The mediating role of academic motivation in the relationship between academic identity and dimensions of emotional well-being in female students in the second year of primary school in Kashan

Extended AbstractAbstractThe aim of this study was to determine the mediating role of academic motivation in the relationship between academic identity and dimensions of emotional well-being in female students in the second year of elementary school in Kashan. The research method is essentially descriptive-correlative. The statistical population of the study consists of 1531 female students of the second grade of elementary school in Kashan. The sample size was obtained by cluster random sampling of 200 people. For data collection, Walland (1982) Academic Motivation Questionnaire, Waz & Isaacson (2008) Academic Identity Questionnaire and Keys and Magyarmo (2003) Emotional Well-Being Questionnaire were used, whose authenticity was confirmed by supervisors and academic experts, and their reliability was also confirmed by Cronbach's alpha coefficient test. To data analysis, the structural equation technique was used by means of Lisrel statistical software and Spss statistical software. Findings showed that academic identity is related to academic motivation and dimensions of students' emotional well-being. Academic motivation is related to students' emotional well-being. The results showed that academic motivation has a mediating role in the relationship between academic identity and dimensions of emotional well-being in female students in the second year of elementary school in Kashan.IntroductionMotivation is a the main variable effective on the educational process, learning efficiency and student performance. Research psychologists have concluded that a set of internal and external factors, variables or structures motivating the Students are involved in his learning and active participation in the learning process. From instinct, drive, need and enthusiasm to interest, curiosity, attribution style, ability, expectation, striving for parental progress and pressure, peer pressure; all in a complex interaction, can influence a student's motivation system and shape his or her teaching, learning, and developmental behavior (Shafiee, Karami, 2020). If there is an academic identity in a person, there is a sense of movement and success in various aspects of education (Tran & et al, 2017). With this feeling, the existing obstacles to success are removed one after another (Gazidari, Lavasani, Ejei, 2016). Academic identity is a reflection of the types of competencies, autonomy, purposefulness, efficiency beliefs, and experiences of common emotions that adolescents and young adults experience in the classroom with their peers and teachers, and the performance quality in the academic arena is its characteristics. (Samimi, Dahani, Shaban, 2017). Welfare has been proposed as one of the important indicators of quality of life. Emotional well-being is a broad category of phenomena including the emotional responses of individuals, the realm of satisfaction, and general evaluations of life. This structure is often considered to have a multidimensional structure including cognitive, social and emotional dimensions. Psychologists consider emotion regulation to be a basic skill for adolescents and believe its dependence on growth; meaning that a person should acquire this skill during development, however reasons such as lack of a rich environment and inappropriate learning patterns can make it difficult to manage their emotions. Based on this, and considering that students spend a lot of time in school, it can be said that emotion regulation is among the skills the school context can strengthen or weaken. (Nikkhah, Yousefi, 2021).Emotional well-being, life satisfaction, optimism and hope, self-confidence, dominance and sense of control, having a purpose in life, a sense of belonging and personal support are the most important aspects of it (Abbasi & Shehni Yailagh 2017). Motivation is the most important condition for learning. Interest in learning is a product of factors related to the student's personality and ability, task characteristics, incentives, and environmental factors (Wright & et al, 2019). Due to the importance of motivation in students 'academic and social life and the need for a comprehensive and complete study of this structure according to its various aspects and the importance of academic motivation and academic identity in students' emotional well-being, it is important to conduct such research to solve Students' learning difficulties and academic achievement. According to the contents of this article, an attempt is made to answer the question whether academic motivation has a mediating role in the relationship between academic identity and the dimensions of emotional well-being in female students in the second year of primary school in Kashan.Theoretical frameworkThe educational institution in each country has components and subdivisions and the education department is one of the most important subdivisions of the educational system. Planners and researchers have faced a variety of problems since training programs were formally implemented in training centers. Since the effective factors on learning are exhaustive, identifying of these factors is important in the education system to eliminate the existing problems and deficiencies (Oz, 2016). One of the goals and tasks of the education system is to create the conditions for the comprehensive development of the individual and to train healthy, efficient and responsible people to play a role in individual and social life. Since students, as one of the basic pillars of the country's educational system, have a special role and position in achieving the goals of the educational system, paying more attention to this segment of society in terms of education leads to fertility and prosperity of the educational system as much as possible. In educational structures, academic motivation is the criterion for measuring the achievement of educational goals (Poorkarimi, Mobayen Rahni, 2018).MethodologyThe present study is a methodological description of correlation. The statistical population of this study consisted of 1531 female students of the second elementary school in Kashan. Nine classrooms were selected with a total of 200 students. The method was cluster random sampling. For data collection, Walrand (1982) Academic Motivation Questionnaire, Waz and Isaacson (2008) Academic Identity Questionnaire and Keyes and Magyarmo (2003) Questionnaire were used. In order to analyze the data collected from the test of research hypotheses, first the Kolmogorov-Smirnov test was used to check the normality of data distribution and structural equations to examine the relationship between independent and mediating variables with dependent variables using statistic software LISREL8.Discussion and ResultsThe final structural equation model has been used to assess the mediating role of academic motivation in the relationship between academic identity and dimensions of emotional well-being in female students in the second year of elementary school in Kashan. Since the root mean square of the model is approximately 0.031, the model has a good fit.Research Hypothesis: Academic motivation has a mediating role in the relationship between academic identity and dimensions of emotional well-being in female students in the second grade of elementary school in Kashan. In order to investigate the mediating effect of academic motivation in the hypothesis under discussion, the direct effect of the two structures with the indirect effect in the case of involving mediating variables should be examined so that if the effect increases, the mediating effect can be considered acceptable. In the present hypothesis, the effect is equal to 0.41. Indirect effect in the presence of mediating variable of academic motivation is: 0.69 × 0.75 = 0.517. Due to the lower effect of direct path compared with that of indirect paths, the presence of mediating variable of academic motivation increases the effect, and the role of the mediator in the present hypothesis is confirmed.ConclusionThe aim of this study was to assess the mediating role of academic motivation in the relationship between academic identity and dimensions of emotional well-being in female students in the second grade of elementary school in Kashan. The results of this study showed that the mediating role of academic motivation in the relationship between academic identity and the dimensions of emotional well-being is 0.41. Due to the smaller effect of direct path compared with that of indirect paths, therefore, the existence of mediator variable of academic motivation increases the amount of influence, and the mediating role in the present hypothesis is confirmed. The result is that students who put studying at the top of their agenda are better able to succeed in life because they consider planning as a tool to achieve their goals. Such students consider themselves much stronger and more capable than others, and on the other hand, they are full of energy. The results of this hypothesis are in line with the findings of Samari et al. (2021). In their research, they concluded that achievement motivation plays a mediating role between the variables of basic psychological needs and academic achievement. These basic needs are derived from students' identities and their perceived emotional well-being. On the other hand, such people are able to accurately identify the annoying problems which effects them. In such situations, they appreciate the deserved people and consider their relationship style with the outside environment as friendly and warm. Overall, such people feel good about what they have done and are satisfied with the way they have done their job. These results are also in line with the findings of Mahna et al. (2020). In a study, they concluded that there is a positive and significant relationship between academic identity and goal orientation with metacognitive strategies of students' self-regulated learning. Finally, students feel that they have an effective role to play and that they are able to make decisions. They increase the amount of effort they put into studying because it is in such circumstances that they enjoy the progress of their lessons. On the other hand, because of the joy they get when they discover new things they have not seen before, they are constantly doing their homework. These results are also consistent with the findings of Nikkhah et al. (2021). They found in a study that emotional well-being can have a negative effect on academic failure and a positive and significant effect on students' academic performance and academic motivation.