Antonio Granero-Gallegos
Ginés David López-García
Rafael Burgueño
Universidad de Almería
ABSTRACT: Guided by self-determination theory, the objective of the present research
was to examine the differences between physical education (PE) and foreign language (FL)
pre-service teachers in terms of the associations between perceived educator-created (dis)
empowering climates and need-based experiences and motivation. A convenience sample
of 246 PE and 208 FL pre-service teachers (57.08% women, Mage=24.92, SD=4.07) parti-
cipated in this cross-sectional research. All the participants came from eight Andalusian
public universities: Almería (19.8%), Cádiz (5.7%), Córdoba (3.7%), Granada (32.2%),
Huelva (3.5%), Jaén (4.8%), Málaga (16.1%) and Sevilla (14.1%). The participants com-
pleted the following scales: the Educator-Created Empowering and Disempowering Cli-
mate Questionnaire, the Basic Psychological Needs Satisfaction Scale, the Psychological
Needs Thwarting Scale, and the Academic Motivation Scale. The results showed that PE
pre-service teachers scored significantly higher than FL pre-service teachers in disem-
powering climate, need satisfaction and amotivation. The results from the multi-group
path analysis revealed that, overall, empowering and disempowering climates were diffe-
rentially associated with the motivational outcomes between the PE and FL pre-service
teachers. More specifically, FL pre-service teachers had slightly higher associations bet-
ween empowering climates and need satisfaction, and between disempowering climates
and need frustration. PE pre-service teachers, on the other hand, had slightly stronger
relationships between need satisfaction and controlled motivation and autonomous moti-
vation, as well as between need frustration and amotivation. Conclusions: the findings un-
derscore the importance not only of teacher educators creating empowering climates, but
also of avoiding disempowering climates so as to promote adaptive motivational processes
in both groups of student teachers.
