The effects of age, cognition, and motivation on GPA among college students at the undergraduate level

Abstract

This study examines the growing number of nontraditional college students returning to college and suggests there may be cognitive implications for older nontraditional college students over 40 years old in relationship to GPA. This project included two studies. The first study recruited two participant groups (n=20 and n=204) to assist in creating a survey instrument and to confirm its validity and reliability. The second larger study recruited 334 participants from the University of Hawaii-West O„ahu and Leeward Community College to explore the effects of age, cognition, and intrinsic motivation on grade point average among three groups of undergraduate college students, traditional students from 18-24 years of age, younger nontraditional students from 25-40 years, and older nontraditional students who were over 40 years of age. Cognition included the categories of encoding, memory, and attention. A multiple Regression model demonstrated that only intrinsic motivation predicted GPA for college students at the undergraduate level. This would imply that a student having adequate amounts of intrinsic motivation could achieve academic success in relationship to GPA levels.