An Investigation of gifted students' intrinsic motivation and classroom productivity

The purpose of this study was to investigate the relationship between academic intrinsic motivation and classroom productivity in a sample of gifted students (N = 99) in Grades 4-8. Participants completed the Children’s Academic Intrinsic Motivation Inventory (CAIMI) (Gottfried, 1986), a measure of intrinsic motivation in four subject areas (reading, math, social studies, science) and in general. Participants’ teachers rated their classroom productivity using the Student Productivity Scale (SPS). Participants scored below the 51st percentile in all CAIMI subscales. Teachers rated 80.8% of students as having high levels of productivity (total SPS score between 11 and 16 out of 16) and only 19.1% were rated as having low levels (total SPS score between 6 and 11 out of 16). Low, but statistically significant, positive correlations were found between levels of student classroom productivity and two of the five CAIMI subscales (reading and social studies).