One of the great challenges of contemporary university education is to train students as future professionals. Several studies confirm that the experience during the first year is key to the completion of university careers (Romero Rodríguez, Figuera Gazo, 2016). Thus, motivation towards certain university subjects becomes especially relevant, when the content do not arouse interest in the students and this hinders their involvement in the learning activities. This apparent lack of interest lies in the perceived low usefulness of some subjects for the future profession and consequently, students end up dedicating themselves to those tasks necessary to pass the exams (Marchesi, 2012).

Motivation is a psychological construct that refers to the ability to undertake a desired action or achievement, that is operationalized in specific behavioral components (attitudes, beliefs, attributions, etc.) and it is maintained over time. It is a complex concept and fundamental principle in the learning process as a person must be motivated to execute a behavior (Trianes, Jiménez & Ríos, 2004). Therefore it influences academic performance in all educational stages. 

Several studies of student motivation in the higher education learning and teaching context have been conducted in order to understand what motivate students and how motivation and academic cognition are related (Pintrich, 2003). Because the level of motivation is perceived as critical for success in the achievement of individual goals, especially in higher education (Mazumber, 2014), much research has examined the relationship between motivation and metacognitive strategy variables: learning strategies, self-efficacy, self-regulation and critical thinking.

However, it is difficult to find the right instruments based on scientific principles for the measurement of the motivational aspects. That reason inspired the authors to design the Motivated Strategies or Learning Questionnaire (MSLQ) (Pintrich, Smith, Garcia, McKeachie, 1991). It has been proposed as a self-report instrument to measure the students’ level of motivation based on a social-cognitive view of motivation and learning strategies, where the student is active and can control the learning process. 

The original authors state that the psychometrical studies of MSLQ indicate it is a useful, reliable and valid questionnaire (Pintrich, Smith, Garcia, & McKeachie, 1993). However, validation and reliability studies on the MSLQ have been carried out in the last 25 years. We find in the literature that there is a lack of them in the Spanish-speaking context as it implies a work of translation and validation. One example is the recent research developed by Ramirez-Dorantes, Canto and Rodríguez, Bueno Álvarez and Echazarreta Moreno (2013) where they design the Spanish version of the MSLQ call Cuestionario de Motivación y Estrategias de Aprendizaje(CMEA) and develop a factorial analysis (N = 1140). Sabogal, Barraza, Hernández & Zapata (2011) (N = 630)  also make a translation into Spanish of the original version in different faculties and through an exploratory factor analysis (N = 630). Roces, Tourón and González-Torres (1995) carried out a validation of a Spanish version of the instrument (N = 463) through a confirmatory factorial analysis.

The aim of this research is to contribute to this knowledge by studying the psychometric properties of the Spanish version of the MSLQ scale (intrinsic and extrinsicmotivation subscale) in the higher education context using Rasch measurements models. 

Participants In the research there was a participation of 559 psychology students from two Spanish universities, the university of Malaga (UMA) (n = 383) and university of Seville (US) (n = 176). The participants were enrolled in a full-time undergraduate psychology program and they were in their first year (n = 211) or second year (n = 338). An 80% of the participants were female. Instrument In this study it has been used the Motivated Strategies for Learning Questionnaire (MSLQ; Pintrich et al., 1991). The original scale consists of 81 items with a 7-point Likert scale anchored at 1 (not all true of me) and 7 (very true of me). For the present research there have been selected two subscales (intrinsic motivation (IM) and extrinsic motivation (EM)) and we chose to use a 5-point response scale, as this had been validated with comparable methods (Nielsen, 2018). Each scale is made up of four items to be rated according to how well each item describe the respondents as students. The original English scale was translated into Spanish, following a blinded translation/back-translation process. Data collection and analysis The data collection was done one month into the subject courses the students were attending. The data were collected into the following subject courses: personality psychology, psychobiology and work and organizational psychology. It was provided a paper-pencil questionnaire to the students after a prior arrangement with the teacher. We used the Rasch model for ordinal data (RM; Rasch, 1960; Masters, 1982), and graphical loglinear Rasch models (GLLRMs; Kreiner & Christensen, 2007) from the item response theory (IRT) models. It has a number of five basic requirements for item responses that are the following ones: unidimensionality, monotonicity, homogeneity, local independence of items (no local dependence; LD), and absence of differential item functioning (no DIF). Fit to the Rasch model means that the sum score is a sufficient statistic for the estimated person parameter (i.e. the Rasch score). In GLLRM it is possible to adjust the for LD and DIF and thus still obtain close to optimal measurement.

The results of the Rasch analysis showed both of the motivation subscales fit GLLRMs with very few departures from the Rasch model requirements. The IM subscale fit a GLLRM with medium strong local dependence between items IM1 and IM2, while the EM subscale fit a GLLRM with local dependence between items EM1 and EM2 as well as year-DIF for item IM1. In the current study targeting was good for the EM subscale and poor for the IM subscale that is caused by the few students being located at the lower end of the scale where most information is provided. We recommend future validities studies with students from other disciplines. Although the scale is short it can be used in Spanish context and as part of larger surveys about learning processes in Higher Education. An idea for further research would be to develop validity cross-cultural studies.

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