Teaching goals of early career university teachers in Germany Marold Wosnitza a,b, *, Kerstin Helker a , Lucas Lohbeck a a RWTH Aachen University, Germany b Murdoch University Perth, Australia 1. Introduction Teacher motivation has become a significant area of research in teaching and teacher education during the past ten years (Watt & Richardson, 2008). Most of the studies in this field focus on practicing schoolteachers and those studying to become schoolteachers. These studies show that many factors motivate individuals to become a schoolteacher, including the desire for personal growth and continued learning, to have a positive impact on others’ lives and contribute to society, as well as to attain stable, secure employment. Intrinsic and extrinsic reasons such as these are commonly articulated by teachers and teacher candidates and have been identified in recent research (e.g., Chong & Low, 2009; Mansfield & Beltman, 2014; Mansfield, Wosnitza, & Beltman, 2012; Sinclair, 2008). Education employers and researchers are interested in these factors since they influence teachers’ decisions to enter, leave or stay in the profession (e.g., Muller, Alliata, & Benninghoff, 2009). The theoretical approaches in the available studies on practicing teachers’ motivation are manifold and range among others from achievement goal theory (e.g., Butler & Shibaz, 2014) and teacher efficacy (e.g., Klassen, Tze, Betts, & Gordon, 2011) to intrinsic and extrinsic motivation (e.g., Otto & Bachmann, 2010) and teacher responsibility (e.g., Lauermann, 2014). Furthermore, there is growing research on the question of the effect different motivating factors have at the beginning as well as during the course of a teaching career (e.g., Richardson & Watt, 2010; Watt, Richardson, & Wilkins, 2014). While the body of research on schoolteachers’ motivation is growing, research on motivation of other groups of teachers like university teachers is still rare. The limited existing research all more or less explicitly used self-determination theory and investigated the qualitative aspects of university teachers’ motivation. The studies showed that intrinsically motivated university teachers made an effort with regard to their teaching and take personal pleasure in it. In accordance with International Journal of Educational Research 65 (2014) 90–103 A R T I C L E I N F O Article history: Received 27 October 2012 Accepted 9 September 2013 Available online 2 November 2013 Keywords: Teacher motivation University teacher Responsibility Teacher efficacy Higher education A B S T R A C T While schoolteacher motivation has become a significant area in educational research, teachers in higher education have been left somewhat disregarded. This exploratory study focuses on early career university teachers’ motivation, specifically on their personal goals. The results show that most participants emphasise their research and qualification rather than their teaching. Focusing on their goals as a teacher, four areas of teaching goals emerge: self-directed, content-directed, teaching-directed and student-directed teaching goals. Based on these, three groups of teachers with different goal profiles were identified: instruction-oriented, student-oriented, and ego-oriented early career university teachers. The study could not confirm any differences between these groups and their self-perceived teacher responsibility or self-efficacy but there were significant differences between the groups in the areas in which early career university teachers teach and in the length of time they have been teaching. ß 2013 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. * Corresponding author at: Institut fu ¨r Erziehungswissenschaft, RWTH Aachen University, Eilfschornsteinstr. 7, 52056 Aachen, Germany. Tel.: +49 241 80 96297; fax: +49 241 80 92569. E-mail address: [email protected](M. Wosnitza). Contents lists available at ScienceDirect International Journal of Educational Research jo ur n al ho mep ag e: www .elsevier .c om /lo cate/ijed u res 0883-0355/$ – see front matter ß 2013 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.ijer.2013.09.009
Transcript
International Journal of Educational Research 65 (2014) 90–103
Contents lists available at ScienceDirect
International Journal of Educational Research
jo ur n al ho mep ag e: www .e lsev ier . c om / lo cate / i jed u res
Teaching goals of early career university teachers in Germany
Marold Wosnitza a,b,*, Kerstin Helker a, Lucas Lohbeck a
a RWTH Aachen University, Germanyb Murdoch University Perth, Australia
A R T I C L E I N F O
Article history:
Received 27 October 2012
Accepted 9 September 2013
Available online 2 November 2013
Keywords:
Teacher motivation
University teacher
Responsibility
Teacher efficacy
Higher education
A B S T R A C T
While schoolteacher motivation has become a significant area in educational research,
teachers in higher education have been left somewhat disregarded. This exploratory study
focuses on early career university teachers’ motivation, specifically on their personal goals.
The results show that most participants emphasise their research and qualification rather
than their teaching. Focusing on their goals as a teacher, four areas of teaching goals
emerge: self-directed, content-directed, teaching-directed and student-directed teaching
goals. Based on these, three groups of teachers with different goal profiles were identified:
instruction-oriented, student-oriented, and ego-oriented early career university teachers.
The study could not confirm any differences between these groups and their self-perceived
teacher responsibility or self-efficacy but there were significant differences between the
groups in the areas in which early career university teachers teach and in the length of
time they have been teaching.
� 2013 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
1. Introduction
Teacher motivation has become a significant area of research in teaching and teacher education during the past ten years(Watt & Richardson, 2008). Most of the studies in this field focus on practicing schoolteachers and those studying to becomeschoolteachers. These studies show that many factors motivate individuals to become a schoolteacher, including the desirefor personal growth and continued learning, to have a positive impact on others’ lives and contribute to society, as well as toattain stable, secure employment. Intrinsic and extrinsic reasons such as these are commonly articulated by teachers andteacher candidates and have been identified in recent research (e.g., Chong & Low, 2009; Mansfield & Beltman, 2014;Mansfield, Wosnitza, & Beltman, 2012; Sinclair, 2008). Education employers and researchers are interested in these factorssince they influence teachers’ decisions to enter, leave or stay in the profession (e.g., Muller, Alliata, & Benninghoff, 2009).The theoretical approaches in the available studies on practicing teachers’ motivation are manifold and range among othersfrom achievement goal theory (e.g., Butler & Shibaz, 2014) and teacher efficacy (e.g., Klassen, Tze, Betts, & Gordon, 2011) tointrinsic and extrinsic motivation (e.g., Otto & Bachmann, 2010) and teacher responsibility (e.g., Lauermann, 2014).Furthermore, there is growing research on the question of the effect different motivating factors have at the beginning aswell as during the course of a teaching career (e.g., Richardson & Watt, 2010; Watt, Richardson, & Wilkins, 2014).
While the body of research on schoolteachers’ motivation is growing, research on motivation of other groups of teacherslike university teachers is still rare. The limited existing research all more or less explicitly used self-determination theoryand investigated the qualitative aspects of university teachers’ motivation. The studies showed that intrinsically motivateduniversity teachers made an effort with regard to their teaching and take personal pleasure in it. In accordance with
M. Wosnitza et al. / International Journal of Educational Research 65 (2014) 90–103 91
self-determination theory, university teachers’ perception of themselves as being autonomous positively correlated withtheir intrinsic motivation to teach (Becker & Wild, 2012; Krucken & Wild, 2012; Wilkesmann & Schmid, 2011). In addition tothe joy of teaching, the personally perceived importance of the teaching activity itself was decisive for the amount of effortinvested in teaching. University teachers identifying with their job ascribed a great importance to higher education andpersonally deemed it relevant and valuable (Krucken & Wild, 2012).
Focusing on those university teachers more extrinsically motivated, Wilkesmann and Schmid (2011) examined theinfluence of performance-oriented steering models on the quality of university teaching, as, for example, the payment ofperformance bonuses for teaching, performance-oriented granting of funds, target agreements and awards for teaching.They found that these above mentioned instruments for the external regulation of behaviour did not have any influence onthe motivation to teach. These findings are also supported by research conducted by Becker and Wild (2012), who found thatsuch institutional incentives did not have any direct influence on newly appointed professors’ motivation to teach and thatthere was an even sceptical to negative attitude regarding the validity of teaching awards. In further support of thesefindings, Krucken and Wild (2012) have pointed out in their study that despite pursuing ‘external goals’, a high degree ofautonomy is being experienced by early career university teachers and that they are willing to highly commit to teachingalthough they perceive this to be disadvantageous for their career. Having to outweigh teaching against research and otherparts of an academic career and the underlying as well as resulting goal conflicts seem to be characteristic of the professionallife of a university teacher (Neumann, 1996).
The potential incompatibility of these goals, to be a good teacher, to be a good researcher and to make one’s career in thehigher education sector, can be assumed to particularly concern early career university teachers who have just entered theprofession. Throughout the early stages of an academic career, when it is critical to establish a research profile and affiliationto the scientific community in order to maintain employment in the sector, conflicts may arise as individuals managepriorities in the light of long-term goals while at the same time having neither strategies nor routines for handling theseconflicts. It is not surprising that Colbeck (2002) found in interviews that especially those at the beginning of their careerdescribed balancing the different duties they have as difficult. About half of these academics stated that they could onlyachieve this balance by fragmenting their teaching, research, and service roles and either focusing on one at a time ordeferring one of these roles altogether. The role deferred was often stated to be teaching. Esdar, Gorges, and Wild (2012)found that junior researchers prioritised research over teaching, as it was perceived to be more beneficial to both reputationand professional development. Teaching was seen as an external requirement.
These findings are supported by extensive research focusing on the research-teaching nexus in which teaching is oftenfound to be theoretically valued by academics but is neither perceived as being connected to research (Hattie & Marsh, 1996)nor as being promoted as strongly or rewarded as highly (Neumann, 1996). Teaching could be shown by Visser-Wijnveen,Van Driel, Van der Rijst, Verloop, and Visser (2009) to however constitute one major component of university teachers’ jobsatisfaction. Whether the working context allows for taking pleasure in teaching, however, differs. Rowland, for example,found several academics mentioning that there were ‘‘dangers in spending too much time on teaching’’ (Rowland, 1996, p.10), a statement that could, if uttered in the presence of someone new to the field, strongly influence how they organise andexperience their subsequent work. In addition, academics leaning more strongly towards research were found to reporthigher weekly working hours than those emphasising teaching (Altbach, 1996), also because of the fact that only less than aquarter of academics believe that staff decisions are strongly based on the respective person’s teaching quality (Hohle &Teichler, 2013). Based on the above, beginning academics can be assumed to find themselves at the challenging interface ofteaching and research all university teachers are facing.
Nevertheless, these two supposedly opposed areas are not sufficient to describe early career university teachers’ workingcontext. Beginning academics are also exposed to demands deriving from their profession or career which are both associatedwith working at a university also subsuming administrative and service-related matters (Kwiek & Antonowicz, 2013).
Furthermore the socialisation into a profession always involves the adaptation of a person’s view of and demands madeon oneself as well as aspects of personal development and positioning in a community or the society (Heinz, 1995).Interferences between these goals, some of them already inherently interrelated, are mediated by the additional area ofqualification. Gaining further qualification, be it regarding research, teaching or other matters, and thereby ensuring one’sstaying in the job, is especially relevant for early career university teachers (Teichler, 2008) and thus influences and overlapswith all of the other aspects of the working context. Fig. 1 illustrates this specific situation.
In contrast to other countries, the German higher education system offers few permanent non-professorial positions. Theimplementation of a tenure track system is still in its infancy and is not extensively supported by German universities.University graduates deciding to pursue a doctorate most often start their career by entering a full or half time position as ajunior researcher in a third party funded research project or on temporary position with a duration of maximum six years.During this time, these young researchers work on research projects of their institute or school, teach and meanwhile alsopursue their PhD. If they do not manage to complete their PhD in six years, they have to leave work at university with the onlyoption to work on third-party funded research projects with all their implications (Ates & Brechelmacher, 2013; Janson,Schomburg, & Teichler, 2007; Teichler, 2008).
The working context these beginning academics enter is highly diverse, as it comprises many different, often conflictingspheres of action. Thus, regarding these persons’ goal structures, we can hypothesise that their personal goals which, if at all,have led to this career choice, are not congruent with all their professional duties. Furthermore, these young academicsmight even show different profiles of motivation regarding the different roles they hold, i.e., being a university teacher, being
Fig. 1. Working context of young academics.
M. Wosnitza et al. / International Journal of Educational Research 65 (2014) 90–10392
a researcher, being a PhD student. This complex professional situation of early career university teachers makes it necessaryto systematically research their motivational profiles and more specifically their goal profiles.
2. Teacher goals
Goals as representing direction and meaning for individual behaviour (Ames, 1992; Dweck, 1986; Ford & Nichols, 1991;Pintrich, 2000; Wentzel, 1994) have been central concepts in research on motivation for several decades. In the last 20 years,however, personal goals have evolved from a relatively stable notion of general direction to a more specific, situated anddynamic construct (e.g., Burger, Wosnitza, Ludwig, & Schmitt, 2012; Murphy & Alexander, 2000). Furthermore, goals werefound to reflect the purposes of an individual’s behaviour. Thus, goals, as underlying short- or long term patterns, stronglyinfluence an individual’s processes of thinking, their behaviour and also their emotional responses in those situations inwhich goals become effective (Schutz, Crowder, & White, 2001).
Research by Butler (2007) applying achievement goal theory, for example, showed a four-factor model comprisingmastery, ability-approach, ability-avoidance, and work-avoidance goals to adequately represent teachers’ goal orientations.This model was later extended by a fifth factor, namely relational goals (Butler, 2012; Butler & Shibaz, 2014), and has yieldedmany findings about teacher motivation, instructional practices, interest in teaching and teacher burnout. Despite these, thefocus on achievement goals has been criticised as being rather limited because achievement goals are short term goals justaiming at a single state to be achieved (cf. Boekaerts, de Koning, & Vedder, 2006; Mansfield, 2012) and thus, broaderunderlying goals cannot be identified.
Research consequently conducted into these more general goals, forming the basis of the development of short-term goals,has identified further goals, like social goals, future goals and well-being goals to influence achievement, adjustment andlearning processes (Dowson & McInerney, 2003). Furthermore, research has also shown that individuals always pursue oftencompeting multiple goals simultaneously (Hofer, Schmid, Fries, Kilian, & Kuhnle, 2010). Learning about teacher motivation canthus not be restricted to studying short-term goals but also has to take into account broader contexts and life goals of teachersfrom which short term goals in specific situations can be assumed to derive (Schutz, Crowder, & White, 2001). Consequently,choosing a career in teaching can be considered a broader life goal. Schmidt (2007) emphasizes the formative influence of theearly years after entering work in higher education which is influenced by a range of personal desires, experiences and socialinfluences. This life goal then provides a context from which sub-goals emerge which again influence engagement, experiencedwell-being (including occupational health) and career decisions of teachers. The goals can be hypothesised to best be congruentwith the personal goals the individual pursues in order to avoid conflicts between them. With regard to teachers, Mansfield,Wosnitza, and Beltman (2012) furthermore hypothesised that teachers pursue goals that not only focus on themselves but alsoon the social nature of teaching by pursuing both intrapersonal and social goals simultaneously.
Regarding the specificity of goals teachers pursue, goal-setting theory assumes that specific and challenging goals triggergreater effort and persistence, which are reciprocally related to feelings of self-efficacy and personal responsibility (Locke &Latham, 2006). Furthermore, self-efficacy strongly affects the persistence with which certain goals are pursued (Bandura,1977). Bierhoff et al. (2005) hypothesised that a person’s perception of their self-efficacy also relates to the choice ofsituations in which to act and thus goal-setting itself. Perceived self-efficacy or more specific teaching efficacy has also been
M. Wosnitza et al. / International Journal of Educational Research 65 (2014) 90–103 93
discussed to possibly enhance feelings of responsibility (i.e., being convinced of the ability to have an impact affects the senseof responsibility for doing so) (cf. Lauermann, Karabenick, & Wosnitza, 2010; Lauermann & Karabenick, 2011). According toLauermann and Karabenick (2011), a teacher’s sense of their responsibility, i.e., their sense of internal obligation to produceor prevent certain outcomes, is again strongly related to their goal commitment. Prior research has shown that feelings ofpersonal responsibility bring people to perceiving an internal obligation for completing certain tasks and thus investingmuch more effort into it (Berkowitz & Daniels, 1963; Ryan & Deci, 2000). Similar to teacher goals, objects of responsibility arehighly personal and their motivational character becomes particularly influential in complex settings, where obligations arenot well-defined, and each individual thus needs to define what they believe themselves and others respectively to beresponsible for (Fischman, DiBara, & Gardner, 2006; Werner, 2006). Working environments of early career universityteachers are such complex and not well-defined settings. University teaching is even less regulated than school teaching andmost university teachers have to define their own tasks and responsibilities for this aspect of their work themselves.Furthermore, teachers in higher education often do not pursue a career in teaching alone but find teaching to be a part oftheir professional duties as academics, for which they may receive hardly any or inadequate training (Ates & Brechelmacher,2013; Bouwma-Gearhart, 2012; Krucken & Wild, 2012).
With most university teachers located at the interface between teaching and research and, in the early years of their career,most of them also pursuing further qualification (Esdar et al., 2012), they constantly face resulting conflicts between differentgoals connected to the diverse aspects of their profession. Furthermore, university teachers might find their personal goals andtheir career goals derived from them to not always overlap with one essential part of their job, i.e., teaching. Although researchon early career university teachers’ goals seems a promising way to contribute to the development of strategies for attractingand introducing young academics to work in higher education, these questions have been left somewhat disregarded.
Based on the above considerations, this study aims at exploring the goals beginning university teachers pursue during theearly years of their career. One central aim is to examine whether the complexity of the work environment with itssometimes even oppositional demands leads to early career university teachers placing explicit emphasis on only one ofthose fields they engage in by establishing certain goal structures.
In order to study this complex issue, this paper addresses the following research questions:
1. W
1
ap
hat are the general goals of early career university teachers?
2. W hat are their teaching goals? 3. A re there specific types of early career university teachers in the light of their goal structure? 4. D o different types of early career university teachers show differences in their teaching efficacy and the perception of their
responsibility?
3. Method
3.1. Participants
Participants were 252 university teachers in their first five years of their career from different German universities in eightdifferent states who completed an online survey. Males comprised 50% of the participants and 49.2% female (missingdata = .8%). Their ages ranged between 24 and 40 years (M = 28.9, SD = 2.73). The participants were teaching in the followingareas1: Mathematics and Science (n = 70), Engineering (n = 65), Humanities (N = 63), Jurisprudence, Economics and SocialScience (n = 45), others (n = 9). 150 participants mentioned that working at university was their goal after finishing their degree,96 said that it was one possibility among others or the only possibility they had. Participants had been working in average forM = 4.73 (SD = 2.38, Min: 1, Max: 10) semesters at the university, most of them (89.7%) with temporary contracts that inherentlyinclude teaching duties. The average teaching load of participants was M = 3.5 (SD = 3.1) weekly contact hours. All participantswere also working on their PhD for which they were contractually assigned time, which is the typical procedure in Germany.
3.2. Instrument
Participants completed an online questionnaire in which the following measures were included:
3.2.1. Two open-ended questions
What are your main goals for working at the university and why? Participants were given space to write down five maingoals and the reasons for these goals being considered important. After that they were asked to sort them via a drag and dropfunction in the order of relevance. Participants had to fill in at least one goal.
What are your main teaching goals and why? Similar to the general goals, participants were asked to write down up to fivemain goals and the reasons for naming these – one goal was mandatory. After that they were also asked to sort them byrelevance.
The classification of study courses into ‘‘Jurisprudence, Economics and Social Sciences’’, ‘‘Humanities’’, ‘‘Engineering’’ and ‘‘Mathematics and Science’’
plied the structure defined by the Federal Bureau of Statistics in Germany.
M. Wosnitza et al. / International Journal of Educational Research 65 (2014) 90–10394
3.2.2. Scales
Teacher efficacy: This instrument consists of one scale with 23 items. The items were adaptations of the teaching efficacyscales by Dellinger, Bobbett, Olivier, and Ellett (2008) extended by self-developed items. The four-point Likert-scale rangedfrom 1 = weak conviction to 4 = strong conviction (e.g., ‘‘I’m convinced of my skills to motivate my students to do their best’’).The internal consistency reliability of the scale assessed by Cronbach’s alpha was very good: a = .92.
Teacher responsibility: This instrument consists of four scales with a total of 18 items (Teaching: 5, Achievement: 5,Motivation: 4, Relationship: 4). The items were adaptations of the responsibility scales of Lauermann and Karabenick (2013).The 11-Point Likert-scale ranged from 0 = not at all responsible to 100 = fully responsible. The internal consistencyreliabilities of the scale assessed by Cronbach’s alpha lay between a = .73 and a = .84.
Sample items for each responsibility scale: I would feel personally responsible if. . .
Teaching
Table 1
General goals – main categories.
1 Research
2 Profession/Career
3 Teaching
4 Self
5 Qualification
5.1 Academic Qualifi
5.2 Teaching Qualific
5.3 Career Qualificat
5.4 Self-Qualification
. . .a course I taught was not as effective for student learning as I could have possibly made it.
Achievement
. . .my students had very low achievement.
Motivation
. . .my students were unmotivated to learn the content I teach.
Relationship
. . .my students did not believe that I truly care about them.
The instrument was piloted to verify the understanding of all items in the questionnaire. Qualitative data were contentanalysed, quantitative data and quantified data were analysed with descriptive and non-parametric statistics. Furthermore,a cluster analytical approach was used to identify specific teaching goal profiles.
In the following results section the research questions will be examined in turn.
4. Results
In a first step the qualitative data were analysed. It became clear that the existing models of teacher goals wereinadequate to analyse the data at hand. The reasons for this were the specific characteristics of the profession in whichteaching is combined with research and – especially early in the career – qualifications. This necessitates the development oftwo category systems: one for general goals and one for teaching goals.
4.1. RQ1: What are the general goals of early career university teachers?
A content analysis with inductive category development based on Fig. 1 was carried out to identify typical goals ofuniversity teachers in the first five years of their career. The category system is organised around the five main areas in acareer of an early career university teacher: Research goals, Profession or Career goals, Teaching goals, Self-directed goals, andQualification goals (see Table 1).
The data from the open-ended question ‘‘Main goals for working at the university’’ were structured with 24 identifiedemergent categories. A second coder then coded 20% of the data into these identified categories. Inter-judge agreement(Kappa-Inter-rater-Reliability) was k = .85. The categories for each goal, information about the distribution and samplequotes for each category are presented in Table 2.
The 626 general goals mentioned by the participants were categorised into the 24 categories. These categories weregrouped with regard to the content to which they referred. For Research, four sub-categories were identified ‘‘to do research’’,‘‘to publish one’s research’’, ‘‘to specialise in a specific research area’’, ‘‘to work on an interesting research topic’’. For
Goal 1 Goal 2 Goal 3 Goal 4 Goal 5 S
28
(14.2%)
38
(20.2%)
18
(11.7%)
17
(17.3%)
4
(8.3%)
105
(15.3%)
10
(5.1%)
23
(12.2%)
10
(6.5%)
9
(9.2%)
3
(6.3%)
55
(8.0%)
5
(2.5%)
23
(12.2%)
30
(19.5%)
11
(11.2%)
5
(10.4%)
74
(10.8%)
24
(12.2%)
23
(12.2%)
23
(14.9%)
19
(19.4%)
11
(22.9%)
100
(14.6%)
130
(66.0%)
81
(43.1%)
73
(47.3%)
42
(42.9%)
25
(52.1%)
351
(51.2%)
cation 105
(53.3%)
25
(13.3%)
19
(11.3%)
3
(3.1%)
3
(6.3%)
ation – 8
(4.3%)
5
(3.2%)
6
(6.1%)
4
(8.3%)
ion 7
(3.6%)
20
(10.6%)
27
(17.5%)
19
(19.4%)
13
(27.1%)
18
(9.1%)
28
(14.9%)
22
(14.3%)
14
(14.3%)
5
(10.4%)
Table 2
General goals – sub-categories.
Sample quotes: Goal ! Reason
My goal is . . . (translated
from German)
Goal 1 Goal 2 Goal 3 Goal 4 Goal 5 S
1 Research
1.1 to do research research (practice oriented,
innovative, etc.) ! I like research
and want to be good in my job
(#899)
24
(12.2%)
24
(12.8%)
12
(7.8%)
8
(8.2%)
2
(4.2%)
70
(10.2%)
1.2 to publish one’s
research
good publications ! most
relevant criteria to get a job
(#551)
3
(1.5%)
11
(5.9%)
4
(2.6%)
7
(7.1%)
2
(4.2%)
27
(3.9%)
1.3 to specialise in a
specific research area
to focus on a specific
topic ! time management
(#215)
1
(.5%)
1
(.5)
– 1
(1.0%)
– 3
(.4%)
1.4 to work on an
interesting research
topic
to work on an interesting
research topic ! motivation
(#321)
– 2
(1.1%)
2
(1.3%)
1
(1.0)
– 5
(.7%)
2 Profession/career
2.1 to work at a university to work permanently at a
university ! interest in research
and teaching (#669)
9
(4.6%)
17
(9.0%)
9
(5.8%)
8
(8.2%)
2
(4.2%)
45
(6.6%)
2.2 to assume a leadership
position
to head a research team ! the
wish to lead (#540)
1
(.5%)
6
(3.2%)
1
(.6%)
1
(1.0%)
1
(2.1%)
10
(1.5%)
3 Teaching
3.1 to avoid teaching to reduce my teaching ! time-
killing and prevents intensive
research (#479)
– – – – 1
(2.1%)
1
(.1%)
3.2 to teach to teach students expert
knowledge ! relevant for future
researchers (#890)
3
(1.5%)
15
(8.0%)
19
(12.3%)
9
(9.2%)
3
(6.3%)
49
(7.2%)
3.3 to ensure teaching
quality
to offer good teaching ! good
teaching is fun (#705)
2
(1.0%)
8
(4.3%)
11
(7.1%)
2
(2.0%)
1
(2.1%)
24
(3.5%)
4 Self
4.1 to gain prestige PhD and maybe
habilitation ! prestige (#530)
2
(1.0%)
1
(.5%)
1
(.6%)
1
(1.0%)
2
(4.2%)
7
(1.0%)
4.2 to develop one’s
personality
to widen my
horizons ! professional
development (#642)
2
(1.0%)
4
(2.1%)
1
(.6%)
– 1
(2.1%)
8
(1.2%)
4.3 to exert influence to make a scientific
contribution ! my work shall
have a benefit for the people
(#609)
1
(.5%)
2
(1.1%)
– 1
(1.0%)
1
(2.1%)
5
(.7%)
4.4 to be successful to achieve good research
results ! results are significant
for my future (#890)
1
(.5%)
1
(.5%)
1
(.6%)
1
(1.0%)
1
(2.1%)
5
(.7%)
4.5 To earn money and
gain (financial)
security
to earn money ! I have to feed
my family (I have three kids)
(#287)
5
(2.5%)
7
(3.7%)
10
(6.5%)
11
(11.2%)
2
(4.2%)
35
(5.1%)
4.6 Well-being to have fun at work ! of course
research also has its boring
aspects but less than other jobs
(#899)
6
(3.0%)
6
(3.2%)
7
(4.5%)
4
(4.1%)
3
(6.3%)
26
(3.8%)
4.7 To be autonomous and
work self-directly
self-directed work ! freedom in
my everyday work (#890)
7
(3.6%)
2
(1.1%)
3
(1.9%)
1
(1.0%)
1
(2.1%)
14
(2.0%)
5 Qualification
5.1 Academic qualification
5.1.1 to get one’s PhD PhD ! nothing works without
it;–) (#854)
105
(53.3%)
25
(13.3%)
19
(12.3%)
3
(3.1%)
3
(6.3%)
155
(22.6%)
5.2 Teaching qualification
5.2.1 To gain teaching
experience
to gain teaching experience ! to
improve my career prospects
(#611)
– 6
(3.2%)
3
(1.9%)
3
(3.1%)
2
(4.2%)
14
(2.0%)
5.2.2 To gain teaching
qualification
to enhance my teaching
skills ! crucial for a career at
university (#422)
– 2
(1.1%)
2
(1.3%)
3
(3.1%)
2
(4.2%)
9
(1.3%)
5.3 Career qualification
5.3.1 To gain work
experience
experience ! to gain an insight
into university processes (#568)
3
(1.5%)
4
(2.1%)
5
(3.2%)
4
(4.1%)
1
(2.1%)
17
(2.5%)
5.3.2 To improve one’s
career chances
to get an academic
qualification ! to improve my
career prospects (#647)
2
(1.0%)
4
(2.1%)
5
(3.2%)
3
(3.1%)
2
(4.2%)
16
(2.3%)
M. Wosnitza et al. / International Journal of Educational Research 65 (2014) 90–103 95
Table 2 (Continued )
Sample quotes: Goal ! Reason
My goal is . . . (translated
from German)
Goal 1 Goal 2 Goal 3 Goal 4 Goal 5 S
5.3.2 To network to network ! contacts are
paramount (#760)
2
(1.0%)
12
(6.4%)
17
(11.0%)
12
(12.2%)
10
(20.8%)
53
(7.7%)
5.4 Self-qualification
5.4.1 To gain and deepen
professional content
knowledge
to gain professional content
knowledge ! I want to become
expert in my research area
(#609)
15
(7.6%)
20
(10.6%)
18
(11.7%)
8
(8.2%)
3
(6.3%)
64
(9.3%)
5.4.2 To develop soft skills to improve my soft skills:
meetings, reports, team
management, agreements !better chances in the industry
(#23)
3
(1.5%)
8
(4.3%)
4
(2.6%)
6
(6.1%)
2
(4.2%)
23
(3.4%)
M. Wosnitza et al. / International Journal of Educational Research 65 (2014) 90–10396
Profession/Career two categories were identified ‘‘to work at a university’’ and ‘‘to assume a leadership position’’. Teaching
related goals were based on three categories ‘‘to avoid teaching’’, ‘‘to teach’’ in general, ‘‘to ensure teaching quality’’. Self-
directed goals included ‘‘to gain prestige’’, ‘‘to develop one’s personality’’, ‘‘to exert influence’’, ‘‘to be successful’’, ‘‘to earnmoney and gain (financial) security’’, ‘‘well-being’’, ‘‘to be autonomous and work self-directedly’’. Qualification related goals
were divided in four areas: Academic qualification (‘‘to get one’s PhD’’), teaching qualification (‘‘to gain teaching experience’’,‘‘to gain teaching qualification’’), career qualification (‘‘to gain work experience’’, ‘‘to improve one’s career chances’’, ‘‘tonetwork’’) and self-qualification (‘‘to gain and deepen professional content knowledge’’, ‘‘to develop soft skills’’).
Ofallgoals,51.2%werequalificationrelatedgoals,mainlythegoaltogetone’sPhD,followedbygoals intheareaofresearchwith15.3% of all nominations. Goals related to teaching represented only about 10.8% of all nominations. Even if the teachingqualification goals ‘‘to gain teaching experience’’ and ‘‘to gain teaching qualification’’ were added to these, only 14.1% of all goalswererelatedtoteaching.Thatteachingisnotoneofthemaingoalsofearlycareeruniversityteachersbecomesevenmoreobviouswhen focusing on the primary goals of the participants. For only five participants teaching-related goals had a top priority.
4.2. RQ2: What are the teaching goals of early career university teachers?
The results up to here show that teaching goals are not the most significant goals of the participants at this point of theircareer. In a second step, the early career university teachers were specifically asked to think about their goals for teaching. Acontent analysis with inductive category development was carried out to identify typical teaching goals of early careeruniversity teachers. Overall, the participants mentioned 644 teaching goals. Four teaching goal areas emerged from the data:student-directed goals, self-directed goals, teaching-directed goals and content-directed goals (Table 3). The data from the open-ended question about the main teaching goals were structured by 31 identified emergent categories. A second coder thencoded 20% of the data into these identified categories. Inter-judge agreement was k = .83. The categories for each goal,information about the distribution and sample quotes for each category are presented in Table 4.
About a third (34.5%) of all goals focused on student-directed teaching goals like ‘‘to provide a good atmosphere for thestudents’’, ‘‘to be inspirational and motivating’’, ‘‘to make sure that students learn, comprehend and are successful inone’s course of study’’, ‘‘to make sure that students learn to be autonomous and capable of critical thinking’’. Thiswas followed by self-directed teaching goals (29%) which was dominated by ‘‘to gain, document and improve myteaching qualification’’, ‘‘to gain and deepen my knowledge’’ or ‘‘to get teaching experience’’. Teaching-directed goals andcontent-directed goals were both at about 18%.
4.3. RQ3: Are there specific types of early career university teachers in the light of their goal structure?
A hierarchical cluster analysis using Ward’s method was used to identify different types of early career universityteachers based on the number of teaching goals nominated by the participants. The proportion of nomination for each
Table 3
Teaching goals – main categories.
Goal 1 Goal 2 Goal 3 Goal 4 Goal 5 S
Student-directed goals 60
(30.3%)
57
(32.4%)
57
(38.0%)
32
(40.0%)
16
(40.0%)
222
(34.5%)
Self-directed goals 52
(26.3%)
50
(28.4%)
46
(30.7%)
26
(32.5%)
13
(32.5%)
187
(29.0%)
Teaching-directed goals 32
(16.1%)
40
(22.7%)
27
(18.0%)
14
(17.5%)
5
(12.5%)
118
(18.3%)
Content-directed goals 54
(27.3%)
29
(16.5%)
20
(13.3%)
8
(10.0%)
6
(15.0%)
117
(18.2%)
Table 4
Teaching goals – sub-categories.
Sample quotes: Teaching
Goal ! Reason
My teaching goal is. . .
(translated from German)
Goal 1 Goal 2 Goal 3 Goal 4 Goal 5 S
1 Student-directed goals
1.1 to provide a good
atmosphere for the
students
convey that I am appreciative of
the students’
situation ! something that
annoyed me during my studies
(#31)
2
(1.0%)
8
(4.5%)
3
(2.0%)
(3.8%) – 16
(3.4%)
1.2 to prepare for the
future
teach students useful practical
knowledge ! for them to be able
to properly perform their job
(#664)
2
(1.0%)
1
(.6%)
– 1
(1.3%)
– 4
(.6%)
1.3 to be inspirational and
motivating
students’
motivation ! important for both
parties to enjoy teaching (#150)
33
(16.7%)
30
(17.0%)
32
(21.3%)
8
(10.0%)
8
(20.0%)
111
(17.2%)
1.4 to support/counsel/
coach
to capably counsel
students ! this is what I’m there
for (#243)
8
(4.0%)
5
(2.8%)
9
(6.0%)
10
(12.5%)
3
(7.5%)
35
(5.4%)
1.5 to be demanding to pose adequate challenges for
students ! to separate the grain
from the chaff (#259)
3
(1.5%)
2
(1.1%)
1
(.7%)
– – 6
(.9%)
1.6 to interact with
students
to discuss with students ! so
that together we can discover
and learn new and exciting
aspects of our subject (#685)
2
(1.0%)
1
(.6%)
3
(2.0%)
2
(2.5%)
1
(2.5%)
9
(1.4%)
1.7 to make sure that
students learn,
comprehend and are
successful in their
studies
enduring comprehension on the
side of the students ! should be
the goal of all teaching (#295)
5
(2.5%)
2
(1.1%)
3
(2.0%)
4
(5.0%)
1
(2.5%)
15
(2.3%)
1.8 to help student
become autonomous
and capable of critical
thinking
to stimulate students’
autonomous thinking ! to me
this is the most important goal of
university education (#685)
3
(1.5%)
8
(4.5%)
4
(2.7%)
3
(3.8%)
1
(2.5%)
19
(4.1%)
1.9 to prepare students for
exams
to help students pass
exams ! major goal (#48)
2
(1.0%)
– – 1
(1.3%)
1
(2.5%)
4
(.6%)
1.10 to be a role model for
students
to be a role model – !./. (#110) – – 2
(1.3%)
– 1
(2.5%)
3
(.5%)
2 Self-directed goals
2.1 diversification diversification from
research ! to get new stimuli
and motivation(#26)
– – 1
(.7%)
– 2
(5.0%)
3
(.5%)
2.2 to pursue own
interests
to get stimuli for own
research ! young people have
new ideas and can provide me
with new impulses (#362)
1
(.5%)
4
(2.3%)
2
(1.3%)
3
(3.8%)
– 10
(1.5%)
2.3 to gain experience to gain teaching
experience ! qualifying for my
next job (#690)
11
(5.6%)
7
(4.0%)
9
(6.0%)
2
(2.5%)
– 29
(4.5%)
2.4 to get good evaluations to get good teaching
evaluations ! appreciation
(#586)
2
(1.0%)
1
(.6%)
3
(2.0%)
1
(1.3%)
1
(2.5%)
8
(1.2%)
2.5 to develop one’s
personality
to become more self-
confident ! improve my
appearance (#305)
3
(1.5%)
3
(1.7%)
3
(2.0%)
– – 9
(1.4%)
2.6 teaching as a duty–no
goals
to get it over with ! teaching is
an annoying evil on the way to
my PhD (#718)
5
(2.5%)
– 1
(.7%)
– – 6
(.9%)
2.7 to gain, document or
improve teaching
qualification
to develop didactical
knowledge ! important for later
career in the industry or
academia (#416)
19
(9.6%)
18
(10.2%)
13
(8.7%)
7
(8.8%)
4
(10.0%)
61
(9.5%)
2.8 to recruit students for
own research
to identify young talents ! can
be recruited as student assistant
(#786)
1
(.5%)
2
(1.1%)
1
(.7%)
2
(2.5%)
– 6
(.9%)
2.9 to develop social
relations
to establish good contacts with
students and be
appreciated ! social motives
(#891)
1
(.5%)
4
(2.3%)
4
(2.7%)
4
(5.0%)
1
(2.5%)
14
(2.2%)
M. Wosnitza et al. / International Journal of Educational Research 65 (2014) 90–103 97
Table 4 (Continued )
Sample quotes: Teaching
Goal ! Reason
My teaching goal is. . .
(translated from German)
Goal 1 Goal 2 Goal 3 Goal 4 Goal 5 S
2.10 to have fun/
enjoyment/being
motivated
to also enjoy teaching ! I want
to enjoy doing my job (#701)
2
(1.0%)
– 2
(1.3%)
– – 4
(.6%)
2.11 to gain/deepen own
knowledge
to work on an unknown
topic ! deepen knowledge
(#215)
5
(2.5%)
10
(5.7%)
5
(3.3%)
5
(6.3%)
4
(10.0%)
29
(4.5%)
2.12 to optimise one’s time
management
a reasonable degree of
supporting students ! using
time resources for PhD (#411)
2
(1.0%)
1
(.6%)
2
(1.3%)
2
(2.5%)
1
(2.5%)
8
(1.2%)
3 Teaching-directed goals
3.1 to provide high quality
learning material
to develop good learning
materials ! because it matters
in the long run (#535)
– 2
(1.1%)
1
(.7%)
1
(1.3%)
1
(2.5%)
5
(.8%)
3.2 to use a variety in
teaching methods/to
choose the right
method
to apply new
methods ! increases students’
success and enjoyment (#399)
5
(2.5%)
6
(3.4%)
7
(4.7%)
7
(8.8%)
1
(2.5%)
26
(4.0%)
3.3 to ensure high quality
teaching
high quality teaching ! the
students are our future (#566)
20
(10.1%)
17
(9.7%)
5
(3.3%)
2
(2.5%)
1
(2.5%)
45
(7.0%)
3.4 transparency and
making relevance
obvious
transparent teaching ! students
should know what is taught
when for what reason (#900)
1
(.5%)
5
(2.8%)
2
(1.3%)
1
(1.3%)
– 9
(1.4%)
3.5 teach comprehensibly
and show connections/
context
to teach comprehensibly ! even
complex matters can be easily
understood if they are explained
properly (#609)
6
(3.0)
7
(4.0%)
10
(6.7%)
1
(1.3%)
1
(2.5%)
25
(3.9%)
3.6 good and fair exams fair exams ! not too easy –
students have to be able to excel.
Not too difficult–connection to
lecture (#306)
– 3
(1.7%)
2
(1.3%)
2
(2.5%)
1
(2.5%)
8
(1.2%)
4 Content-directed goals
4.1 being up to date up-to-dateness ! graduates’
suitability for praxis (#28)
– 1
(.6%)
– 1
(1.3%)
1
(2.5%)
3
(4.5%)
4.2 to transfer knowledge
and skills
transfer of knowledge ! that’s
just the goal of it all, isn’t it?
(#192)
52
(26.3%)
26
(14.8%)
17
(11.3%)
5
(6.3%)
3
(7.5%)
103
(16.0%)
4.3 to create a concept of
science, knowledge of
scientific work and
methods in students
to transfer scientific
thinking ! because
unfortunately some do not
achieve this during their studies
(#554)
2
(1.0%)
2
(1.1%)
3
(2.0%)
2
(2.5%)
2
(5.0%)
11
(1.7%)
M. Wosnitza et al. / International Journal of Educational Research 65 (2014) 90–10398
teaching goal category was entered into the analysis (e.g., Participant 1 named 4 goals: Student-Directed (StD) = 1, Self-
Directed (SD) = 2, Teaching-Directed (TD) = 1, Content-Directed (CD) = 0: Data entered for Participant 1 was: StD = 25, SD = 50,TD = 25, CD = 0; Participant 2 named 3 goals: StD = 0, SD = 3, TD = 0, CD = 0: Data entered for Participant 2 was: StD = 0,SD = 100, TD = 0, CD = 0). The decision regarding the final number of clusters was based on the cluster dendrogram, number ofsteps in the screen-type plot of fusion coefficients relative to number of clusters, and on the basis of substantiveinterpretability. Due to the limited sample sizes of some of the identified clusters non-parametric inferential statistics werecarried out for the subsequent analyses (see Table 5 for cluster sample sizes). The Kruskal–Wallis test was conducted toexamine significant effects of cluster membership on the variables employed in the cluster analysis (student-directed goals,
self-directed goals, teaching-directed goals, content-directed goals). As shown in Table 3, statistically significant differenceswere found for all of the four goals across all three clusters.
Post-hoc analyses systematically comparing each cluster combination using the Mann–Whitney test revealed thatstudent-directed goals significantly and consistently varied between all identified clusters (p < .05). Significant between-cluster differences were also found for teaching-directed goals (p < .001) except for cluster 2 and cluster 3 (U = 2704.0, z = .80,p = .42), which did not significantly vary on that measure. Furthermore, there were no significant differences for content-
directed goals between clusters 2 and 3 (U = 2794.0, z = .80, p = .42). Finally, no significant differences were found for self-
directed goals between cluster 1 and 2 (U = 1057.5, z = �1.65, p = .10). Fig. 2 shows a graphical representation of the goalprofiles. Each cluster will briefly be outlined in the light of the underlying teaching goal structures.
4.3.1. Cluster 1: instruction-oriented early career university teachers (N = 45)
Early career university teachers in this cluster were characterised by expressing no self-directed goals, the highest level ofcontent-directed and teaching-directed goals of all early career university teachers and an average level of student-directed
M. Wosnitza et al. / International Journal of Educational Research 65 (2014) 90–103 99
goals. These teachers focused equally on aspects like quality of teaching, and choosing the best possible methods for theirteaching, as on the fact that the content they are teaching is up to date and that they are transferring knowledge and skills intheir teaching. They showed no goals which have a clear self-focus, like to pursue their own interests, gain experience ordocument a teaching qualification. Consequently, this teaching goal type can be characterised as instruction-oriented. Thistype was the smallest group of university teachers.
4.3.2. Cluster 2: student-oriented early career university teachers (N = 58)
A negligible score of self-directed goals and very low scores on content- and teaching-goals characterised early careeruniversity teachers in this cluster. These teachers focused on the motivation of the students, the support of students or tomake sure that students are learning and are successful. They focused on their students’ development. Consequently, thisteaching goal type can be characterised as student-oriented university teachers. This type was the second largest group ofearly career university teachers.
4.3.3. Cluster 3: ego-oriented early career university teachers (N = 101)
A predominant level of self-directed goals characterised early career university teachers in this cluster. These teachersfocus on aspects such as to pursue their own interest, gain experience through their teaching, get good evaluations or havefun and enjoy their teaching. The other three goals (student-directed goals, teaching-directed goals and content-directedgoals) were at a very low level. Consequently, this teaching goal type can be characterised as ego-oriented. This type was byfar the largest group of early career university teachers.
Fig. 2. Teaching goal profiles.
Table 6
Clusters and programmes of teaching.
Humanities Jurisprudence, economics and social science Mathematics and science Engineering
M. Wosnitza et al. / International Journal of Educational Research 65 (2014) 90–103100
4.4. RQ4: Do different types of early career university teachers show a difference in their teaching efficacy and the perception of
their responsibility?
Overall early career university teachers did appraise themselves rather positively regarding teacher efficacy (M = 2.9,SD = .47). Furthermore the results also showed that they had a differentiated view on their responsibility. On the one hand,they saw their main responsibility as the quality of their teaching (M = 75.04, SD = 18.42), directly followed by theirresponsibility for good relations with their students (M = 67.12, SD = 19.84). On the other hand, they did not see a largeresponsibility for their students’ achievement (M = 47.44; SD = 19.28), and even less responsibility for their students’motivation (M = 41.21, SD = 20.02). A series of paired t-tests showed significant differences between all four responsibilitycategories (p < .001).
Kruskal–Wallis’ ANOVAs were conducted to explore the cluster differences for responsibility and teacher efficacy. Nosignificant differences were found between the clusters for teacher efficacy and or for the four responsibility categories.There were also no differences regarding age and gender. Differences were found for the number of semesters an early careeruniversity teacher had been already teaching (H(2) = 6.67, p < .05), showing that student-oriented early career university
teachers (M = 3.47, SD = 2.17) were teaching for a significantly shorter time than instruction-oriented early career university
teachers (M = 4.76, SD = 2.55; U = 834.0, z = 2.34, p < .05) and self-oriented early career university teachers (M = 4.29, SD = 2.30;U = 2179.5, z = �2.05, p < .05).
Furthermore, there was a significant difference identified for the area in which the early career university teacher wasteaching (x2 = 19.57, df = 6, p < .01). Table 6 shows that the early career university teachers teaching in ‘‘Jurisprudence,Economics and Social Science’’ were fairly evenly distributed over the three clusters. ‘‘Humanities’’-early career universityteachers on the other hand were predominantly ego-oriented in their teaching goal structure. This was very similar to the‘‘Engineering’’-early career university teachers. ‘‘Mathematics and Science’’-early career university teachers comprised thesmallest subgroups of early career university teachers with a student-oriented teaching goal structure.
5. Discussion
The results of this exploratory study in early career university teachers’ motivation can overall be said to support ageneral hypothesis in the literature focusing on this issue: Teaching is not a primary goal of early career university teachersin Germany. The results of this study indicate that the main explanation for this finding is that most of these early careeruniversity teachers did not choose teaching but rather research as a career. Teaching, however, is included as a part of the job.Schutz, Crowder, and White (2001) have suggested that people develop broader life goals from which short term goals can beassumed to derive so that, while schoolteachers experience teaching to be their broader life goal, early career universityteachers were shown in this study to mainly focus on other aspects of their work in academia, i.e., doing research and gainingfurther qualification. The emphasis put on goals connected to the university teachers themselves, like the ones ‘‘to gainprestige’’ and ‘‘to be successful’’ can also be assumed to be strongly connected to the early career university teachers’ maingoal to establish themselves and gain different kinds of qualification for them to be able to further pursue a career atuniversity. Especially in these early years when just starting to work in academia, trying to establish oneself as a researcherand integrating into the scientific community is crucial for one’s further career and maintaining employment in the sector.Thus naturally, aspects which are experienced as not contributing to this overall goal might be somewhat disregarded (Locke& Latham, 2006). Furthermore, university teachers go through a professional socialisation when starting their work, whichcan easily be assumed to strongly differ from that of a teacher starting their work at school, where they do not experiencepermanent goal conflicts (Neumann, 1996). In particular, colleagues emphasising the role of research and calling teaching aburden and ‘‘danger’’ (Rowland, 1996) keeping an academic from research, can have a strong impact on what goals areconsequently emphasised by the young professional and thus a decreasing student-orientation as has been shown in thisstudy.
Early career university teachers in this German sample mainly emphasised student- and self-directed goals for teaching.The self-directed teaching goals with the emphasis on gaining and documenting teaching qualification can be assumed toagain derive from the need to establish one’s profile. As teaching is a part of most positions at German universities, gainingone of these positions also depends on a researcher’s qualifications regarding their teaching. In this respect, teaching is againperceived to be a means to an end rather than having its own relevance recognised. Student-directed goals being the grouphighest in numbers, however, shows that despite not viewing teaching as one of the main goals of their work at university,early career university teachers perceive student-related goals to be the most important with regards to their teaching. Thehigh numbers of nominations of sub-goals such as ‘‘to be inspirational and motivating’’ also suggest that a large number of
M. Wosnitza et al. / International Journal of Educational Research 65 (2014) 90–103 101
early career university teachers focus on a good relationship with their students. In spite of this, the results of the clusteranalysis show a large group of teachers who do not have a student focus when they reflect about their teaching.
The study identified three types of teacher: Ego-oriented early career university teachers whose goals revolve aroundtheir own personal development constituted the by far largest group. About half of all teachers in this study could beidentified as such. The other half of the teachers could be organised into two types of university teachers: the instruction-
oriented early career university teachers with a focus on content-directed and teaching directed goals and the student-oriented
early career university teachers with a focus on the development of their students.The fact that a person is identified as one of the three types of teachers could be expected to also manifest itself in regard
of their view of responsibility and their self-perceived level of teacher-efficacy (Lauermann & Karabenick, 2011; Locke &Latham, 2006). This relation could not be identified in this study. The teachers overall showed a high level of responsibilityregarding their quality of teaching, their relationship with their students as well as their feeling of teacher efficacy, but nodifferences could be found between the different types of teachers (ego-oriented, instruction-oriented or student-oriented).Independently of their personal goal structure, these early career university teachers felt particularly responsible for theirrelationships with their students and the quality of their teaching. They furthermore showed a high level of teacher-efficacy.
Since these results are based on self-report measures only, it is possible that this outcome can be attributed to a commonmethod bias or socially desirable answers (Podsakoff, MacKenzie, Lee, & Podsakoff, 2003). Further studies have to provide amulti-perspective set of data including observation data, student reports, reports of supervisors or evaluation outcomes. Thiswould give a valuable insight into early career university teachers’ actual teaching and behaviour which can than be relatedto their teaching goal profiles.
Regarding the distribution of types of teacher over the programmes of studies, the study showed that only in in‘‘Jurisprudence, Economics and Social Sciences’’ were the teachers fairly distributed over the three types of teachers. In all theother areas of teaching specific types were identified. For example, in ‘‘Humanities’’ predominantly ego-oriented early careeruniversity teachers were identified. This study cannot give an answer why this is the case. As has been discussed, it can beassumed that the development of goals or goal profiles is context-related. The different distribution could be the outcome ofspecific forms of socialisation in the respective research and teaching area. For example, self-directed goals might beemphasised by colleagues or the general context of working in ‘‘Humanities’’ which leads to a specific view of teaching. Also,these early career university teachers might be influenced by how they, during their own studies, experienced their teachers’view of teaching. Another explanation could be different teaching traditions and forms in the particular programmes, whichcan have an impact on the development of teaching goal structures. For example, one could expect that if lectures are thedominant form in one programme and interactive workshops the dominant form in another, this could lead to differentviews of teaching and so to different goal structures. Future research using multiple methodological approaches likeobservations or student reports in combination with the instruments used in this study would shed light on thisphenomenon.
6. Conclusion
This study focused on a largely under-researched area of motivation research. It shows that regarding their goal structure,university teachers show different profiles, which are a result of their specifically complex working environment with itsoften conflicting demands. The study also indicated some questions for research. Significant starting points of futureresearch, which build on the insights of this study, are for example the study of goal structures of university teachers moreestablished in their job and not facing these same issues that beginning professionals have to deal with. The question is,whether the feeling of being more settled in their profession leads to further identification with teaching and thus also todifferent teaching goal profiles. With regard to the discussion about the context-sensitivity of goals, it is relevant to try toexplain differences of teacher type distribution in different programmes. The sample of this study is specific in so far as it is asolely German group of early career university teachers with its own specific characteristics regarding job arrangement thatis reflected in the demographics of the sample. It would be interesting to find out in how far goal structures of teachers inother higher education settings and other countries respectively differ from those of early career university teachers inGermany. Finally, the expectation that goals can change over time suggests the necessity of longitudinal research in this area.Nevertheless, through the identification of different types of German early career university teachers in relation to the goalsthey pursue, this study has contributed to this emerging field of research.
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