that she was taking her first political science course and finding it interesting. He quickly got into his recruitment role. He started describing the importance of the questions being addressed, the impact the field can have on the world, and the career options it offered. She stopped him in mid-pitch. “Dad, all through high school, when I came home, you were in your office working; when I left the house on the weekends, you were working. Why would I ever want to live that way?”

She hadn’t yet experienced the intrinsic rewards of her study.

This move from extrinsic motivators to intrinsic motivators is also relevant to pedagogical goals of a modern university. We all seek to prepare students for their long lives after graduation. They will need to stay current with changing fields. They will need to adapt to new technologies. Some may see one occupation disappear, but the skills underlying work in the occupation reassembling into a new occupation. Their lives will be enriched by identifying the pleasures of their work and life activities, not the external rewards of prestige and money.

For many students the discovery of intrinsic motivators comes in being part of a research project or an experience-based learning project. Those activities often mimic the scholarly life of faculty. Indeed, that part of my colleague’s life was not yet revealed to his daughter, who saw the field as another graded course, albeit with some interesting concepts. We faculty succeed when we are able to help students experience the internal pleasure of learning.