Exploratory Study on Profiles of Academic-work Mental Health: Focused on Academic Motivation

Objectives The present study aimed to explore the profiles of academic-work mental health among Korean high school students, with a focus on academic motivation, which further contribute to providing fundamental evidence to preventive academic-work counseling. Methods The data, self-reported by 391 students in the first and second years from 7 high schools, measured exhaustion, vigor, approach-avoidance motivation, and self-determination motivations were employed for latent profile analysis. Based on this, the profiles of academic-work mental health were investigated, and then multinomial logistic regression analysis was conducted with academic motivation as antecedents. Results Four profiles were observed: the engaged, the burned-out, the studyholic, and the unidentified. Only avoidance motivation significantly distinguished the studyholic from the engaged. Within self-determination motivations, no motivation distinguished it from the engaged and the unidentified except the burned-out. Amotivation and introjected motivation showed the differences between the engaged and the identified/ the burned-out. Conclusions The present findings imply the necessity of early-intervention for the studyholic, featured with the exhausted but engaged. Even with indistinctiveness in appearance between the engaged and the studyholic, screening by avoidance motivation enables their distinction. Further, practical implications lie in the potential possibility for intervention strategy for an adaptive academic-work mental health profile.