Personality and Motivation Profiles and Academic Outcomes in University Students: A Five-Year Prospective Study

This five-year prospective study adopted a person-centered approach to examine how combinations of personality traits and motivational characteristics predict university students’ degree grades and delays in study completion. A total of 179 first-year students from the Department of Physical Education and Sport Science completed questionnaires assessing multiple forms of motivation grounded in self-determination theory, as well as personality traits based on the five-factor model. LCA identified three distinct profiles: (1) students exhibiting high levels across all five personality traits and strong self-determined motivation for studying (Profile 1); (2) students characterized by higher extraversion but lower agreeableness, conscientiousness, and self-determined motivation (Profile 2); and (3) students displaying lower self-determined motivation but high agreeableness and conscientiousness (Profile 3). These profiles showed differential associations with degree grades and delays in graduation. The findings are discussed in relation to prior empirical and theoretical research.