A Study on Academic Achievement and Selected Psychological Attributes among College Students

Scientific evidence is piling up that shows regular exercise provides important cognitive benefits that could make your scholarly efforts a little less taxing. The importance of exercise is nothing new. Thomas Jefferson once wrote that to be successful in academic studies, a person should give about two of them [that's hours, people!], every day, to exercise, for health must not be sacrificed to learning. A strong body makes the mind strong. The purpose of the study was to investigate the relationship among the student's academic achievement and the selected psychological attributes- self-esteem, self-efficacy and achievement motivation.600 students doing various under graduate programmes at Mahatma Gandhi University, Kottayam participated in this study. It was hypothesised that there would be significant relationship among the student's academic achievement, self-esteem, self-efficacy and achievement motivation. The population consists of 300 (50%) male students and 300 (50%) female students. They were divided into three groups, each consisting of 33.33% namely individual sport (n=200), team games (n=200) and non-athletes (n=200). Three instruments were used in this study, namely a) Rosenberg Self-esteem Scale (Morris Rosenberg, 1965) and b) General Self-efficacy Scale (Schwarzer, R& Jerusalem, M. , 1995) c) Sports Achievement Motivation Test (M L Kamlesh, 1990). The percentage of total marks scored in the university degree examinations was calculated by the researcher with the help of their mark list. The data pertaining to achievement motivation, self-esteem, self-efficacy and academic achievement were tested using Pearson's Product Moment correlation. Demographic characteristic information was analysed using mean and standard deviation, and percentage for discrete variables. The study revealed that Self-efficacy having significant positive correlation with self-esteem and sports achievement motivation and no significant correlation was found with academic achievement among under graduate students in Mahatma Gandhi University, Kottayam.