Research in pedagogy and education shows that four key self-initiated student behaviors are crucial for developing, progressing, and enhancing positive intrinsic learning qualities. These essential self-driven behaviors support the growth and refinement of valuable academic and social skills, offering the potential to advance skills, knowledge, insights, and understanding across all disciplines. This process involves the development and application of four intrinsic qualities (Purje, 2014).

These four intrinsic qualities are: self-motivation, self-discipline, self-regulation, and self-management. These constructs have been identified through educational research as essential for understanding how learners develop and eventually begin to recognize what is required in their learning journey and ongoing quest to reach their desired goals. All of which begins with the application of self-motivation (Duckworth & Seligman, 2005; Martin & Marsh, 2006; Mischel et al., 1989; Pintrich & De Groot, 1990; Purje, 2014; Ryan & Deci, 2020; Schunk & Zimmerman, 1997; Zimmerman, 2002).

Self-motivation is the internal drive to start and maintain goal-oriented behavior without external rewards. Research suggests that self-motivation is the driver of actions; it is the personally understood and, importantly, the personally applied action by the individual without (in colloquial terms) being constantly told what to do. Self-motivation is connected to the desire of “want.” That of wanting to achieve, and of wanting to continuously work to achieve their goals.

A thousand-mile journey begins with the first step, and the only one who can take that first step, and all the required steps that follow, is the self. This action is directly connected to self-discipline (Duckworth & Seligman, 2005; Martin & Marsh, 2006; Mischel et al.,........

© Psychology Today