Is it Significant?: Examining the Relationship between the Racial Identity Statuses and Academic Motivation Styles of African-American College Students

As African-American college attainment has consistently lagged in comparison to the European-American community, this quantitative study examined the relationship between the racial identity statuses and academic motivation styles of African-American college students. More specifically, the Multidimensional Inventory of Black Identity (MIBI) (racial centrality, private regard, & public regard) was utilized to discover the racial identity statuses, and the Academic Motivation Scale (AMS) (extrinsic & intrinsic academic motivation) was employed to determine the academic motivation styles of African-American college students. Approximately 211 African-Americans (81% women) were recruited via a Facebook group, which is a designed private space for African-American college professionals and students. The results revealed a propensity towards greater levels of Extrinsic Academic Motivation (EAM) while higher levels of Racial Centrality and Private Regard rendered positive relationships with EAM. Further, greater levels of Public Regard was shown to have a negative relationship with EAM, whereas greater levels of Public Regard was shown to have a positive relationship with Intrinsic Academic Motivation (IAM). These findings provide further implications for research concerning the American K-12 curriculum and American media sources regarding their impacts on the racial identity statuses and academic motivations of African-American college students and African-American K-12 students. Keywords: racial identity, MIBI, academic motivation, AMS, K-12, curriculum, American, media, African-American, socialization, community development