Voices from the Classroom: A Qualitative Exploration of How Motivation Shapes Undergraduate Students’ Academic Experiences and Performance

Abstract

In educational psychology, motivation is often quantified through surveys and effect sizes, yet its lived nuances—how students feel it, navigate it, and let it ebb or flow—remain underexplored. This qualitative study delves into the subjective experiences of 25 undergraduate students at a mid-sized urban university in India, using semi-structured interviews to uncover how intrinsic and extrinsic motivations interplay with academic performance. Grounded in self-determination theory (SDT), the research addresses the central question: How do undergraduate students perceive and enact motivation in their daily academic lives, and what role does it play in their sense of achievement? Thematic analysis revealed four core themes: (1) Intrinsic sparks as anchors of resilience, where personal curiosity sustained effort amid setbacks; (2) Extrinsic pressures as double-edged swords, boosting short-term output but fostering burnout; (3) Contextual enablers like peer bonds and faculty empathy amplifying relatedness needs; and (4) Barriers of inequity, where socioeconomic divides skewed access to motivational supports. Findings illuminate SDT’s basic psychological needs—autonomy, competence, relatedness—as dynamic threads in students’ narratives, with implications for culturally sensitive pedagogies in diverse settings like India. This study contributes to qualitative traditions in psychology by prioritising participant voices over metrics, offering educators practical insights like “motivation mapping” exercises. Amid rising mental health concerns in higher education, it call for interventions that nurture intrinsic drives equitably. Future work could extend to longitudinal ethnographies for deeper temporal insights.