Motivational and Social Cognition Determinants of Out-of-School Physical Activity Participation in High-School Adolescents: A Test and Extension of the Trans-Contextual Model

The aim of the current study is to test an extended version of the trans-contextual model, an integrated motivational and social cognition model purposed to describe the determinants of motivation toward, and participation in, education- and health-related behaviors and associated activities across in-school and out-of-school contexts (Hagger et al., 2003). The present study will extend the scope of the model by including additional or seldom-included constructs that address some of the limitations of prior tests in a sample of school children aged 12 to 14 years in physical education (PE) and leisure-time (out-of-school) physical activity contexts. Specifically, the study will extend the model by including additional determinants as following: (1) a measure of an additional construct representing non-conscious processes, namely self-reported habit for physical activity, that may be implicated in students’ physical activity participation in out-of-school contexts; (2) measures of other perceived sources of autonomous support, namely parent and peer support, for students’ leisure-time physical activity in out-of-school context that have seldom been included in prior model tests; and (3) a measure of students’ subsequent PE grades as an additional outcome measure taken alongside students’ self-reported leisure-time physical activity participation, the typical outcome used in prior model tests, which may provide an additional indirect indication of the extent to which students’ have engaged in sustained both in-class and out-of-school physical activity participation and the value they attach to activities in these contexts. Taken together, the model test including these extensions is expected to provide evidence that broadens the scope of the model as a comprehensive and precise description of the determinants of, and the associated motivational processes by which, students’ perceived autonomy support and autonomous motivation in a PE context transfers to autonomous motivation toward out-of-school activities, their beliefs with respect to performing these activities in future, and, ultimately participation in these activities in an out-of-school context. References Hagger, M. S., Chatzisarantis, N. L., Culverhouse, T., & Biddle, S. J. (2003). The processes by which perceived autonomy support in physical education promotes leisure-time physical activity intentions and behavior: A trans-contextual model. Journal of Educational Psychology, 95(4), 784-795. https://doi.org/10.1037/0022-0663.95.4.784