For the love of learning science: Connecting learning orientation and career productivity in physics and chemistry

An individual’s motivational orientation serves as a drive to action and can influence their career success. This study examines how goal orientation toward the pursuit of a graduate degree in physics and chemistry influences later success outcomes of practicing physicists and chemists. Two main categories of goal orientation are examined in this paper: performance orientation or motivation to demonstrate one’s ability or performance to others, and learning orientation or motivation through the desire to learn about a topic. The data were obtained as part of Project Crossover, a mixed-methods study which focused on studying the transition from graduate student to scientist in the physical sciences and included a survey of members of two national professional physical science organizations. Using regression analysis on data from 2353 physicists and chemists, results indicate that physicists and chemists who reported a learning orientation as their motivation for going to graduate school were more productive, in terms of total career primary and/or first-author publications and grant funding, than those reporting a performance orientation. Furthermore, given equal salary, learning-oriented individuals produced more primary and/or first-author publications than their nonlearning oriented counterparts.

Figure 1

Effect of learning and performance orientations on grant funding and primary and/or first-author publications for practicing physicists and chemists while controlling for gender, race and/or ethnicity, field, current position, type of institution, and years in current position. Error bars represent $\pm 1$ standard error.

Figure 2

Regression lines predicting primary and/or first-author publications with increasing salary in thousands while controlling for gender, race and/or ethnicity, field, current position, and years in current position. Dashed lines represent 95% confidence intervals.