The Big Five personality traits as determinants of teachers' achievement motivation

Abstract

Many studies have reported that motivated teachers put more effort in order to affect the behaviour of their students in the most desirable and positive manner and to transfer appropriate knowledge to their students. The objective of this study was to determine if the Big Five personality traits predict the achievement motive for teachers’ work. The sample consisted of 732 teachers (75.4% female) from 25 Bosnia and Herzegovina elementary schools, and the Big Five Inventory and Achievement Motive Scale were used. The results of Regression Analysis show that personality traits explain 31% of the variance of the achievement motive total score. When it comes to components of the achievement motive, the Big Five personality traits explain 8% of the variance in competition with other people, 49% of the variance in persistence in goal achieving, 34% of the variance in goal achievement as a source of satisfaction, and 18% of the variance in orientation towards planning. Conscientiousness is the most powerful predictor of all components of the achievement motive, as well as of the achievement motive total score. Extraversion and openness are significant positive predictors of the following components: competition with other people, persistence in goal achieving and goal achievement as a source of satisfaction, and the total score for the achievement motive. Finally, the obtained results show that teachers’ achievement motive has a significant personal background.