Abstract:

Motivation as a psychological mechanism is the reason for people’s actions and it is defined as the process that initiates, guides, and maintains goal-oriented behaviors. Motives are the “whys” of human behavior - the needs or wants that drive the behavior and explain what we do. People don't actually observe a motive; rather, an individual infers that one exists based on the behavior he or she observes ([1]).

Motivation, which energizes and directs behavior toward a goal, could certainly be perceived as one of the most important psychological mechanisms in education and academic sphere ([2]). Motivation to succeed and achieve something academically is an important component in a university student’s successful educational journey and in a further career-building process.

Therefore, in order to succeed in an academic, social and professional environment it is essential for a student to be motivated and to look for efficient motivation tools and sources.

One of such effective instruments of motivation may become the new media discourse space. The reason that defines such new media discourse salience lies in the fact that the world we exist nowadays in is completely digitalized and mediatized. Both the education and academic environment are being integrated in the media discourse space. Therefore, university students expose to the new media space effects consciously and unconsciously. Hence we hypothesize that university students’ motivation to study and gain new knowledge and professional skills may be defined by the media discourse space in direct and indirect ways.

The purpose of this research is to identify the media discourse factors that influence students’ activity in their academic and professional environment and raise their motivation level directing to the formation and development of new knowledge and proficiency.

Students of three higher education institutions (Moscow State Pedagogical University, RUDN university (Moscow), South Ural State Humanitarian Pedagogical University (Chelyabinsk)) have been surveyed to estimate the correlation between young people’s academic behavior, motives, interests and their perceived new media discourse presence. The combination of three statistical methods – correlation, factor and regression analyses has been applied in the research to prove the above mentioned hypothesis and achieve the main goal of the study as well as to introduce new challenges and research questions for further scientific findings.

References:
[1] J.S. Nevid, S.A. Rathus, B., Greene, Abnormal Psychology in a Changing World. (10th edition). Pearson, 2017.
[2] N. Guslyakova, Teacher’s professional consciousness: a psychological approach. Chelyabinsk: Izdatel’stvo CSPU. 2013.

Keywords:

New media discourse space, motivation, academic motivation, university students, education, academic and professional skills, correlation, contemporary media factors.